R«?S3av«i^*i 


Itt7l44?r»5|-; 


[StlliliiJ^-- 


'.Hiiiiil^;- 


iT?»¥2^5iEr?p! 


Illustrated  Bterling  Sdition 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF 
ENGLAND ^ 


AMERICAN  NOTES  i-  -^- 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY  >-'^i 


MISCELLANIES 

BY 
CHARLES  DICKENS 


BOSTON 
DANA  ESTES  &  COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 


Digitized  by  tine  Internet  Arciiive 

in  2007  witii  funding  from 

IVIicrosoft  Corporation 


littp://www.arcliive.org/details/cliildsliistoryengOOdickiala 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 


TABLE  OF  THE  REIGNS. 

BEGINNING  WITH  KING  ALFRED  THE  GREAT. 


THE  SAXONS. 

BEGAN.  ENDED.      LASTED 

The  ReiRn  of  Alfred  the  Great 871  901  30  years. 

The  Reign  of  Edward  the  Elder 901  925  34  years. 

The  Reign  of  Athelstan 925  941  16  years. 

The  Reigns  of  the  Six  Boy-Kings 941  1016  75  years. 

THE   DANES,   AND  THE   RESTORED  SAXONS. 

The  Reign  of  Canute 1016  1035  19  years. 

The  Reign  of  Harold  Harefoot 1035  1040  5  years. 

The  Reign  of  Hardicanute 1040  1042  2  years. 

The  Reign  of  Edward  the  Confessor 1042  1066  24  years. 

The  Reign  of  Harold  the  Second,  and  the  Norman  Conquest,  were  also  within  the 
year  1066. 

THE  NORMANS. 

The  Reign  of  William  the  First,  called  the  Conqueror 1066  1087  21  years. 

The  Reign  of  William  the  Second,  called  Rufus 1087  1100  13  years. 

The  Reign  of  Henry  the  First,  called  Fine-Scholar 1100  1135  a5  years. 

The  Reigns  of  Matilda  and  Stephen 1135  1154  19  years. 

THE   PLANTAGENETS. 

The  Reign  of  Henry  the  Second 1154  1189  35  years. 

The  Reign  of  Richard  the  First,  called  the  Lion-Heart. . . .  1189  1199  10  years. 

The  Reign  of  John,  called  Lackland 1199  1216  17  years. 

The  Reign  of  Henry  the  Third 1216  1272  56  years. 

The  Reign  of  Edward  the  First,  called  Lougshanks , .  1272  1307  35  years. 

The  Reign  of  Edward  the  Second 1307  1327  20  years. 

The  Reign  of  Edward  the  Third 1327  1377  50  years. 

The  Reign  of  Richard  the  Second 1377  1399  22  years. 

The  Reign  of  Henry  the  Fourth,  called  Boltngbroke 1399  1413  14  years. 

The  Reign  of  Henry  the  Fifth 1413  1422  9  years. 

The  Reign  of  Henry  the  Sixth 1422  1461  39  years. 

The  Reign  of  Edward  the  Fourth 1461  1483  22  years. 

The  Reign  of  Edward  the  Fifth 1483  1483  few  weeks. 

The  Reign  of  Richard  the  Third 1483  1485  2year&. 


TABLE   OF  THE   KEJGN8. 


THE  TUD0R8. 

BIOAN.  BNDED.     LASTED. 

The  Reijni  of  Henry  the  Seventh 1485  1509  24  years. 

The  Reign  of  Henry  the  Eighth 1509  1547  38years. 

The  Reign  of  Edward  the  Sixth 1547  1553  6  years. 

The  Reign  of  Mary 1553  1558  5  years. 

The  Reign  of  Elizabeth 1558  1603  45  years. 

THE  STUARTS. 

The  Reign  of  James  the  First 1603  1625  22  years. 

The  Reign  of  Charles  the  First 1625  1649  24  years. 

THE  COMMONWEALTH. 

The  Council  of  State  and  Government  by  Parliament 1649  1653  4  years. 

The  Protectorate  of  Oliver  Cromwell 1853  1658  5  years. 

The  Protectorate  of  Richard  Cromwell  1658  1659  7  months. 

The  Council  of  State  and  Government  by  Parliament,  re- 
sumed   1659  1660  13  months. 

THE  STUARTS  RESTORED. 

The  Reign  of  Charles  the  Second 1660  1685  25  years. 

The  Reign  of  James  the  Second 1685  1688  3  years. 

THE  REVOLUTION.— 1688. 


(Comprised  in  the  concluding  chapter.) 

The  Reign  of  William  III.  and  Mary  II 1689  1695  6  years. 

The  Reign  of  William  III 1703  13  years. 

The  Reign  of  Anne 1702  1714  12  years. 

The  Reign  of  George  the  First 1714  1727  13  years. 

The  Reign  of  George  the  Second .' 1737  1760  33  years. 

The  Reign  of  George  the  Third 1760  1820  60  years. 

The  Reign  of  George  the  Fourth 1820  1830  10  years. 

The  Reign  of  William  the  Fourth 1830  1837  7  years. 

The  Reign  of  Victoria 1837 


CHRONOLOGICAL  TABLE,  AND  TABLE 
OF  CONTENTS. 


CnAPTIR  PAGB 

I.  Ancient  England  and  the  Romans.     Prom  50  years 

before  Christ,  to  the  year  of  our  Lord  450,     .        .       1 
II.  Ancient  England  under  the  Early  Saxons.     From 

the  year  450,  to  the  year  871,  .         .         .         .10 

m.  England  under  the  Good  Saxon  Alfred,  and  Edward 

the  Elder.     From  the  year  871,  to  the  year  925,     .     15 
IV.  England  under  Athelstan  and  the  Six  Boy-Kings. 

From  the  year  925,  to  the  year  1016,       .         .         .     2G 
V.  England  under  Canute  the  Dane.     From  the  year 

1016,  to  the  year  1035, 31 

VI.  England  under  Harold  Harefoot,  Hardicanute,  and 
Edward  the  Confessor.     From  the  year  1035,  to 

the  year  1066, 33 

V^II.  England  under  Harold  the  Second,  and  Conquered 

by  the  Normans.     All  in  the  same  year,  1066,        .     40 
VIII.  England  under  William  the  First,  the  Norman  Con- 
queror.    From  the  year  1066,  to  the  year  1087,      .     44 
IX.  England  under  William  the  Second,  called  Rufus. 

From  the  year  1087,  to  the  year  1100,     ...     51 
X.  England  under  Henry  the  First,  called  Fine-Scholar. 

From  the  year  1100,  to  the  year  1135,  ...  58 
XI.  England  under  Matilda  and   Stephen.      From  the 

year  1135,  to  the  year  1154, 67 

XII.  England  under  Henry  the  Second.     From  the  year 

1154,  to  the  year  1189, 71 

XIII.  England  under  Richard  the  First,  called  the  Lion- 

Heart.     From  the  year  1189,  to  the  year  1199,        .     90 

XIV.  England  under  John,   called  Lackland.     From  the 

year  1199,  to  the  year  1216,  .  .  .  .  .99 
XV.  England  under  Henry  the  Third.     From  the  year 

1216,  to  the  year  1272, 110 

XVI.  England  under  Edward  the  First,  called  Longshanks. 

From  the  year  1272,  to  the  year  1307,  .  .  .122 
XVII.  England  under  Edward  the  Second.     From  the  year 

1307,  to  the  year  1327, 189 


IV  CONTENTS. 

OHAPTKR  PAOI 

XVIII.  England  under  Edward  the  Third.     Prom  the  year 

1327,  to  the  year  1377 148 

XIX.  England  under  Richard  the  Second.     From  the  year 

1377,  to  the  year  1399 160 

XX.  England  under  Henry  the  Fourth,  called    Boling- 

broke.     From  the  year  1399,  to  the  year  1418,        .  171 
XXI.  England  under  Henry  the  Fifth.     From  the  year 

1413,  to  the  year  1422,     .        .        .         .         .        .176 

XXII.  England  under  Henry  the  Sixth.     From  the  year 

1422,  to  the  year  1461  {T?ie  Story  of  Joan  of  Arc),  .  186 

XXIII.  England  under  Edward  the  Fourth.     From  the  year 

1461,  to  the  year  1483, 205 

XXIV.  England  under  Edward  the  Fifth.     For  a  few  weeks 

in  the  year  1483 218 

XXV.  England  under  Richard  the  Third.     From  thie  year 

1483,  to  the  year  1485 217 

XXVI.  England  under  Henry  the  Seventh.     From  the  year 

1485,  to  the  year  1509, 222 

XXVII.  England  under  Henry  the  Eighth,  called  Bluff  King 
Hal  and  Burly  King  Harry.     From  the  year  1509, 

to  the  year  1538, 232 

XXVIII.  England  under  Henry  the  Eighth,  called  Bluflf  King 
Hal  and  Burly  King  Harry.     From  the  year  1533, 

to  the  year  1547 244 

XXIX.  England  under  Edward  the  Sixth.     From  the  year 

1547,  to  the  year  1553     .        .        .        .        .        .254 

XXX.  England  under  Mary.     From  the  year  1553,  to  the 

year  1558, 261 

XXXI.  England  under  Elizabeth.     From  the  year  1558,  to 

the  year  1603, 278 

XXXII.  England   under  James  the  First.      From  the  year 

1603,  to  the  year  1625,     .        .     '  .        .        .        .297 

XXXIII.  England  under  Charles  the  First.     From  the  year 

1625,  to  the  year  1649 313 

XXXIV.  England  under  Oliver  Cromwell.     From  the  year 

1649,  to  the  year  1660, 341 

XXXV.  England  under  Charles  the  Second,  called  the  Merry 

Monarch.     From  the  year  1660,  to  the  year  1685,  .  357 
XXXVI.  England  under  James  the  Second.     From  the  year 

1685,  to  the  year  1688, 878 

XXXVII.  Conclusion.    From  the  year  1688,  to  the  year  1837,  .  391 


LIST   OF  ILLUSTRATIONS    '^As 

CHILD'S   HISTORY  OF   ENGLAND        l-^^^. 

PAOB 

Portrait  op  George  III.     (By  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds)     Frontispiece 
The  Four  Leaders  of  the  First  Crusade    . 
Interview  Between  Edward  IV.  and  Louis  XI.      ^  . 
(^ardinal  Wolsey  Served  by  Noblemen         .         .         . 
Execution  of  King  Charles  I , 


55 
211 
236 
341 

AMERICAN  NOTES       l-Z^O 

By  A.  B.  Frost 

"  Rather  a  heavy  sea  on,  sir,  and  a  head  wind  "    .         .12 
When  suddenly  the  lively  hero  dashed  in  to  the  rescue       90 
In  the  White  House         ........     123 

And  having  his  wet  pipe  presented  to  him        .         .         .     203 

PICTURES    FROM   ITALY      1— IT^ 

By  Marcus  Stone  and  F.  O.  C.  Darley 

Holiday  People 22 

The  Chiffonier 92 

In  the  Catacombs 128 

J 

HUNTED   DOWN       I  -  Z  2) 
By  Frederick  Barnard 
"  You   shall  see  me   once    again  in  the  body  ;   whbn  you 

ARE    TRIED    FOR    YOUR    LIFE  " 22 


HOLIDAY   ROMANCE       »-3^ 

On   the   paper   was   pencilled,    "  Heavens  !    Can   I   write 

THE  word  ? " 3 

I 

GEORGE    SILVERMAN'S    EXPLANATION        i-X.^ 

"What    is    the    matter?"    asked    Brother     Hawkyard. 

"  At  !  What  is  the  matter  ?  "  asked  Brother  Gimblet       14 

t 

Child's  England 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 


CHAPTER    L 

ANCIENT  ENGLAND  AND  THE  ROMANS. 

If  you  look  at  a  Map  of  the  World,  you  will  see,  in  the 
left-hand  upper  corner  of  the  Eastern  Hemisphere,  two 
Islands  lying  in  the  sea.  They  are  England  and  Scotland, 
and  Ireland.  England  and  Scotland  form  the  greater  part 
of  these  Islands.  Ireland  is  the  next  in  size.  The  little 
neighbouring  islands,  which  are  so  small  upon  the  Map  as 
to  be  mere  dots,  are  chiefly  little  bits  of  Scotland — broken 
off,  I  dare  say,  in  the  course  of  a  great  length  of  time,  by 
the  power  of  the  restless  water. 

In  the  old  days,  a  long,  long  while  ago,  before  Our 
Saviour  was  born  on  earth  and  lay  asleep  in  a  manger, 
these  Islands  were  in  the  same  place,  and  the  stormy  sea 
roared  round  them,  just  as  it  roars  now.  But  the  sea  was 
not  alive,  then,  with  great  ships  and  brave  sailors,  sailing 
to  and  from  all  parts  of  the  world.  It  was  very  lonely. 
The  Islands  lay  solitary,  in  the  great  expanse  of  water. 
The  foaming  waves  dashed  against  their  cliffs,  and  the  bleak 
winds  blew  over  their  forests;  but  the  winds  and  waves 
brought  no  adventurers  to  land  upon  the  Islands,  and  the 
savage  Islanders  knew  nothing  of  the  rest  of  the  world,  and 
the  rest  of  the  world  knew  nothing  of  them. 

It  is  supposed  that  the  Phoenicians,  who  were  an  ancient 
people,  famous  for  carrying  on  trade,  came  in  ships  to  these 
Islands,  and  found  that  they  produced  tin  and  lead;  both 
very  useful  things,  as  you  know,  and  both  produced  to  this 
very  hour  upon  the  sea-coast.  The  most  celebrated  tin 
mines  in  Cornwall  are,  still,  close  to  the  sea.  One  of  them, 
which  I  have  seen,  is  so  close  to  it  that  it  is  hollowed  out 
underneath  the  ocean;  and  the  miners  say,  that  in  stormy 
weather,  when  they  are  at  work  down  in  that  deep  place, 
1 


2  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

they  can  hear  the  noise  of  the  waves  thundering  above  their 
heads.  So,  the  Phoenicians,  coasting  about  the  Islands, 
would  come,  without  much  difficulty,  to  where  the  tin  and 
lead  were. 

The  Phoenicians  traded  with  the  Islanders  for  these 
metals,  and  gave  the  Islanders  some  other  useful  things  in 
exchange.  The  Islanders  were,  at  lirst,  poor  savages,  go- 
ing almost  naked,  or  only  dressed  in  the  rough  skins  of 
beasts,  and  staining  their  bodies,  as  other  savages  do,  with 
coloured  earths  and  the  juices  of  plants.  But  the  Phoeni- 
cians, sailing  over  to  the  opposite  coasts  of  France  and  Bel- 
gium, and  saying  to  the  people  there,  "  We  have  been  to 
those  white  cliffs  across  the  water,  which  you  can  see  in 
fine  weather,  and  from  that  country,  which  is  called  Brit- 
ain, we  bring  this  tin  and  lead,"  tempted  some  of  the 
French  and  Belgians  to  come  over  also.  These  people  set- 
tled themselves  on  the  south  coast  of  England,  whicli  is 
now  called  Kent;  and,  although  they  were  a  rough  people 
too,  they  taught  the  savage  Britons  some  useful  arts,  and 
improved  that  part  of  the  Islands.  It  is  probable  that 
other  people  came  over  from  Spain  to  Ireland,  and  settled 
there. 

Thus,  by  little  and  little,  strangers  became  mixed  with 
the  Islanders,  and  the  savage  Britons  grew  into  a  wild  bold 
people;  almost  savage,  still,  especially  in  the  interior  of 
the  country  away  from  the  sea  where  the  foreign  settlers 
seldom  went;   but  hardy,  brave,  and  strong. 

The  whole  country  was  covered  with  forests,  and  swamps. 
The  greater  part  of  it  was  very  misty  and  cold.  There 
were  no  roads,  no  bridges,  no  streets,  no  houses  that  you 
would  think  deserving  of  the  name.  A  town  was  nothing 
but  a  collection  of  straw-covered  huts,  hidden  in  a  thick 
wood,  with  a  ditch  all  round,  and  a  low  wall,  made  of  mud, 
or  the  trunks  of  trees  placed  one  upon  another.  The  peo- 
ple planted  little  or  no  corn,  but  lived  upon  the  flesh  of 
their  flocks  and  cattle.  They  made  no  coins,  but  used 
metal  rings  for  money.  They  were  clever  in  basket-work, 
as  savage  people  often  are;  and  they  could  make  a  coarse 
kind  of  cloth,  and  some  very  bad  earthenware.  But  in 
building  fortresses  they  were  much  more  clever. 

They  made  boats  of  basket-work,  covered  with  the  skins 
of  animals,  but  seldom,  if  ever,  ventured  far  from  the 
shore.    They  made  swords,  of  copper  mixed  with  tin;  but, 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  3 

these  swords  were  of  an  awkward  shape,  and  so  soft  that  a 
heavy  blow  would  bend  one.  They  made  light  shields, 
short  pointed  daggers,  and  spears — which  they  jerked  back 
after  they  had  thrown  them  at  an  enemy,  by  a  long  strip 
of  leather  fastened  to  the  stem.  The  butt-end  was  a  rat- 
tle, to  frighten  an  enemy's  horse.  The  ancient  Britons, 
being  divided  into  as  many  as  thirty  or  forty  tribes,  each 
commanded  by  its  own  little  king,  were  constantly  fighting 
with  one  another,  as  savage  people  usually  do;  and  they 
always  fought  with  these  weapons. 

They  were  very  fond  of  horses.  The  standard  of  Kent 
was  the  picture  of  a  white  horse.  They  could  break  them 
in  and  manage  them  wonderfully  well.  Indeed,  the  horses 
(of  which  they  had  an  abundance,  though  they  were  rather 
small)  were  so  well  taught  in  those  days,  that  they  can 
scarcely  be  said  to  have  improved  since;  though  the  men 
are  so  much  wiser.  They  understood,  and  obeyed,  every 
word  of  command;  and  would  stand  still  by  themselves, 
in  all  the  din  and  noise  of  battle,  while  their  masters  went 
to  fight  on  foot.  The  Britons  could  not  have  succeeded  in 
their  most  remarkable  art,  without  the  aid  of  these  sensible 
and  trusty  animals.  The  art  I  mean,  is  the  construction 
and  management  of  war-chariots  or  cars,  for  which  they 
have  ever  been  celebrated  in  history.  Each  of  the  best 
sort  of  these  chariots,  not  quite  breast  high  in  front,  and 
open  at  the  back,  contained  one  man  to  drive,  and  two  or 
three  others  to  tight — all  standing  up.  The  horses  who 
drew  them  were  so  well  trained,  that  they  would  tear,  at 
full  gallop,  over  the  most  stony  ways,  and  even  through 
the  woods;  dashing  down  their  masters'  enemies  beneath 
their  hoofs,  and  cutting  them  to  pieces  with  the  blades  of 
swords,  or  scythes,  which  were  fastened  to  the  wheels,  and 
stretched  out  beyond  the  car  on  each  side,  for  that  cruel 
purpose.  In  a  moment,  while  at  full  speed,  the  horses 
would  stop,  at  the  driver's  command.  The  men  within 
would  leap  out,  deal  blows  about  them  with  their  swords 
like  hail,  leap  on  the  horses,  on  the  pole,  spring  back  into 
the  chariots  anyhow;  and,  as  soon  as  they  were  safe,  the 
horses  tore  away  again. 

The  Britons  had  a  strange  and  terrible  religion,  called 
the  Religion  of  the  Druids.  It  seems  to  have  been  brought 
over,  in  very  early  times  indeed,  from  the  opposite  country 
of  France,  anciently  called  Gaul,  and  to  have  mixed  up  the 


4  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

worship  of  the  Serpent,  and  of  the  Sun  and  Moon,  with  the 
worship  of  some  of  the  Heathen  Gods  and  Goddesses. 
Most  of  its  ceremonies  were  kept  secret  by  the  priests,  the 
Druids,  who  pretended  to  be  enchanters,  and  who  carried 
magicians'  wands,  and  wore,  each  of  them,  about  his  neck, 
what  he  told  the  ignorant  people  was  a  Serpent's  egg  in  a 
golden  case.  But  it  is  certain  that  the  Druidical  cere- 
monies included  the  sacrifice  of  human  victims,  the  torture 
of  some  suspected  criminals,  and,  on  particular  occasions, 
even  the  burning  alive,  in  immense  wicker  cages,  of  a 
number  of  men  and  animals  together.  The  Druid  Priests 
had  some  kind  of  veneration  for  the  Oak,  and  for  the  mis- 
tletoe— the  same  plant  that  we  hang  up  in  houses  at  Christ- 
mas Time  now — when  its  white  berries  grew  upon  the  Oak. 
They  met  together  in  dark  woods,  which  they  called  Sacred 
Groves;  and  there  they  instructed,  in  their  mysterious  arts, 
young  men  who  came  to  them  as  pupils,  and  who  some- 
times stayed  with  them  as  long  as  twenty  years. 

These  Druids  built  great  Temples  and  altars,  open  to  the 
sky,  fragments  of  some  of  which  are  yet  remaining.  Stone- 
henge,  on  Salisbury  Plain,  in  Wiltshire,  is  the  most  extraor- 
dinary of  these.  Three  curious  stones,  called  Kits  Coty 
House,  on  Bluebell  Hill,  near  Maidstone,  in  Kent,  form 
another.  We  know,  from  examination  of  the  great  blocks 
of  which  such  buildings  are  made,  that  they  could  not  have 
been  raised  without  the  aid  of  some  ingenious  machines, 
which  are  common  now,  but  which  the  ancient  Britons  cer- 
tainly did  not  use  in  making  their  own  uncomfortable 
houses.  I  should  not  wonder  if  the  Druids,  and  their  pupils 
who  stayed  with  them  twenty  years,  knowing  more  than 
the  rest  of  the  Britons,  kept  the  people  out  of  sight  while 
they  made  these  buildings,  and  then  pretended  that  they 
built  them  by  magic.  Perhaps  they  had  a  hand  in  the  for- 
tresses too;  at  all  events,  as  they  were  very  powerful,  and 
very  much  believed  in,  and  as  they  made  and  executed  the 
laws,  and  paid  no  taxes,  I  don't  wonder  that  they  liked 
their  trade.  And,  as  they  persuaded  the  people  the  more 
Druids  there  were,  the  better  off  the  people  would  be,  I  don't 
wonder  that  there  were  a  good  many  of  them.  But  it  is 
pleasant  to  think  that  there  are  no  Druids,  notv,  who  go  on 
in  that  way,  and  pretend  to  carry  Enchanters'  Wands  and 
Serpents'  Eggs — and  of  course  there  is  nothing  of  the  kind, 
anywhere. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  5 

Such  was  the  improved  condition  of  the  ancient  Britons, 
fifty -five  years  before  the  birth  of  Our  Saviour,  when  the 
Romans,  under  their  great  General,  Julius  Caesar,  were 
masters  of  all  the  rest  of  the  known  world.  Julius  Caesar 
had  then  just  conquered  Gaul;  and  hearing,  in  Gaul,  a  good 
deal  about  the  opposite  Island  with  the  white  cliffs,  and 
about  the  bravery  of  the  Britons  who  inhabited  it — some  of 
whom  had  been  fetched  over  to  help  the  Gauls  in  the  war 
against  him — he  resolved,  as  he  was  so  near,  to  come  and 
conquer  Britain  next. 

So,  Julius  Caesar  came  sailing  over  to  this  Island  of  ours, 
with  eighty  vessels  and  twelve  thousand  men.  And  he 
came  from  the  French  coast  between  Calais  and  Boulogne, 
"because  thence  was  the  shortest  passage  into  Britain;" 
just  for  the  same  reason  as  our  steam-boats  now  take  the 
same  track,  every  day.  He  expected  to  conquer  Britain 
easily :  but  it  was  not  such  easy  work  as  he  supposed — for 
the  bold  Britons  fought  most  bravely;  and,  what  with  not 
having  his  horse-soldiers  with  him  (for  they  had  been 
driven  back  by  a  storm),  and  what  with  having  some  of 
his  vessels  dashed  to  pieces  by  a  high  tide  after  they 
were  drawn  ashore,  he  ran  great  risk  of  being  totally  de- 
feated. However,  for  once  that  the  bold  Britons  beat 
him,  he  beat 'them  twice;  though  not  so  soundly  but  that 
he  was  very  glad  to  accept  their  proposals  of  peace,  and 
go  away. 

But,  in  the  spring  of  the  next  year,  he  came  back;  this 
time,  with  eight  hundred  vessels  and  thirty  thousand  men. 
The  British  tribes  chose,  as  th^ir  general-iu-chief ,  a  Briton, 
whom  the  Romans  in  their  Latin  language  called  Cassivel- 
liAUNus,  but  whose  British  name  is  supposed  to  have  been 
Caswallon.  a  brave  general  he  was,  and  well  he  and  his 
soldiers  fought  the  Roman  army !  So  well,  that  whenever 
in  that  war  the  Roman  soldiers  saw  a  great  cloud  of  dust, 
and  heard  the  rattle  of  the  rapid  British  chariots,  they 
trembled  in  their  hearts.  Besides  a  number  of  smaller  bat- 
tles, there  was  a  battle  fought  near  Canterbury,  in  Kent; 
there  was  a  battle  fought  near  Chertsey,  in  Surrey;  there 
was  a  battle  fought  near  a  marshy  little  town  in  a  wood, 
the  capital  of  that  part  of  Britain  which  belonged  to  Cas- 
sivELLAUNUs,  and  which  was  probably  near  what  is  now 
Saint  Albans,  in  Hertfordshire.  However,  brave  Cassi- 
VELLAUNUS  had  the  worst  of  it,  on  the  whole;  though  he 


6  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

and  his  men  always  fought  like  lions.  As  the  other  Brit- 
ish chiefs  were  jealous  of  him,  and  were  always  quarrelling 
with  him,  and  with  one  another,  he  gave  up,  and  proposed 
peace.  Julius  Caesar  was  very  glad  to  grant  peace  easily, 
and  to  go  away  again  with  all  his  remaining  ships  and 
men.  He  had  expected  to  find  pearls  in  Britain,  and  he 
may  have  found  a  few  for  anything  I  know;  but,  at  all 
events,  he  found  delicious  oysters,  and  I  am  sure  he  found 
tough  Britons — of  whom,  I  dare  say,  he  made  the  same 
complaint  as  Napoleon  Bonaparte  the  great  French  General 
did,  eighteen  hundred  j^ears  afterwards,  when  he  said  they 
were  such  unreasonable  fellows  that  they  never  knew  when 
they  were  beaten.  They  never  did  know,  I  believe,  and 
never- will. 

Nearly  a  hundred  years  passed  on,  and  all  that  time, 
there  was  peace  in  Britain.  The  Britons  improved  their 
towns  and  mode  of  life :  became  more  civilised,  travelled, 
and  learnt  a  great  deal  from  the  Gauls  and  Romans.  At 
last,  the  Roman  Emperor,  Claudius,  sent  Aulus  Plautius, 
a  skilful  general,  with  a  mighty  force,  to  subdue  the  Island, 
and  shortly  afterwards  arrived  himself.  They  did  little; 
and  OsTORius  Scapula,  another  general,  came.  Some  of 
the  British  Chiefs  of  Tribes  submitted.  Others  resolved  to 
fight  to  the  death.  Of  these  brave  men,  thd  bravest  was 
Caractacus,  or  Caradoc,  who  gave  battle  to  the  Romans, 
with  his  army,  among  the  mountains  of  North  Wales. 
"This  day,"  said  he  to  his  soldiers,  "decides  the  fate  of 
Britain  !  Your  liberty,  or  your  eternal  slavery,  dates  from 
this  hour.  Remember  your  brave  ancestors,  who  drove  the 
great  Caesar  himself  across  the  sea!"  On  hearing  these 
words,  his  men,  with  a  great  shout,  rushed  upon  the  Ro- 
mans. But  the  strong  Roman  swords  and  armour  were  too 
much  for  the  weaker  British  weapons  in  close  conflict. 
The  Britons  lost  the  day.  The  wife  and  daughter  of  the 
brave  Caractacus  were  taken  prisoners;  his  brothers  deliv- 
ered themselves  up;  he  himself  was  betrayed  into  the 
hands  of  the  Romans  by  his  false  and  base  step-mother; 
and  they  carried  him,  and  all  his  family,  in  triumph  to 
Rome, 

But  a  great  man  will  be  great  in  misfortune,  great  in 
prison,  great  in  chains.  His  noble  air,  and  dignified  en- 
durance of  distress,  so  touched  the  Roman  people  who 
thronged  the  streets  to  see  him,  that  lie  and  his  family  were 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  7 

restored  to  freedom.  No  one  knows  whether  his  great 
heart  broke,  and  he  died  in  Rome,  or  whether  he  ever  re- 
turned to  his  own  dear  country.  English  oaks  have  grown 
up  from  acorns,  and  withered  away,  when  they  were  hun- 
dreds of  years  old — and  other  oaks  have  sprung  up  in  their 
places,  and  died  too,  very  aged — since  the  rest  of  the  his- 
tory of  the  brave  Caractacus  was  forgotten. 

Still,  the  Britons  would  not  yield.  They  rose  again  and 
again,  and  died  by  thousands,  sword  in  hand.  They  rose, 
on  every  possible  occasion.  Suetonius,  another  Roman 
general,  came,  and  stormed  the  Island  of  Anglesey  (then 
called  Mona),  which  was  supposed  to  be  sacred,  and  he 
burnt  the  Druids  in  their  own  wicker  cages,  by  their  own 
fires.  But,  even  while  he  was  in  Britain,  with  his  victori- 
ous troops,  the  Britons  rose.  Because  Boadicea,  a  Brit- 
ish queen,  the  widow  of  the  King  of  the  Norfolk  and  Suf- 
folk people,  resisted  the  plundering  of  her  property  by  the 
Romans  who  were  settled  in  England,  she  was  scourged,  by 
order  of  Catus  a  Roman  officer;  and  her  two  daughters 
were  shamefully  insulted  in  her  presence,  and  her  husband's 
relations  were  made  slaves.  To  avenge  this  injury,  the 
Britons  rose,  with  all  their  might  and  rage.  They  drove 
Catus  into  Gaul;  they  laid  the  Roman  possessions  waste; 
they  forced  the  Romans  out  of  London,  then  a  poor  little 
town,  but  a  trading  place;  they  hanged,  burnt,,  crucified, 
and  slew  by  the  sword,  seventy  thousand  Romans  in  a  few 
days.  Suetonius  strengthened  his  army,  and  advanced  to 
give  them  battle.  They  strengthened  their  army,  and  des- 
perately attacked  his,  on  the  field  where  it  was  strongly 
posted.  Before  the  first  charge  of  the  Britons  was  made, 
Boadicea,  in  a  war-chariot,  with  her  fair  hair  streaming 
in  the  wind,  and  her  injured  daughters  lying  at  her  feet, 
drove  among  the  troops,  and  cried  to  them  for  vengeance  on 
their  oppressors,  the  licentious  Romans.  The  Britons 
fought  to  the  last;  but  they  were  vanquished  with  great 
slaughter,  and  the  unhappy  queen  took  poison. 

Still,  the  spirit  of  the  Britons  was  not  broken.  When 
Suetonius  left  the  country,  they  fell  upon  his  troops,  and 
retook  the  Island  of  Anglesey.  Agricola  came,  fifteen  or 
twenty  years  afterwards,  and  retook  it  once  more,  and  de- 
voted seven  years  to  subduing  the  country,  especially  that 
part  of  it  which  is  now  called  Scotland;  but,  its  people, 
the   Caledonians,  resisted  him   at  every  inch  of  ground. 


8  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

They  fought  the  bloodiest  battles  with  him;  they  killed 
their  very  wives  and  children,  to  prevent  his  making  pris- 
oners of  them;  they  fell,  fighting,  in  such  great  numbers 
that  certain  hills  in  Scotland  are  yet  supposed  to  be  vast 
heaps  of  stones  piled  up  above  their  graves.  Hadrian 
came,  thirty  years  afterwards,  and  still  they  resisted  him. 
Severus  came,  nearly  a  hundred  years  afterwards,  and 
they  worried  his  great  army  like  dogs,  and  rejoiced  to  see 
them  die,  by  thousands,  in  the  bogs  and  swamps.  Cara- 
CALLA,  the  son  and  successor  of  Severus,  did  the  most  to 
conquer  them,  for  a  time;  but  not  by  force  of  arms.  He 
knew  how  little  that  would  do.  He  yielded  up  a  quantity 
of  land  to  the  Caledonians,  and  gave  the  Britons  the  same 
privileges  as  the  Romans  possessed.  There  was  peace,  after 
this,  for  seventy  years. 

Then  new  enemies  arose.  They  were  the  Saxons,  a 
fierce,  seafaring  people  from  the  countries  to  the  North  of 
the  Rhine,  the  great  river  of  Germany  on  the  banks  of 
which  the  best  grapes  grow  to  make  the  German  wine. 
They  began  to  come,  in  pirate  ships,  to  the  sea-coast  of 
Gaul  and  Britain,  and  to  plunder  them.  They  were  re- 
pulsed by  Carausius,  a  native  either  of  Belgium  or  of  Brit- 
ain, who  was  appointed  by  the  Romans  to  the  command, 
and  under  whom  the  Britons  first  began  to  fight  upon  the 
sea.  But,  after  this  time,  they  renewed  their  ravages.  A 
few  years  more,  and  the  Scots  (which  was  then  the  name 
for  the  people  of  Ireland),  and  the  Picts,  a  northern  peo- 
ple, began  to  make  frequent  plundering  incursions  into  the 
South  of  Britain.  All  these  attacks  were  repeated,  at  in- 
tervals, during  two  hundred  years,  and  through  a  long  suc- 
cession of  Roman  Emperors  and  chiefs;  during  all  which 
length  of  time,  the  Britons  rose  against  the  Romans,  over 
and  over  again.  At  last,  in  the  days  of  the  Roman  Hono- 
Rius,  when  the  Roman  power  all  over  the  world  was  fast 
declining,  and  when  Rome  wanted  all  her  soldiers  at  home, 
the  Romans  abandoned  all  hope  of  conquering  Britain,  and 
went  SLWSij.  And  still,  at  last,  as  at  first,  the  Britons  rose 
against  them,  in  their  old  brave  manner;  for,  a  very  little 
while  before,  they  had  turned  away  the  Roman  magistrates, 
and  declared  themselves  an  independent  people. 

Five  hundred  years  had  passed,  since  Julius  Caesar's  first 
invasion  of  the  Island,  when  the  Romans  departed  from  it 
for  ever.     In  the  course  of  tha^  time,  although  they  had 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  9 

been  the  cause  of  terrible  fighting  and  bloodshed,  they  had 
done  much  to  improve  the  condition  of  the  Britons.  They 
had  made  great  military  roads;  they  had  built  forts;  they 
had  taught  them  how  to  dress,  and  arm  themselves,  much 
better  than  they  had  ever  known  how  to  do  before;  they 
had  refined  the  whole  British  way  of  living.  Agbicola 
had  built  a  great  wall  of  earth,  more  than  seventy  miles 
long,  extending  from  Newcastle  to  beyond  Carlisle,  for  the 
purpose  of  keeping  out  tlie  Picts  and  Scots;  Hadrian  had 
strengthened  it;  Severus,  finding  it  much  in  want  of  re- 
pair, had  built  it  afresh  of  stone.  Above  all,  it  was  in  the 
Roman  time,  and  by  means  of  Roman  ships,  that  the  Chris- 
tian Religion  was  first  brought  into  Britain,  and  its  people 
first  taught  the  great  lesson  that,  to  be  good  in  the  sight  of 
God,  tliey  must  love  their  neighbours  as  themselves,  and 
do  unto  others  as  they  would  be  done  by.  The  Druids  de- 
clared that  it  was  very  wicked  to  believe  in  any  such  thing, 
and  cursed  all  the  people  who  did  believe  it,  very  heartily. 
But,  when  the  people  found  that  they  were  none  the  better 
for  the  blessings  of  the  Druids,  and  none  the  worse  for 
the  curses  of  the  Druids,  but,  that  the  sun  shone  and  the 
rain  fell  without  consulting  the  Druids  at  all,  they  just  be- 
gan to  think  that  the  Druids  were  mere  men,  and  that  it 
signified  very  little  whether  they  cursed  or  blessed.  After 
which,  the  pupils  of  the  Druids  fell  off  greatly  in  numbers, 
and  the  Druids  took  to  other  trades. 

Thus  I  have  come  to  the  end  of  the  Roman  time  in  Eng- 
land. It  is  but  little  that  is  known  of  those  five  hundred 
years;  but  some  remains  of  them  are  still  found.  Often, 
when  labourers  are  digging  up  the  ground,  to  make  founda- 
tions for  houses  or  churches,  they  light  on  rusty  money  that 
once  belonged  to  the  Romans.  Fragments  of  plates  from 
which  they  ate,  of  goblets  from  which  they  drank,  and  of 
pavement  on  which  they  trod,  are  discovered  among  the 
earth  that  is  broken  by  tlie  plough,  or  the  dust  that  is 
crumbled  by  the  gardener's  spade.  Wells  that  the  Romans 
sunk,  still  yield  water;  roads  that  the  Romans  made,  form 
part  of  our  highways.  In  some  old  battle-fields,  British 
spear-heads  and  Roman  armour  have  been  found,  mingled 
together  in  decay,  as  they  fell  in  the  thick  pressure  of  the 
fight.  Traces  of  Roman  camps  overgrown  with  grass,  and 
of  mounds  that  are  the  burial-places  of  heaps  of  Britons, 
are  to  be  seen  in  almost  all  parts  of  the  country.     Across 


10  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

the  bleak  moors  of  Northumberland,  the  wall  of  Sbverus. 
overrun  with  moss  and  weeds,  still  stretches,  a  strong  ruin; 
and  the  shepherds  and  their  dogs  lie  sleeping  on  it  in  the 
summer  weather.  On  Salisbury  Plain,  Stouehenge  yet 
stands :  a  monument  of  the  earlier  time  when  the  Roman 
name  was  unknown  in  Britain,  and  when  the  Druids,  with 
their  best  magic  wands,  could  not  have  written  it  in  the 
sands  of  the  wild  sea-shore. 


CHAPTER    II. 

ANCIENT  ENGLAND  UNDER  THE  EARLY  SAXONS. 

The  Romans  had  scarcely  gone  away  from  Britain,  when 
the  Britons  began  to  wish  they  had  never  left  it.  For, 
the  Roman  soldiers  being  gone,  and  the  Britons  being 
much  reduced  in  numbers  by  their  long  wars,  the  Picts 
and  Scots  came  pouring  in,  over  the  broken  and  un- 
guarded wall  of  Severus,  in  swarms.  They  plundered  the 
richest  towns,  and  killed  the  people;  and  came  back  so 
often  for  more  booty  and  more  slaughter,  that  the  unfortu- 
nate Britons  lived  a  life  of  terror.  As  if  the  Picts  and 
Scots  were  not  bad  enough  on  land,  the  Saxons  attacked 
the  islanders  by  sea;  and,  as  if  something  more  were  still 
wanting  to  make  them  miserable,  they  quarrelled  bitterly 
among  themselves  as  to  what  prayers  they  ought  to  say, 
and  how  they  ought  to  say  them.  The  priests,  being  very 
angry  with  one  another  on  these  questions,  cursed  one  an- 
other in  the  heartiest  manner;  and  (uncommonly  like  the 
old  Druids)  cursed  all  the  people  whom  they  could  not 
persuade.  So,  altogether,  the  Britons  were  very  badly  off, 
you  may  believe. 

They  were  in  such  distress,  in  short,  that  they  sent  a  let- 
ter to  Rome  entreating  help — which  they  called  the  Groans 
of  the  Britons;  and  in  which  they  said,  "The  barbarians 
chase  us  into  the  sea,  the  sea  throws  us  back  upon  the  bar- 
barians, and  we  have  only  the  hard  choice  left  us  of  perish- 
ing by  the  sword,  or  perishing  by  the  waves."  But,  the 
Romans  could  not  help  them,  even  if  they  were  so  inclined; 
for  they  had  enough  to  do  to  defend  themselves  against 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  11 

their  own  enemies,  who  were  then  rery  fierce  and  strong. 
At  last,  the  Britons,  unable  to  bear  their  hard  condition 
any  longer,  resolved  to  make  peace  with  the  Saxons,  and  to 
invite  the  Saxons  to  come  into  their  country,  and  help  them 
to  keep  out  tlie  Ficts  and  Scots. 

It  was  a  British  Prince  named  Vortigebn  who  took  this 
resolution,  and  who  made  a  treaty  of  friendship  with  Hen- 
gist  and  HoKsA,  two  Saxon  chiefs.  Both  of  these  names, 
in  the  old  Saxon  language,  signify  Horse;  for  the  Saxons, 
like  many  other  nations  in  a  rough  state,  were  fond  of  giv- 
ing men  the  names  of  animals,  as  Horse,  Wolf,  Bear, 
Hound.  The  Indians  of  North  America, — a  very  inferior 
people  to  the  Saxons,  though — do  the  same  to  this  day. 

Hengist  and  Horsa  drove  out  the  Picts  and  Scots;  and 
VoRTiGERN,  being  grateful  to  them  for  that  service,  made 
no  opposition  to  their  settling  themselves  in  that  part  of 
England  which  is  called  the  Isle  of  Thanet,  or  to  their  in- 
viting over  more  of  their  countrymen  to  join  them.  But 
Hexgist  had  a  beautiful  daughter  named  Rowena;  and 
when,  at  a  feast,  she  filled  a  golden  goblet  to  the  brim  with 
wine,  and  gave  it  to  Vortigern,  saying  in  a  sweet  voice, 
"  Dear  King,  thy  health !  "  the  King  fell  in  love  with  her. 
My  opinion  is,  that  the  cunnhig  Hengist  meant  him  to  do 
so,  in  order  that  the  Saxons  might  have  greater  influence 
with  him ;  and  that  the  fair  Rowena  came  to  that  feast, 
golden  goblet  and  all,  on  purpose. 

At  any  rate,  they  were  married;  and,  long  afterwards, 
whenever  the  King  was  angry  with  the  Saxons,  or  jealous 
of  their  encroachments,  Rowena  would  put  her  beautiful 
arms  round  his  neck,  and  softly  say,  "Dear  King,  they  are 
my  people !  Be  favourable  to  them,  as  you  loved  that  Sax- 
on girl  who  gave  you  the  golden  goblet  of  wine  at  the  feast !  " 
And,  really,  I  don't  see  how  the  King  could  help  himself. 

Ah  I  We  must  all  die !  In  the  course  of  years,  Vorti- 
gern  died — he  was  dethroned,  and  put  in  prison,  first,  I. am 
afraid;  and  Rowena  died;  and  generations  of  Saxons  and 
Britons  died;  and  events  that  happaiied  during  a  long,  long 
time,  Would  have  been  quite  forgotten  but  for  the  tales  and 
songs  of  the  old  Bards,  who  used  to  go  about  from  feast 
to  feast,  with  their  white  beards,  recounting  the  deeds  of 
their  forefathers.  Among  the  histories  of  which  they  sang 
and  talked,  there  was  a  famous  one,  concerning  the  bravery 
and  virtues  of  King  Arthur,  supposed  to  have  been  a 


12  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

British  Prince  in  those  old  times.  But,  whether  such  a 
person  really  lived,  or  whether  there  were  several  persons 
whose  histories  came  to  be  confused  together  under  that  one 
name,  or  whether  all  about  him  was  invention,  no  one 
knows. 

I  will  tell  you,  shortly,  what  is  the  most  interesting  in 
the  early  Saxon  times,  as  they  are  described  in  these  songs 
and  stories  of  the  Bards. 

In,  and  long  after,  the  days  of  Vortigern,  fresh  bodies 
of  Saxons,  under  various  chiefs,  came  pouring  into  Britain. 
One  body,  conquering  the  Britons  in  the  East,  and  settling 
there,  called  their  kingdom  Essex;  another  body  settled  in 
the  West,  and  called  their  kingdom  Wessex;  the  Northfolk, 
or  Norfolk  people,  established  themselves  in  one  place; 
the  Southfolk,  or  Suffolk  people,  established  themselves  in 
another;  and  gradually  seven  kingdoms  or  states  arose  in 
England,  which  were  called  the  Saxon  Heptarchy.  The 
poor  Britons,  falling  back  before  these  crowds  of  fighting 
men  whom  they  had  innocently  invited  over  as  friends, 
retired  into  Wales  and  the  adjacent  country;  into  Devon- 
shire, and  into  Cornwall.  Those  parts  of  England  long  re- 
mained unconquered.  And  in  Cornwall  now — where  the 
sea-coast  is  very  gloomy,  steep,  and  rugged — -where,  in  the 
dark  winter-time,  ships  have  often  been  wrecked  close  to 
the  land,  and  every  soul  on  board  has  perished — where 
the  winds  and  waves  howl  drearily,  and  split  the  solid 
rocks  into  arches  and  caverns — there  are  very  ancient 
ruins,  which  the  people  call  the  ruins  of  King  Arthur's 
Castle. 

Kent  is  the  most  famous  of  the  seven  Saxon  kingdoms, 
because  the  Christian  religion  was  preached  to  the  Saxons 
there  (who  domineered  over  the  Britons  too  much,  to  care 
for  what  they  said  about  their  religion,  or  anything  else)  by 
Augustine,  a  monk  from  Rome.  King  Ethelbert,  of 
Kent,  was  soon  converted;  and  the  moment  he  said  he  was 
a  Christian,  his  courtiers  all  said  they  were  Christians; 
after  which,  ten  thousand  of  his  subjects  said  they  were 
Christians  too.  Augustine  built  a  little  church,  close  to 
this  King's  palace,  on  the  ground  now  occupied  by  the 
beautiful  cathedral  of  Canterbury.  Sebert,  the  King's 
nephew,  built  on  a  muddy  marshy  place  near  London, 
where  there  had  been  a  temple  to  Apollo,  a  church  dedi- 
cated to  Saint  Peter,  which  is  now  Westminster  Abbey 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  13 

And,  in  London  itself,  on  the  foundation  of  a  temple  to 
Diana,  he  built  another  little  church,  which  has  risen  up, 
since  that  old  time,  to  be  Saint  Paul's. 

After  the  death  of  Ethelbekt,  Edwin,  King  of  North- 
umbria,  who  was  such  a  good  king  that  it  was  said  a  wom- 
an or  child  might  openly  carry  a  purse  of  gold,  in  his  reign. 
without  fear,  allowed  his  child  to  be  baptised,  and  held  a 
great  council  to  consider  whether  he  and  his  people  should 
all  be  Christians  or  not.  It  was  decided  that  they  should 
be.  CoiFi,  the  chief  priest  of  the  old  religion,  made  a 
great  speech  on  the  occasion.  In  tliis  discourse,  he  told  the 
people  that  he  had  found  out  the  old  gods  to  be  impostors. 
"I  am  quite  satisfied  of  it,"  he  said.  "Look  at  me!  I 
have  been  serving  them  all  my  life,  and  they  have  done 
nothing  for  me;  whereas,  if  they  had  been  really  powerful, 
they  could  not  have  decently  done  less,  in  return  for  all  I 
have  done  for  them,  than  make  my  fortune.  As  they  have 
never  made  my  fortune,  I  am  quite  convinced  they  are  im- 
postors !  "  When  this  singular  priest  had  finished  speak- 
ing, he  hastily  armed  himself  with  sword  and  lance, 
mounted  a  war-horse,  rode  at  a  furious  gallop  in  sight  of 
all  the  people  to  the  temple,  and  flung  his  lance  against  it 
as  an  insult.  From  tliat  time,  the  Christian  religion  spread 
itself  among  the  Saxons,  and  became  their  faith. 

The  next  very  famous  prince  was  Egbert.  He  lived 
about  a  hundred  and  fifty  years  afterwards,  and  claimed  to 
have  a  better  right  to  the  throne  of  Wessex  than  Beortric, 
another  Saxon  prince  who  was  at  the  head  of  that  kingdom, 
and  who  married  Edburga,  the  daughter  of  Offa,  king  of 
another  of  the  seven  kingdoms.  This  Queen  Edburga 
was  a  handsome  murderess,  who  poisoned  people  when  they 
offended  her.  One  day,  she  mixed  a  cup  of  poison  for  a 
certain  noble  belonging  to  the  court;  but  her  husband 
drank  of  it  too,  by  mistake,  and  died.  Upon  this,  the  peo- 
ple revolted,  in  great  crowds;  and  running  to  the  palace, 
and  thundering  at  the  gates,  cried,  "  Down  with  the 
wicked  queen,  who  poisons  men !  "  They  drove  her  out  of 
the  country,  and  abolished  the  title  she  had  disgraced. 
Wh6n  years  had  passed  away,  some  travellers  came  home 
from  Italy,  and  said  that  in  the  town  of  Pavia  they  had 
seen  a  ragged  beggar-woman,  who  had  once  been  handsome, 
but  was  then  shrivelled,  bent,  and  yellow,  wandering  about 
the  streets,  crying  for  bread;  and  that  this  beggar-woman 


14  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

was  the  poisoning  English  queen.  It  was,  indeed,  Edbur- 
ga;  and  so  she  died,  without  a  shelter  for  her  wretched 
head. 

Egbert,  not  considering  himself  safe  in  England,  in  con- 
sequence of  his  having  claimed  the  crown  of  Wessex  (for 
he  thought  his  rival  might  take  him  prisoner  and  put  him 
to  death),  sought  refuge  at  the  court  of  Charlemagne, 
King  of  France.  On  the  death  of  Beortric,  so"  unhappily 
poisoned  by  mistake,  Egbert  came  back  to  Britain;  suc- 
ceeded to  the  throne  of  Wessex;  conquered  some  of  the 
other  monarchs  of  the  seven  kingdoms;  added  their  territo- 
ries to  his  own;  and,  for  the  first  time,  called  the  country 
over  which  he  ruled,  England. 

And  now,  new  enemies  arose,  who,  for  a  long  time, 
troubled  England  sorely.  These  were  the  Northmen,  the 
people  of  Denmark  and  Norway,  whom  the  English  called 
the  Danes.  They  were  a  warlike  people,  quite  at  home 
upon  the  sea;  not  Christians;  very  daring  and  cruel.  They 
came  over  in  ships,  and  plundered  and  burned  wheresoever 
they  landed.  Once,  they  beat  Egbert  in  battle.  Once, 
Egbert  beat  them.  But,  they  cared  no  more  for  being 
beaten  than  the  English  themselves.  In  the  four  following 
short  reigns,  of  Ethelwulf,  and  his  sons,  Ethelbald, 
Ethelbert,  and  Ethelred,  they  came  back,  over  and  over 
again,  burning  and  plundering,  and  laying  England  waste. 
In  the  last-mentioned  reign,  they  seized  Edmund,  King  of 
East  England,  and  bound  him  to  a  tree.  Then,  they  pro- 
posed to  him  that  he  should  change  his  religion;  but  he, 
being  a  good  Christian,  steadily  refused.  Upon  that,  they 
beat  him,  made  cowardly  jests  upon  him,  all  defenceless  as 
he  was,  shot  arrows  at  him,  and,  finally,  struck  off  his 
head.  It  is  impossible  to  say  whose  head  they  might  have 
struck  off  next,  but  for  the  death  of  King  Ethklred  from 
a  wound  he  had  received  in  fighting  against  them,  and  the 
succession  to  his  throne  of  the  best  and  wisest  king  that 
ever  lived  in  England. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP    ENGLAND.  15 

CHAPTER    III. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  THE  GOOD  SAXON,   ALFRED. 

Alfred  the  Great  was  a  young  man,  three-and-twenty 
years  of  age,  when  he  became  king.  Twice  in  his  child- 
hood, he  had  been  taken  to  Eonie,  where  the  Saxon  nobles 
were  in  the  habit  of  going  on  journeys  which  they  supposed 
to  be  religious;  and,  once,  he  had  stayed  for  some  time  in 
Paris.  Learning,  however,  was  so  little  cared  for,  then, 
that  at  twelve  years  old  he  had  not  been  taught  to  read; 
although,  of  the  sons  of  Kixg  Ethelwulf,  he,  the  young- 
est, was  the  favourite.  But  he  had — as  most  men  who 
grow  up  to  be  great  and  good  are  generally  found  to  have 
had — an  excellent  mother;  and,  one  day,  this  lady,  whose 
name  was  Osburga,  happened,  as  she  was  sitting  among 
her  sons,  to  read  a  book  of  Saxon  poetry.  The  art  of 
printing  was  not  known  until  long  and  long  after  that  pe- 
riod, and  the  book,  which  was  written,  was  what  is  called 
"  illuminated,"  Avith  beautiful  bright  letters,  richly  painted. 
The  brothers  admiring  it  very  much,  their  mother  said,  "  I 
will  give  it  to  that  one  of  you  four  princes  who  first  learns 
to  read. "  Alfred  sought  out  a  tutor  that  very  day,  applied 
himself  to  learn  with  great  diligence,  and  soon  won  the 
book.     He  was  proud  of  it,  all  his  life. 

This  great  king,  in  the  first  year  of  his  reign,  fought  nine 
battles  with  the  Danes.  He  made  some  treaties  with  them 
too,  by  which  the  false  Danes  swore  they  would  quit  the 
country.  They  pretended  to  consider  that  they  had  taken 
a  very  solemn  oath,  in  swearing  this  upon  the  holy  brace- 
lets that  they  wore,  and  which  were  always  buried  with 
them  when  they  died;  but  they  cared  little  for  it,  for  they 
thought  nothing  of  breaking  oaths  and  treaties  too,  as  soon 
as  it  suited  their  purpose,  and  coming  back  again  to  fight, 
plunder,  and  burn,  as  usual.  One  fatal  winter,  in  the 
foui-th  year  of  King  Alfred's  reign,  they  spread  them- 
selves jn  great  numbers  over  the  whole  of  England;  and  so 
dispersed  and  routed  the  King's  soldiers  that  the  King 
was  left  alone,  and  was  obliged  to  disguise  himself  as  a 
common  peasant,  and  to  take  refuge  in  the  cottage  of  one 
of  his  cowherds  who  did  not  know  his  face 


16  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

Here,  King  Alfred,  while  the  Danes  sought  him  far 
and  near,  was  left  alone  one  day,  by  the  cowherd's  wife, 
to  watch  some  cakes  which  she  pnt  to  bake  upon  the  hearth. 
But,  being  at  work  upon  his  bows  and  arrows,  with  which 
he  hoped  to  punish  the  false  Danes  when  a  brighter  time 
should  come,  and  thinking  deeply  of  his  poor  unhappy  sub- 
jects whom  the  Danes  chased  through  the  land,  his  noble 
mind  forgot  the  cakes,  and  they  were  burnt.  "What!" 
said  the  cowherd's  wife,  who  scolded  him  well  when  she 
came  back,  and  little  thought  that  she  was  scolding  the 
King,  "you  will  be  ready  enougli  to  eat  them  by-and-bye, 
and  yet  you  cannot  watch  them,  idle  dog?  " 

At  length,  the  Devonshire  men  made  head  against  a  new 
host  of  Danes  who  landed  on  their  coast;  killed  their  chief, 
and  captured  their  flag;  on  which  was  represented  the  like- 
ness of  a  Raven — a  very  fit  bird  for  a  thievish  army  like 
that,  I  think.  The  loss  of  their  standard  troubled  the 
Danes  greatly,  for  they  believed  it  to  be  enchanted — woven 
by  the  three  daughters  of  one  father  in  a  single  afternoon 
— and  they  had  a  story  among  themselves  that  when  they 
were  victorious  in  battle,  the  Raven  stretched  his  wings 
and  seemed  to  fly;  and  that  when  they  were  defeated,  he 
would  droop.  He  had  good  reason  to  droop,  now,  if  he 
could  have  done  anything  half  so  sensible;  for.  King  Al- 
fred joined  the  Devonshire  men;  made  a  camp  with  them 
on  a  piece  of  firm  ground  in  the  midst  of  a  bog  in  Somerset- 
shire; and  prepared  for  a  great  attempt  for  vengeance  on 
the  Danes,  and  the  deliverance  of  his  oppressed  people. 

But,  first,  as  it  was  important  to  know  how  numerous 
those  pestilent  Danes  were,  and  how  they  were  fortified. 
King  Alfred,  being  a  good  musician,  disguised  himself 
as  a  glee-man  or  minstrel,  and  went,  with  his  harp,  to  the 
Danish  camp.  He  played  and  sang  in  the  very  tent  of 
GuTHRUM  the  Danish  leader,  and  entertained  the  Danes  as 
they  caroused.  While  he  seemed  to  think  of  nothing  but 
his  music,  he  was  watchful  of  their  tents,  their  arms,  their 
discipline,  everything  that  he  desired  to  know.  And  right 
soon  did  this  great  king  entertain  them  to  a  different  tune; 
for,  summoning  all  his  true  followers  to  meet  him  at  an 
appointed  place,  where  they  received  him  with  joyful  shouts 
and  tears,  as  the  monarch  whom  many  of  them  had  given 
up  for  lost  or  dead,  he  put  himself  at  their  head,  marched 
on  the  Danish  camp,  defeated  the  Danes  with  great  slaugh- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  17 

ter,  and  besieged  them  for  fourteen  days  to  prevent  theii 
escape.  But,  being  as  merciful  as  he  was  good  and  brave, 
he  then,  instead  of  killing  them,  proposed  peace :  on  con- 
dition that  they  should  altogether  depart  from  that  West- 
ern part  of  England,  and  settle  in  the  East;  and  that 
GuTHRUM  should  become  a  Christian,  in  remembrance  of 
the  Divine  religion  which  now  taught  his  conqueror,  the 
noble  Alfred,  to  forgive  the  enemy  who  had  so  often  in- 
jured him.  This,  Guthrum  did.  At  his  baptism.  King 
Alfred  was  his  godfather.  And  Guthrum  was  an  honour- 
able chief  who  well  deserved  that  clemency;  for,  ever  after- 
wards he  was  loyal  and  faithful  to  the  king.  The  Danes 
under  him  were  faithful  too.  They  plundered  and  burned  no 
more,  but  worked  like  honest  men.  They  ploughed,  and 
sowed,  and  reaped,  and  led  good  honest  English  lives.  And  I 
hope  the  children  of  those  Danes  played,  many  a  time,  with 
Saxon  children  in  the  sunny  fields;  and  that  Danish  young 
men  fell  in  love  with  Saxon  girls,  and  married  them ;  and 
that  English  travellers,  benighted  at  the  doors  of  Danish 
cottages,  often  went  in  for  shelter  until  morning;  and  that 
Danes  and  Saxons  sat  by  the  red  fire,  friends,  talking  of 
King  Afred  the  Great. 

All  the  Danes  were  not  like  these  under  Guthrum;  for, 
after  some  years,  more  of  them  came  over,  in  the  old  plun- 
dering and  burning  way — among  them  a  fierce  pirate  of  the 
name  of  Hastings,  who  had  the  boldness  to  sail  up  the 
Thames  to  Gravesend,  with  eighty  ships.  For  three  years 
there  was  a  war  with  these  Danes;  and  there  was  a  famine 
in  the  country,  too,  and  a  plague,  both  upon  human  creat- 
ures and  beasts.  But  King  Alfred,  whose  mighty  heart 
never  failed  him,  built  large  ships  nevertheless,  with  which 
to  pursue  the  pirates  on  the  sea;  and  he  encouraged  his  sol- 
diers, by  his  brave  example,  to  tight  valiantly  against  them 
on  the  shore.  At  last,  he  drove  them  all  away;  and  then 
there  was  repose  in  England. 

As  great  and  good  in  peace,  as  he  was  great  and  good  in 
war.  King  Alfred  never  rested  from  his  labours  to  im- 
prove his  people.  He  loved  to  talk  with  clever  men,  and 
with  travellers  from  foreign  countries,  and  to  write  down 
what  they  told  him,  for  his  people  to  read.  He  had  stud- 
ied Latin  after  learning  to  read  English,  and  now  another 
of  his  labours  was,  to  translate  Latin  books  into  the  Eng- 
lish-Saxon tongue,  that  his  people  might  be  interested,  and 
2 


18  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

improved  by  their  contents.  He  made  just  laws,  that  they 
might  live  more  happily  and  freely;  he  turned  away  all 
partial  judges,  that  no  wrong  might  be  done  them;  he  was 
so  careful  of  their  property,  and  punished  robbers  so  se- 
verely, that  it  was  a  common  thing  to  say  that  under  the 
great  King  Alfred,  garlands  of  golden  chains  and  jewels 
might  have  hung  across  the  streets,  and  no  man  would 
have  touched  one.  He  founded  schools;  he  patiently  heard 
causes  himself  in  his  Court  of  Justice;  the  great  desires  of 
his  heart  were,  to  do  right  to  all  his  subjects,  and  to  leave 
England  better,  wiser,  happier  in  all  ways,  than  he  found 
it.  His  industry  in  these  efforts  was  quite  astonishing. 
Every  day  he  divided  into  certain  portions,  and  in  each 
portion  devoted  himself  to  a  certain  pursuit.  That  he 
might  divide  his  time  exactly,  he  had  wax  torches  or  can- 
dles made,  which  were  all  of  the  same  size,  were  notched 
across  at  regular  distances,  and  were  always  kept  burning. 
Thus,  as  the  candles  burnt  down,  he  divided  the  day  into 
notches,  almost  as  accurately  as  we  now  divide  it  into  hours 
upon  the  clock.  But  when  the  candles  were  lirst  invented, 
it  was  found  that  the  wind  and  draughts  of  air,  blowing 
into  the  palace  through  the  doors  and  windows,  and 
through  the  chinks  in  the  walls,  caused  them  to  gutter  and 
burn  unequally.  To  prevent  this,  the  King  had  them  put 
into  cases  formed  of  wood  and  white  horn.  And  these  were 
the  first  Ian  thorns  ever  made  in  England. 

All  this  time,  he  was  afflicted  with  a  terrible  unknown 
disease,  which  caused  him  violent  and  frequent  pain  that 
nothing  could  relieve.  He  bore  it,  as  he  had  borne  all  the 
troubles  of  his  life,  like  a  brave  good  man,  until  he  was 
fifty-three  years  old;  and  then,  having  reigned  thirty  years, 
he  died.  He  died  in  the  year  nine  hundred  and  one;  but, 
long  ago  as  that  is,  his  fame,  and  the  love  and  gratitude 
with  which  his  subjects  regarded  him,  are  freshly  remem- 
bered to  the  present  hour. 

In  the  next  reign,  which  was  the  reign  of  Edward,  sur- 
named  The  Elder,  who  was  chosen  in  council  to  succeed, 
a  nephew  of  King  Alfred  troubled  the  country  by  trying 
to  obtain  the  throne.  The  Danes  in  the  East  of  England 
took  part  with  this  usurper  (perhaps  because  they  had  hon- 
o'.ired  his  uncle  so  much,  and  honoured  him  for  his  uncle's 
sake),  and  there  was  hard  fighting;  but,  the  King,  with 
the  assistance  of  his  sister,  gained  the  day,  and  reigned  in 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  19 

peace  for  four  and  twenty  years.  He  gradually  extended 
his  power  over  the  whole  of  England,  and  so  the  Seven 
Kmgdoms  were  united  into  one. 

When  England  thus  became  one  kingdom,  ruled  over  by 
one  Saxon  king,  the  Saxons  had  been  settled  in  the  country 
more  than  four  hundred  and  fifty  years.  Great  changes 
had  taken  place  in  its  customs  during  that  time.  The  Sax- 
ons were  still  greedy  eaters  and  great  drinkers,  and  their 
feasts  were  often  of  a  noisy  and  drunken  kind;  but  many 
new  comforts  and  even  elegancies  had  become  known,  and 
were  fast  increasing.  Hangings  for  the  walls  of  rooms, 
where,  in  these  modern  days,  we  paste  up  paper,  are  known 
to  have  been  sometimes  made  of  silk,  ornamented  with 
birds  and  flowers  in  needlework.  Tables  and  chairs  were 
curiously  carved  in  different  woods ;  were  soinetimes  deco- 
rated with  gold  or  silver;  sometimes  even  made  of  those 
precious  metals.  Knives  and  spoons  were  used  at  table; 
golden  ornaments  were  worn — with  silk  and  cloth,  and 
golden  tissues  and  embroideries;  dishes  were  made  of  gold 
and  silver,  brass  and  bone.  There  were  varieties  of  drink- 
ing-horns, bedsteads,  musical  instruments.  A  harp  was 
passed  round,  at  a  feast,  like  the  drinking-bowl,  from 
guest  to  guest;  and  each  one  usually  sang  or  plaj-ed  when 
his  turn  came.  The  weapons  of  the  Saxons  were  stoutly 
made,  and  among  them  was  a  terrible  iron  hammer  that 
gave  deadly  blows,  and  was  long  remembered.  The  Saxons 
themselves  were  a  handsome  people.  The  men  were  proud 
of  their  long  fair  hair,  parted  on  the  forehead;  their  ample 
beards,  their  fresh  complexions,  and  clear  eyes.  The 
beauty  of  the  Saxon  women  filled  all  England  with  a  new 
delight  and  grace. 

I  have  more  to  tell  of  the  Saxons  yet,  but  I  stop  to  say 
this  now,  because  under  the  Great  Alfred,  all  the  best 
points  of  the  English-Saxon  character  were  first  encouraged, 
and  in  him  first  shown.  It  has  been  the  greatest  character 
among  the  nations  of  the  earth.  Wherever  the  descendants 
of  the  Saxon  race  have  gone,  have  sailed,  or  otherwise 
made  their  way,  even  to  the  remotest  regions  of  the  world, 
they  have  been  patient,  persevering,  never  to  be  broken  in 
spirit,  never  to  be  turned  aside  from  enterprises  on  which 
they  have  resolved.  In  Europe,  Asia,  Africa,  America, 
the  whole  world  over;  in  the  desert,  in  the  forest,  on  the 
sea;  scorched  by  a  burning  sun,  or  frozen  by  ice  that  never 


^  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

melts;  the  Saxon  blood  remains  unchanged.  Wheresoever 
that  race  goes,  there,  law  and  industry,  and  safety  for  life 
and  property,  and  all  the  great  results  of  steady  persever- 
ance, are  certain  to  arise. 

I  pause  to  think  with  admiration,  of  the  noble  king  who, 
in  his  single  person,  possessed  all  the  Saxon  virtues. 
Whom  misfortune  could  not  subdue,  whom  prosperity  could 
not  spoil,  whose  perseverance  nothing  could  shake.  Who 
was  hopeful  in  defeat,  and  generous  in  success.  Who  loved 
justice,  freedom,  truth,  and  knowledge.  Who,  in  his  care 
to  instruct  his  people,  probably  did  more  to  preserve  the 
beautiful  old  Saxon  language,  than  I  can  imagine.  With- 
out whom,  the  English  tongue  in  which  I  tell  this  story 
might  have  wanted  half  its  meaning.  As  it  is  said  that  his 
spirit  still  inspires  some  of  our  best  English  laws,  so,  let 
you  and  I  pray  that  it  may  animate  our  English  hearts,  at 
least  to  this — to  resolve,  when  we  see  any  of  our  fellow- 
creatures  left  in  ignorance,  that  we  will  do  our  best,  while 
life  is  in  us,  to  have  them  taught;  and  to  tell  those  rulers 
whose  duty  it  is  to  teach  them,  and  who  neglect  their  duty, 
that  they  have  profited  very  little  by  all  the  years  that 
have  rolled  away  since  the  year  nine  hundred  and  one,  and 
that  they  are  far  behind  the  bright  example  of  King  Al- 

FKED  THE  GrEAT. 


CHAPTER    IV. 

ENGLAND   UNDER  ATHELSTAN  AND  THE  SIX  BOY- 
KINGS. 

Athelstan,  the  son  of  Edward  the  Elder,  succeeded 
that  king.  He  reigned  only  fifteen  years;  but  he  remem- 
bered the  glory  of  his  grandfather,  the  great  Alfred,  and 
governed  England  well.  He  reduced  the  turbulent  people 
of  Wales,  and  obliged  them  to  pay  him  a  tribute  in  money, 
and  in  cattle,  and  to  send  him  their  best  haAvks  and  hounds. 
He  was  victorious  over  the  Cornish  men,  who  were  not  yet 
quiet  under  the  Saxon  government.  He  restored  such  of 
the  old  laws  as  were  good,  and  had  fallen  into  disuse;  made 
some  wise  new  laws,  and  took  care  of  the  poor  and  weak. 
A  strong  alliance,  made  against  him  by  Anlaf  a  Danish 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  21 

Prince,  CoNSTAXTiisrE  King  of  the  Scots,  and  the  people  of 
North  Wales,  he  broke  and  defeated  in  one  great  battle, 
long  famous  for  the  vast  numbers  slain  in  it.  After  that, 
he  had  a  quiet  reign;  the  lords  and  ladies  about  him  had 
leisure  to  become  polite  and  agreeable;  and  foreign  princes 
were  glad  (as  they  have  sometimes  been  since)  to  come  to 
England  on  visits  to  the  English  court. 

When  Athelstan  died,  at  forty-seven  years  old,  his 
brother  Edmund,  who  was  only  eighteen,  became  king. 
He  was  the  first  of  six  boy-kings,  as  you  will  presently 
know. 

They  called  him  the  Magnificent,  because  he  showed  a 
taste  for  improvement  and  refinement.  But  he  was  beset 
by  the  Danes,  and  had  a  short  and  troubled  reign,  which 
came  to  a  troubled  end.  One  night,  when  he  was  feasting 
in  his  hall,  and  had  eaten  much  and  drunk  deep,  he  saw, 
among  the  company,  a  noted  robber  named  Leof,  who  had 
been  banished  from  England.  Made  very  angry  by  the 
boldness  of  this  man,  the  King  turned  to  his  cup-bearer, 
and  said,  "There  is  a  robber  sitting  at  the  table  yonder, 
who,  for  his  crimes,  is  an  outlaw  in  the  land — a  hunted 
wolf,  whose  life  any  man  may  take,  at  any  time.  Com- 
mand that  robber  to  depart!  "  "  I  will  not  depart!  "  said 
Leof.  "  No?  "  cried  the  King.  "  No,  by  the  Lord ! "  said 
Leof.  Upon  that  the  King  rose  from  his  seat,  and,  mak- 
ing passionately  at  the  robber,  and  seizing  him  by  his  long 
hair,  tried  to  throw  him  down.  But  the  robber  had  a  dag- 
ger underneath  his  cloak,  and,  in  the  scuffle,  stabbed  the 
King  to  death.  That  done,  he  set  his  back  against  the 
wall,  and  fought  so  desperately,  that  although  he  was  soon 
cut  to  pieces  by  the  King's  armed  men,  and  the  wall  and 
pavement  were  splashed  with  his  blood,  yet  it  was  not  be- 
fore he  had  killed  and  wounded  many  of  them.  You  may 
imagine  what  rough  lives  the  kings  of  those  times  led, 
when  one  of  them  could  struggle,  half  drunk,  with  a  public 
robber  in  his  own  dining-hall,  and  be  stabbed  in  presence 
of  the  company  who  ate  and  drank  with  him. 

Then  succeeded  the  boy-king  Edred,  who  was  weak  and 
sickly  in  body,  but  of  a  strong  mind.  And  his  armies 
fought  the  Northmen,  the  Danes,  and  Norwegians,  or  the 
Sea-Kings,  as  they  were  called,  and  beat  them  for  the  time. 
And,  in  nine  years,  Edred  died,  and  passed  away. 

Then  came  the  boy-king  Edwt,  fifteen  years  of  age;  but 


22  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND. 

the  real  king,  who  had  the  real  power,  was  a  monk  named 
DuNSTAN — a  clever  priest,  a  little  mad,  and  not  a  little 
proud  and  cruel. 

Dunstan  was  then  Abbot  of  Glastonbury  Abbey,  whither 
the  body  of  King  Edmund  the  Magnificent  was  carried,  to 
be  buried.  While  yet  a  boy,  he  had  got  out  of  his  bed  one 
night  (being  then  in  a  fever),  and  walked  about  Glaston- 
bury Church  when  it  was  under  repair;  and,  because  he 
did  not  tumble  off  some  scaffolds  that  were  there,  and  break 
his  neck,  it  was  reported  that  he  had  been  shown  over  the 
building  by  an  angel.  He  had  also  made  a  harp  that  was 
said  to  play  of  itself — which  it  very  likely  did,  as  ^olian 
Harps,  which  are  played  by  the  wind,  and  are  understood 
now,  always  do.  For  these  wonders  he  had  been  once  de- 
nounced by  his  enemies,  who  were  jealous  of  his  favour 
with  the  late  King  Athelstan,  as  a  magician;  and  he  had 
been  waylaid,  bound  hand  and  foot,  and  thrown  into  a 
marsh.  But  he  got  out  again,  somehow,  to  cause  a  great 
deal  of  trouble  yet. 

The  priests  of  those  days  were,  generally,  the  only  schol- 
ars. They  were  learned  in  many  things.  Having  to  make 
their  own  convents  and  monasteries  on  uncultivated  grounds 
that  were  granted  to  them  by  the  Crown,  it  was  necessary 
that  they  should  be  good  farmers  and  good  gardeners,  or 
their  lands  would  have  been  too  poor  to  support  them.  For 
the  decoration  of  the  chapels  where  they  prayed,  and  for 
the  comfort  of  the  refectories  where  they  ate  and  drank,  it 
was  necessary  that  there  should  be  good  carpenters,  good 
smiths,  good  painters,  among  them.  For  their  greater 
safety  in  sickness  and  accident,  living  alone  by  themselves 
in  solitary  places,  it  was  necessary  that  they  should  study 
the  virtues  of  plants  and  herbs,  and  should  know  how  to 
dress  cuts,  burns,  scalds,  and  bruises,  and  how  to  set  bro- 
ken limbs.  Accordingly,  they  taught  themselves,  and  one 
another,  a  great  variety  of  useful  arts;  and  became  skilful 
in  agriculture,  medicine,  surgery,  and  handicraft.  And 
when  they  wanted  the  aid  of  any  little  piece  of  machinery, 
which  would  be  simple  enough  now,  but  was  marvellous 
then,  to  impose  a  trick  upon  the  poor  peasants,  they  knew 
very  well  how  to  make  it;  and  did  make  it  many  a  time 
and  often,  I  have  no  doubt. 

Dunstan,  Abbot  of  Glastonbury  Abbey,  was  one  of  the 
most  sagacious  of  these  monks.     He  was  an  ingenious  smith, 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  23 

and  worked  at  a  forge  in  a  little  cell.  This  cell  was  made 
too  short  to  admit  of  his  lying  at  full  length  when  he  went 
to  sleep — as  if  tliat  did  any  good  to  anybody ! — and  he  used 
to  tell  the  most  extraordinary  lies  about  demons  and  spir^ 
its,  who,  he  said,  came  there  to  persecute  him.  For  in- 
stance, he  related  that  one  day  when  he  was  at  work,  the 
devil  looked  hi  at  the  little  window,  and  tried  to  tempt  him 
to  lead  a  life  of  idle  pleasure;  whereupon,  having  his  pin- 
cers in  the  fire,  red  hot,  he  seized  the  devil  by  the  nose, 
and  put  him  to  such  pain,  that  his  bellowings  were  heard 
for  miles  and  miles.  Some  people  are  inclined  to  think  this 
nonsense  a  part  of  Dunstan's  madness  (for  his'  head  never 
quite  recovered  the  fever),  but  I  think  not.  I  observe  that 
it  induced  the  ignorant  people  to  consider  him  a  holy  man, 
and  that  it  made  him  very  powerful.  Which  was  exactly 
what  he  always  wanted. 

On  the  day  of  the  coronation  of  the  handsome  boy-king 
Edwy,  it  was  remarked  by  Odo,  Archbishop  of  Canterbury 
(who  was  a  Dane  by  birth),  that  the  King  quietly  left  the 
coronation  feast,  while  all  the  company  were  there.  Odo, 
much  displeased,  sent  his  friend  Dunstan  to  seek  him. 
Duustan  finding  him  in  the  company  of  his  beautiful  young 
wife  Elgiva,  and  her  mother  Ethelgiva,  a  good  and  vir- 
tuous lady,  not  only  grossly  abused  them,  but  dragged  the 
young  King  back  into  the  feasting-hall  by  force.  Some, 
again,  think  Dunstan  did  this  because  the  young  King's 
fair  wife  was  his  own  cousin,  and  the  monks  objected  to 
people  marrying  their  own  cousins;  but  I  believe  he  did  it, 
because  he  was  an  imperious,  audacious,  ill-conditioned 
priest,  who,  having  loved  a  young  lady  himself  before  he 
became  a  sour  monk^  hated  all  love  now,  and  everything 
belonging  to  it. 

The  young  King  was  quite  old  enough  to  feel  this  insult. 
Dunstan  had  been  Treasurer  in  the  last  reign,  and  he  soon 
charged  Duustan  with  having  taken  some  of  the  last  king's 
money.  The  Glastonbury  Abbot  fled  to  Belgium  (very  nar- 
rowly escaping  some  pursuers  who  were  sent  to  put  out  his 
eyes,  as  you  will  wish  they  had,  when  you  read  what  fol- 
lows), and  his  abbey  was  given  to  priests  who  were  mar- 
ried; whom  he  always,  both  before  and  afterwards,  op- 
posed. But  he  quickly  conspired  with  his  friend,  Odo  the 
Dane,  to  set  up  the  King's  young  brother,  Edgar,  as  his 
rival  for  the  throne;  and,  not  content  with  this  revenge. 


24  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND. 

he  caused  the  beautiful  queen  Elgiva,  though  a  lovely  girl 
of  only  seventeen  or  eighteen,  to  be  stolen  from  one  of  the 
Royal  Palaces,  branded  in  the  cheek  with  a  red-hot  iron, 
and  sold  into  slavery  in  Ireland.  But  the  Irish  people 
pitied  and  befriended  her;  and  they  said,  "  Let  us  restore 
the  girl-queen  to  the  boy-king,  and  make  the  young  lovers 
happy !  "  and  they  cured  her  of  her  cruel  wound,  and  sent 
her  home  as  beautiful  as  before.  But  the  villain  Dunstan, 
and  that  other  villain,  Odo,  caused  her  to  be  waylaid  at 
Gloucester  as  she  was  joyfully  hurrying  to  join  her  hus- 
band, and  to  be  hacked  and  hewn  with  swords,  and  to  be 
barbarously  'maimed  and  lamed,  and  left  to  die.  When 
Edwy  the  Fair  (his  people  called  him  so,  because  he  was  so 
young  and  handsome)  heard  of  her  dreadful  fate,  he  died 
of  a  broken  heart;  and  so  the  pitiful  story  of  the  poor 
young  wife  and  husband  ends!  Ah!  Better  to  be  two 
cottagers  in  these  better  times,  than  king  and  queen  of 
England  in  those  bad  days,  though  never  so  fair! 

Then  came  the  boy-king,  Edgar,  called  the  Peaceful, 
fifteen  years  old.  Dunstan,  being  still  the  real  king,  drove 
all  married  priests  out  of  the  monasteries  and  abbeys,  and 
replaced  them  by  solitary  monks  like  himself,  of  the  rigid 
order  called  the  Benedictines.  He  made  himself  Arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury,  for  his  greater  glory;  and  exercised 
such  power  over  the  neighbouring  British  princes,  and  so 
collected  them  about  the  King,  that  once,  when  the  King 
held  his  court  at  Chester,  and  went  on  the  river  Dee  to  visit 
the  monastery  of  St.  John,  the  eight  oars  of  his  boat  were 
pulled  (as  the  people  used  to  delight  in  relating  in  stories 
and  songs)  by  eight  crowned  kings,  and  steered  by  the  King 
of  England.  As  Edgar  was  very  obedient  to  Dunstan  and 
the  monks,  they  took  great  pains  to  represent  him  as  the 
best  of  kings.  But  he  was  really  profligate,  debauched, 
and  vicious.  He  once  forcibly  carried  off  a  young  lady 
from  the  convent  at  Wilton;  and  Dunstan,  pretending  to 
be  very  much  shocked,  condemned  him  not  to  wear  his 
crown  upon  his  head  for  seven  years — no  great  punishment, 
I  dare  say,  as  it  can  hardly  have  been  a  more  comfortable 
ornament  to  wear,  than  a  stewpan  without  a  handle.  His 
marriage  with  his  second  wife,  Elfrida,  is  one  of  the  worst 
events  of  his  reign.  Hearing  of  the  beauty  of  this  lady,  he 
despatched  his  favourite  courtier,  Athelwold,  to  her 
father's  castle  in  Devonshire,  to  see  if  she  were  really  as 


A  CHILD'S  mSTORl    OF  ENGLAND.  25 

charming  as  fame  reported.  Now,  she  was  so  exceedingly 
beautiful  that  Athelwold  fell  in  love  with  her  himself,  and 
married  her;  but  he  told  the  King  that  she  was  only  rich 
— not  handsome.  The  King,  suspecting  the  truth  when 
they  came  home,  resolved  to  pay  the  newly-married  couple 
a  visit;  and,  suddenly,  told  Athelwold  to  prepare  for  his 
immediate  coming.  Athelwold,  terrified,  confessed  to  his 
young  wife  what  he  had  saiJ  and  done,  and  implored  her 
to  disguise  her  beauty  by  some  ugly  dress  or  silly  manner, 
that  he  might  be  safe  from  the  King's  anger.  She  promised 
that  she  would;  but  she  was  a  proud  woman,  who  would 
far  rather  have  been  a  queen  than  the  wife  of  a  courtier. 
She  dressed  herself  in  her  best  dress,  and  adorned  herself 
with  her  richest  jewels;  and  when  the  King  came,  pres- 
ently, he  discovered  the  cheat.  So,  he  caused  his  false 
friend,  Athelwold,  to  be  murdered  in  a  wood,  and  married 
his  widow,  this  bad  Elfrida.  Six  or  seven  years  after- 
wards, he  died;  and  was  buried,  as  if  he  had  been  all  that 
the  monks  said  he  was,  in  the  abbey  of  Glastonbury,  which 
he — or  Duhstan  for  him — had  much  enriched. 

England,  in  one  part  of  this  reign,  was  so  troubled  by 
wolves,  which,  driven  out  of  the  open  country,  hid  them- 
selves in  the  mountains  of  Wales  when  they  were  not  attack- 
ing travellers  and  animals,  that  the  tribute  payable  by  the 
Welsh  people  was  forgiven  them,  on  condition  of  their  pro- 
ducing, every  year,  three  hundred  wolves'  heads.  And  the 
Welshmen  were  so  sharp  upon  the  wolves,  to  save  their 
money,  that  in  four  years  there  was  not  a  wolf  left. 

Then  came  the  boy-king,  Edward,  called  the  Martyr, 
from  the  manner  of  his  death,  Elfrida  had  a  son,  named 
Ethelred,  for  whom  she  claimed  the  throne;  but  Dunstan 
did  not  choose  to  favour  him,  and  he  made  Edward  king. 
The  boy  was  hunting,  one  day,  down  in  Dorsetshire,  when 
he  rode  near  to  Corfe  Castle,  where  Elfrida  and  Ethelred 
lived.  Wishing  to  sfee  them  kindly,  he  rode  away  from  his 
attendants  and  galloped  to  the  castle  gate,  where  he  ar- 
rived at  twilight,  and  blew  his  hunting-horn.  "  You  are 
welcome,  dear  King,"  said  Elfrida,  coming  out,  with  her 
brightest  smiles.  "Pray  you  dismount  and  enter."  "Not 
so,  dear  madam,"  said  the  King.  "  My  company  will  miss 
me,  and  fear  that  I  have  met  with  some  harm.  Please  you 
to  give  me  a  cup  of  wine,  that  I  may  drink  here,  in  the 
saddle,  to  you  and  to  my  little  brother,  and  so  ride  away 


26  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

with  the  good  speed  I  have  made  in  riding  here. "  Elf  rida, 
going  iu  to  bring  the  wine,  whispered  an  armed  servant, 
one  of  her  attendants,  who  stole  out  of  the  darkening  gate- 
way, and  crept  round  behind  the  King's  horse.  As  the 
King  raised  the  cup  to  his  lips,  saying,  "  Health ! "  to  the 
wicked  woman  who  was  smiling  on  him,  and  to  his  inno- 
cent brother  whose  hand  she  held  in  hers,  and  who  was 
only  ten  years  old,  this  armed  man  made  a  spring  and 
stabbed  bim  in  the  back.  He  dropped  the  cup  and  spurred 
his  horse  away;  but,  soon  fainting  with  loss  of  blood, 
drooped  from  the  saddle,  and,  in  his  fall,  entangled  one  of 
his  feet  in  the  stirrup.  The  frightened  horse  dashed  on; 
trailing  his  rider's  curls  upon  the  ground;  dragging  his 
smooth  young  face  through  ruts,  and  stones,  and  briers, 
and  fallen  leaves,  and  mud;  until  the  hunters,  tracking  the 
animal's  course  by  the  King's  blood,  caught  his  bridle,  and 
released  the  disfigured  body. 

Then  came  the  sixth  and  last  of  the  boy-kings,  Ethel- 
red,  whom  Elfrida,  when  he  cried  out  at  the  sight  of  his 
murdered  brother  riding  away  from  the  castle  gate,  unmer- 
cifully beat  with  a  torch  which  she  snatched  from  one  of 
the  attendants.  The  people  so  disliked  this  boy,  on  account 
of  his  cruel  mother  and  the  murder  she  had  done  to  promote 
him,  that  Dunstan  would  not  have  had  him  for  king,  but 
would  have  made  Edgitha,  the  daughter  of  the  dead  King 
Edgar,  and  of  the  lady  whom  he  stole  out  of  the  convent  at 
Wilton,  Queen  of  England,  if  she  would  have  consented. 
But  she  knew  the  stories  of  the  youthful  kings  too  well, 
and  would  not  be  persuaded  from  the  convent  where  she 
lived  in  peace;  so,  Dunstan  put  Ethelred  on  the  throne, 
having  no  one  else  to  put  there,  and  gave  him  the  nickname 
of  The  Unready — knowing  that  he  wanted  resolution  and 
firmness. 

At  first,  Elfrida  possessed  great  influence  over  the  young 
King,  but,  as  he  grew  older  and  came  of  age,  her  influence 
declined.  The  infamous  woman,  not  having  it  in  her 
power  to  do  any  more  evil,  then  retired  from  court,  and, 
according  to  the  fashion  of  the  time,  built  churches  and 
monasteries,  to  expiate  her  guilt.  As  if  a  church,  with  a 
steeple  reaching  to  the  very  stars,  would  have  been  any 
sign  of  true  i-epentance  for  the  blood  of  the  poor  boy,  whose 
murdered  form  was  trailed  at  his  horse's  heels!  As  if  she 
could  ha^'e  buried  her  wickedness   beneath  the  senseless 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  E:N  GLAND,  27 

stones  of  the  whole  world,  piled  up  one  upon  another,  for 
the  monks  to  live  in ! 

About  the  ninth  or  tenth  year  of  this  reign,  Dunstan 
died.  He  was  growing  old  then,  but  was  as  stern  and  art- 
ful as  ever.  Two  circumstances  that  happened  in  connec- 
tion with  him,  in  this  reign  of  Ethelred,  made  a  great  noise. 
Once,  he  was  present  at  a  meeting  of  the  Church,  when  the 
question  was  discussed  whether  priests  should  have  per- 
mission to  marry;  and,  as  he  sat  with  his  head  hung  down, 
apparently  thinking  about  it,  a  voice  seemed  to  come  out 
of  a  crucifix  in  the  room,  and  warn  the  meeting  to  be  of  his 
opinion.  This  was  some  juggling  of  Dunstan' s,  and  was 
probably  his  own  voice  disguised.  But  he  played  off  a 
worse  juggle  than  that,  soon  afterwards;  for,  another 
meeting  being  held  on  the  same  subject,  and  he  and  his 
supporters  being  seated  on  one  side  of  a  great  room,  and 
their  opponents  on  the  other,  he  rose  and  said,  "To  Christ 
Himself,  as  Judge,  do  I  commit  this  cause !  "  Immediately 
on  these  words  being  spoken,  the  floor  where  the  opposite 
party  sat  gave  way,  and  some  were  killed  and  many 
wounded.  You  may  be  pretty  sure  that  it  had  been  weak- 
ened under  Dunstan's  direction,  and  that  it  fell  at  Dau- 
stan's  signal.  His  part  of  the  floor  did  not  go  down.  No, 
no.     He  was  too  good  a  workman  for  that. 

When  he  died,  the  monks  settled  that  he  was  a  Saint, 
and  called  him  Saint  Dunstan  ever  afterwards.  They 
\night  just  as  well  have  settled  that  he  was  a  coach-horse, 
and  could  just  as  easily  have  called  him  one. 

Ethelred  the  Unready  was  glad  enough,  I  dare  say,  to 
be  rid  of  this  holy  saint;  but,  left  to  himself,  he  was  a 
poor  weak  king,  and  his  reign  was  a  reign  of  defeat  and 
shame.  The  restless  Danes,  led  by  Sweyn,  a  son  of  the 
King  of  Denmark  who  had  quarrelled  with  his  father  and 
had  been  banished  from  home,  again  came  into  England, 
and,  year  after  year,  attacked  and  despoiled  large  towns. 
To  coax  these  sea-kings  away,  the  weak  Ethelred  paid  them 
money;  but,  the  more  money  he  paid,  the  more  money  the 
Danes  wanted.  At  first,  he  gave  them  ten  thousand 
pounds;  on  their  next  invasion,  sixteen  thousand  pounds; 
on  their  next  invasion,  four  and  twenty  thousand  pounds: 
to  pay  which  large  sums,  the  unfortunate  English  people 
were  heavily  taxed.  But,  as  the  Danes  still  came  back 
and  wanted  more,  he  thought  it  would  be  a  good  plan  to 


28  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

marry  into  some  powerful  foreign  family  that  would  help 
him  with  soldiers.  So,  in  the  year  one  thousand  and  two, 
he  courted  and  married  Emma,  the  sister  of  Richard  Duke 
of  Normandy;  a  lady  who  was  called  the  Flower  of  Nor- 
mandy. 

And  now,  a  terrible  deed  was  done  in  England,  the  like 
of  which  was  never  done  on  English  ground  before  or  since. 
On  the  thirteenth  of  November,  in  pursuance  of  secret  in- 
structions sent  by  the  King  over  the  whole  country,  the 
inhabitants  of  every  town  and  city  armed,  and  murdered 
all  the  Danes  who  were  their  neighbours.  Young  and  old, 
babies  and  soldiers,  men  and  women,  every  Dane  was 
killed.  No  doubt  there  were  among  them  many  ferocious 
men  who  had  done  the  English  great  wrong,  and  whose 
pride  and  insolence,  in  swaggering  in  the  houses  of  the 
English  and  insulting  their  wives  and  daughters,  had  be- 
come unbearable;  but  no  doubt  there  were  also  among 
them  many  peaceful  Christian  Danes  who  had  married  Eng- 
lish women  and  become  like  English  men.  They  were  all 
slain,  even  to  Gunhilda,  the  sister  of  the  King  of  Den- 
mark, married  to  an  English  lord;  who  was  first  obliged  to 
see  the  murder  of  her  husband  and  her  child,  and  then  was 
killed  herself. 

When  the  King  of  the  sea-kings  heard  of  this  deed  of 
blood,  he  swore  that  he  would  have  a  great  revenge.  He 
raised  an  army,  and  a  mightier  fleet  of  ships  than  ever  yet 
had  sailed  to  England;  and  in  all  his  army  there  was  not  a 
slave  or  an  old  man,  but  every  soldier  was  a  free  man,  and 
the  son  of  a  free  man,  and  in  the  prime  of  life,  and  sworn 
to  be  reveng.ed  upon  the  English  nation,  for  the  massacre 
of  that  dread  thirteenth  of  November,  when  his  country- 
men and  countrywomen,  and  the  little  children  whom  they 
loved,  were  killed  with  fire  and  sword.  And  so,  the  sea- 
kings  came  to  England  in  many  great  ships,  each  bearing 
the  flag  of  its  own  commander.  Golden  eagles,  ravens, 
dragons,  dolphins,  beasts  of  prey,  threatened  England 
from  the  prows  of  those  ships,  as  they  came  onward 
through  the  water;  and  were  reflected  in  the  shining  shields 
that  hung  upon  their  sides.  The  ship  that  bore  the  stand- 
ard of  the  King  of  the  sea-kings  was  carved  and  painted 
like  a  mighty  serpent;  and  the  King  in  his  anger  prayed 
that  the  Gods  in  whom  he  trusted  might  all  desert  him,  if 
his  serpent  did  not  strike  its  fangs  into  England's  heart. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  29 

And  indeed  it  did.  For,  the  great  army  landing  from 
the  great  fleet,  near  Exeter,  went  forward,  laying  England 
waste,  and  striking  their  lances  in  the  earth  as  they  ad- 
vanced, or  throwing  them  into  rivers,  in  token  of  their  mak- 
ing all  the  island  theirs.  In  remembrance  of  the  black 
November  night  when  the  Danes  were  murdered,  whereso- 
ever the  invaders  came,  they  made  the  Saxons  prepare  and 
spread  for  them  great  feasts;  and  when  they  had  eaten 
those  feasts,  and  had  drunk  a  curse  to  England  with  wild 
rejoicings,  they  drew  their  swords,  and  killed  their  Saxon 
entertainers,  and  marched  on.  For  six  long  years  they 
carried  on  this  war :  burning  the  crops,  farmhouses,  barns, 
mills,  granaries;  killing  the  labourers  in  the  fields;  pre- 
venting the  seed  from  being  sown  in  the  ground;  causing 
famine  and  starvation;  leaving  only  heaps  of  ruin  and 
smoking  ashes,  where  they  had  found  rich  towns.  To 
crown  this  misery,  English  officers  and  men  deserted,  and 
even  the  favourites  of  Ethelred  the  Unready,  becoming 
traitors,  seized  many  of  the  English  ships,  turned  pirates 
against  their  own  country,  and  aided  by  a  storm  occasioned 
the  loss  of  nearly  the  whole  English  navy. 

There  was  but  one  man  of  note,  at  this  miserable  pass, 
who  was  true  to  his  country  and  the  feeble  King.  He  was 
a  priest,  and  a  brave  one.  For  twenty  days,  the  Archbishop 
of  Canterbury  defended  that  city  against  its  Danish  besieg- 
ers; and  when  a  traitor  in  the  town  threw  the  gates  open 
and  admitted  them,  he  said,  in  chains,  "  I  will  not  buy  my 
life  with  money  that  must  be  extorted  from  the  suffering 
people.  Do  with  me  what  you  please!  "  Again  and  again, 
he  steadily  refused  to  purchase  his  release  with  gold  wrung 
from  the  poor. 

At  last,  the  Danes  being  tired  of  this,  and  being  assem- 
bled at  a  drunken  merrymaking,  had  him  brought  into  the 
feasting-hall. 

"Now,  bishop,"  they  said,  "we  want  gold!" 

He  looked  round  on  the  crowd  of  angry  faces :  from  the 
shaggy  beards  close  to  him,  to  the  shaggy  beards  against 
the  walls,  where  men  were  mounted  on  tables  and  forms  to 
see  him  over  the  heads  of  others :  and  he  knew  that  his 
time  was  come. 

"  I  have  no  gold,"  said  he. 

"  Get  it,  bishop ! "  they  all  thundered. 

"That,  I  have  often  told  you  I  will  not,"  said  he. 


^0  A  CHILD'S   HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND. 

They  gathered  closer  round  him,  threatening,  but  he 
stood  unmoved.  Then,  one  man  struck  him;  then,  another; 
then  a  cursing  soldier  picked  up  from  a  heap  in  a  corner  of 
the  hall,  where  fragments  had  been  rudely  thrown  at  din- 
ner, a  great  ox-bone,  and  cast  it  at  his  face,  from  which 
the  blood  came  spurting  forth;  then,  others  ran  to  the  same 
heai),  and  knocked  him  down  with  other  bones,  and  bruised 
and  battered  him;  until  one  soldier  whom  he  had  baptised 
(willing,  as  I  hope  for  the  sake  of  that  soldier's  soul,  to 
shorten  the  sufferings  of  the  good  man)  struck  him  dead 
with  his  battle-axe. 

If  Ethelred  had  had  the  heart  to  emulate  the  courage  of 
this  noble  archbishop,  he  might  have  done  something  jet. 
But  he  paid  the  Danes  forty-eight  thousand  pounds,  in- 
stead, and  gained  so  little  by  the  cowardly  act,  that  Sweyn 
soon  afterwards  came  over  to  subdue  all  England.  So 
broken  was  the  attachment  of  the  English  people,  by  this 
time,  to  their  incapable  King  and  their  forlorn  country 
which  could  not  protect  them,  that  they  welcomed  Sweyn 
on  all  sides,  as  a  deliverer.  London  faithfully  stood  out, 
as  long  as  the  King  was  within  its  walls;  but,  Avhen  he 
sneaked  away,  it  also  welcomed  the  Dane.  Then,  all  was 
over;  and  the  King  took  i-efuge  abroad  with  the  Duke  of 
Normandy,  who  had  already  given  shelter  to  the  King's 
wife,  once  the  Flower  of  that  country,  and  to  her  children. 

Still,  the  English  ])eople,  in  spite  of  their  sad  sufferings, 
could  not  quite  forget  the  great  King  Alfred  and  the  Saxon 
race.  When  Sweyn  died  suddenly,  in  little  more  than  a 
month  after  he  had  been  proclaimed  King  of  England,  they 
generously  sent  to  Ethelred,  to  say  that  they  would  have 
him  for  their  King  again,  "if  he  would  only  govern  them 
better  than  he  had  governed  them  before."  The  Unread}^ 
instead  of  coming  him.self,  sent  Edward,  one  of  his  sons, 
to  make  promises  for  him.  At  last,  he  followed,  and  the 
English  declared  liim  King.  The  Danes  declared  Canute, 
the  son  of  Sweyn,  King.  Thus,  direful  war  began  again, 
and  lasted  for  three  years,  when  the  Unready  died.  And 
I  know  of  nothing  better  that  he  did,  in  all  his  reign  of 
eight  and  thirty  years. 

Was  Canute  to  be  King  now?  Not  over  the  Saxons, 
they  said;  they  must  have  Edmund,  one  of  the  sons  of  the 
Unready,  who  was  surnamed  Ironside,  because  of  his 
strength  and  stature.     Edmund  and  Canute  thereupon  fell 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND.  31 

to,  and  fought  five  battles — O  unhappy  England,  what  a 
fighting-ground  it  was — and  then  Ironside,  who  was  a  big 
man,  proposed  to  Canute,  who  was  a  little  man,  that  they 
two  should  fight  it  out  in  single  combat.  If  Canute  had 
been  the  big  man,  he  would  probably  have  said  yes,  but, 
being  tlie  little  man,  he  decidedly  said  no.  However,  he 
declared  that  he  was  willing  to  divide  the  kingdom — to 
take  all  that  lay  north  of  Watling  Street,  as  the  old  Roman 
militai-y  road  from  Dover  to  Chester  was  called,  and  to  give 
Ironside  all  that  lay  south  of  it.  Most  men  being  weary 
of  so  much  bloodshed,  this  was  done.  But  Canute  soon 
became  sole  King  of  England;  for  Ironside  died  suddenly 
within  two  months.  Some  think  that  he  was  killed,  and 
killed  by  Canute's  orders.     No  one  knows. 


CHAPTER     V. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  CANUTE  THE  DANE. 

Canute  reigned  eighteen  years.  He  was  a  merciless 
King  at  first.  After  he  had  clasped  the  hands  of  the  Sax- 
on chiefs,  in  token  of  the  sincerity  with  which  he  swore  to 
be  just  and  good  to  them  in  return  for  their  acknowledg- 
ing him,  he  denounced  and  slew  many  of  them,  as  well  as 
many  relations  of  the  late  King.  "  He  who  brings  me  the 
head  of  one  of  my  enemies,"  he  used  to  say,  "shall  be 
dearer  to  me  than  a  brother."  And  he  was  so  severe  in 
hunting  down  his  enemies,  that  he  must  have  got  together 
a  pretty  large  family  of  these  dear  brothers.  He  was 
strongly  inclined  to  kill  Edmund  and  Edward,  two  chil- 
dren, sons  of  poor  Ironside;  but,  being  afraid  to  do  so  in 
England,  he  sent  them  over  to  the  King  of  Sweden,  with  a 
request  that  the  King  would  be  so  good  as  "  dispose  of 
them."  If  the  King  of  Sweden  had  been  like  many,  many 
other  men  of  that  day,  he  would  have  had  their  innocent 
throats  cut;  but  he  was  a  kind  man,  and  brought  them  up 
tenderly. 

Normandy  ran  much  in  Canute's  mind.  In  Normandy 
were  the  two  children  of  the  late  King — Edward  and 
Alfred  by  name;   and  their  uncle  the  Duke  might  one  day 


32  A  CHILD'S  HTSTOHY  OF  ENGLAND. 

claim  the  crown  for  them.  But  the  Duke  showed  so  little 
inclination  to  do  so  now,  that  he  proposed  to  Canute  to 
marry  his  sister,  the  widow  of  The  Unready;  who,  being 
but  a  showy  flower,  and  caring  for  nothing  so  much  as  be- 
coming a  queen  again,  left  her  children  and  was  wedded  to 
him. 

Successful  and  triumphant,  assisted  by  the  valour  of  the 
English  in  his  foreign  wars,  and  with  little  strife  to  trouble 
him  at  home,  Canute  had  a  prosperous  reign,  and  made 
many  improvements.  He  was  a  poet  and  a  musician.  He 
grew  sorry,  as  he  grew  older,  for  the  blood  he  had  shed  at 
first;  and  went  to  Eome  in  a  Pilgrim's  dress,  by  way  of 
washing  it  out.  He  gave  a  great  deal  of  money  to  foreign- 
ers on  his  journey;  but  he  took  it  from  the  English  before 
he  started.  On  the  whole,  however,  he  certainly  became  a 
far  better  man  when  he  had  no  opposition  to  contend  with, 
and  was  as  great  a  King  as  England  had  known  for  some 
time. 

The  old  writers  of  history  relate  how  that  Canute  was 
one  day  disgusted  with  his  coui-tiers  for  their  flattery,  an  d 
how  he  caused  his  chair  to  be  set  on  the  sea-shore,  and 
feigned  to  command  the  tide  as  it  came  up  not  to  wet  the 
edge  of  his  robe,  for  the  land  was  his;  how  the  tide  came 
up,  of  course,  without  regarding  him;  and  how  he  then 
turned  to  his  flatterers,  and  rebuked  them,  saying,  what 
was  the  might  of  any  earthly  king,  to  the  might  of  the 
Creator,  who  could  say  unto  the  sea,  "  Thus  far  shalt  thou 
go,  and  no  farther ! "  We  may  learn  from  this,  I  think, 
that  a  little  sense  will  go  a  long  way  in  a  king;  and  that 
courtiers  are  not  easily  cured  of  flattery,  nor  kings  of  a 
liking  for  it.  If  the  courtiers  of  Canute  had  not  known, 
long  before,  that  the  King  was  fond  of  flattery,  they  would 
have  known  better  than  to  offer  it  in  such  large  doses. 
And  if  they  had  not  known  that  he  was  vain  of  this  speech 
(anything  but  a  wonderful  speech  it  seems  to  me,  if  a  good 
child  had  made  it),  they  would  not  have  been  at  such  great 
pains  to  repeat  it.  I  fancy  I  see  them  all  on  the  sea-shore 
together;  the  King's  chair  sinking  in  the  sand;  the  King 
in  a  mighty  good  humour  with  his  own  wisdom;  and  the 
courtiers  pretending  to  be  quite  stunned  by  it ! 

It  is  not  the  sea  alone  that  is  bidden  to  go  "thus  far,  and 
no  farther."  The  great  command  goes  forth  to  all  the 
kings  upon  the  aarth,  and  went  to  Canute  in  the  year  one 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  33 

thousand  and  thirty-five,  and  stretched  him  dead  upon  his 
bed.  Beside  it,  stood  his  Norman  wife.  Perhaps,  as  the 
King  looked  his  last  upon  her,  he,  who  had  so  often  thought 
distrustfully  of  Normandy,  long  ago,  thought  once  more  of 
the  two  exiled  Princes  in  their  uncle's  court,  and  of  the 
little  favour  they  could  feel  for  either  Danes  or  Saxons, 
and  of  a  rising  cloud  in  Normandy  that  slowly  moved 
towards  England. 


CHAPTEE.    VI. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  HAROLD  HAREFOOT,  HARDICA- 
NUTE,  AND  EDWARD  THE  CONFESSOR. 

Canute  left  three  sons,  by  name  Sweyn,  Harold,  and 
Hardicanute;  but  his  Queen,  Emma,  once  the  Flower  of 
Normandy,  was  the  mother  of  only  Hardicanute.  Canute 
had  wished  his  dominions  to  be  divided  between  the  three, 
and  had  wished  Harold  to  have  England;  but  the  Saxon 
people  in  the  South  of  England,  headed  by  a  nobleman 
with  great  possessions,  called  the  powerful  Earl  Godwin 
(who  is  said  to  have  been  originally  a  poor  cow-boy),  op- 
posed this,  and  desired  to  have,  instead,  either  Hardica- 
nute, or  one  of  the  two  exiled  Princes  who  were  over  in 
Normandy.  It  seemed  so  certain  that  there  would  be  more 
bloodshed  to  settle  this  dispute,  that  many  people  left  their 
homes,  and  took  refuge  in  the  woods  and  swamps.  Hap- 
pily, however,  it  was  agreed  to  refer  the  whole  question  to 
a  great  meeting  at  Oxford,  which  decided  that  Harold 
should  have  all  the  country  north  of  the  Thames,  with  Lon- 
don for  his  capital  city,  and  that  Hardicanute  should  have 
all  the  south.  The  quarrel  was  so  arranged;  and,  as  Har- 
dicanute was  in  Denmark  troubling  himself  very  little 
about  anything  but  eating  and  getting  drunk,  his  mother 
and  Earl  Godwin  governed  the  south  for  him. 

They  had  hardly  begun  to  do  so,  and  the  trembling  peo- 
ple who  had  hidden  themselves  were  scarcely  at  home  again, 
when  Edward,  the  elder  of  the  two  exiled  Princes,  came 
over  from  Normandy  with  a  few  followers,  to  claim  the 
English  Crown.  His  mother  Emma,  however,  who  only 
cared  for  her  last  son  Hardicanute,  instead  of  assisting 


34  A   CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

him,  as  he  expected,  opposed  him  so  strongly  with  all  her 
influence  that  he  was  very  soon  glad  to  get  safely  back. 
His  brother  Alfred  was  not  so  fortunate.  Believing  in  an 
affectionate  letter,  written  some  time  afterwards  to  him  and 
his  brother,  in  his  mother's  name  (but  whether  really  with 
or  without  his  mother's  knowledge  is  now  uncertain),  he 
allowed  himself  to  be  tempted  over  to  England,  with  a 
good  force  of  soldiers,  and  landing  on  the  Kentish  coast, 
and  being  met  and  welcomed  by  Earl  Godwin,  proceeded 
into  Surrey,  as  far  as  the  town  of  Guildford.  Here,  he  and 
his  men  halted  in  the  evening  to  rest,  having  still  the  Earl 
in  their  company;  who  had  ordered  lodgings  and  good 
cheer  for  them.  But,  in  the  dead  of  the  night,  when  they 
were  off  their  guard,  being  divided  into  small  parties  sleep- 
ing soundly  after  a  long  march  and  a  plentiful  supper  in 
different  houses,  they  were  set  upon  by  the  King's  troops, 
and  taken  prisoners.  Kext  morning  they  were  drawn  out 
in  a  line,  to  the  number  of  six  hundred  men,  and  were  bar- 
barously tortured  and  killed ;  with  the  exception  of  every 
tenth  man,  who  was  sold  into  slavery.  As  to  the  wretched 
Prince  Alfred,  he  was  stripped  naked,  tied  to  a  horse  and 
sent  away  into  the  Isle  of  Ely,  where  his  eyes  were  torn 
out  of  his  head,  and  where  in  a  few  days  he  miserably  died. 
I  am  not  sure  that  the  Earl  had  wilfully  entrapped  him, 
but  I  suspect  it  strongly. 

Harold  was  now  King  all  over  England,  though  it  is 
doubtful  whether  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  (the  greater 
part  of  the  priests  were  Saxons,  and  not  friendly  to  the 
Danes)  ever  consented  to  crown  him.  Crowned  or  un- 
crowned, with  the  Archbishop's  leave  or  without  it,  he  was 
King  for  four  years :  after  which  short  reign  he  died,  and 
was  buried ;  having  never  done  much  in  life  but  go  a  hunting. 
He  was  such  a  fast  runner  at  this,  his  favourite  sport,  that 
the  people  called  him  Harold  Harefoot. 

Hardicanute  was  then  at  Briiges,  in  Flanders,  plotting, 
with  his  mother  (who  had  gone  over  there  after  the  cruel 
murder  of  Prince  Alfred),  for  the  invasion  of  England. 
The  Danes  and  Saxons,  finding  themselves  without  a  King, 
and  dreading  new  disputes,  made  common  cause,  and  joined 
in  inviting  him  to  occupy  the  Throne.  He  consented,  and 
soon  troubled  them  enough ;  for  he  brought  over  numbers 
of  Danes,  and  taxed  the  people  so  insupportably  to  enrich 
those  greedy  favourites  that  there  were  many  insurrections, 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  35 

especially  one  at  Worcester,  where  the  citizens  rose  and 
killed  his  tax-collectors;  in  revenge  for  which  he  burned 
their  city.  He  was  a  brutal  King,  whose  first  public  act 
was  to  order  the  dead  body  of  poor  Harold  Harefoot  to  be 
dug  up,  beheaded,  and  thrown  into  the  river.  His  end  was 
worthy  of  such  a  beginning.  He  fell  down  drunk,  with  a 
goblet  of  wine  in  his  hand,  at  a  wedding-feast  at  Lambeth, 
given  in  honour  of  the  marriage  of  his  standard-bearer,  a 
Dane  named  Towed  the  Pkoud.  And  he  never  spoke 
again. 

Edward,  afterwards  called  by  the  monks  The  Confessor, 
succeeded ;  and  his  first  act  was  to  oblige  his  mother  Emma, 
who  had  favoured  him  so  little,  to  retire  into  the  country ; 
where  she  died  some  ten  years  afterwards.  He  was  the 
exiled  prince  whose  brother  Alfred  had  been  so  foully 
killed.  He  had  been  invited  over  from  Normandy  by  Har- 
dicanute,  in  the  course  of  his  short  reign  of  two  years,  and 
had  been  handsomely  treated  at  court.  His  cause  was  now 
favoured  by  the  powerful  Earl  Godwin,  and  he  was  soon 
made  King.  This  Earl  had  been  suspected  by  the  people, 
ever  since  Prince  Alfred's  cruel  death;  he  had  even  been 
tried  in  the  last  reign  for  the  Prince's  murder,  but  had 
been  pronounced  not  guilty ;  chiefly,  as  it  was  supposed, 
because  of  a  present  he  had  made  to  the  swinish  King,  of 
a  gilded  ship  with  a  figure-head  of  solid  gold,  and  a  crew 
of  eighty  splendidly  armed  men.  It  was  his  interest  to 
help  the  new  King  with  his  power,  if  the  new  King  would 
help  him  against  the  popular  distrust  and  hatred.  So  they 
made  a  bargain.  Edward  the  Confessor  got  the  Throne. 
The  Earl  got  more  power  and  more  land,  and  his  daughter 
Editha  was  made  queen;  for  it  was  a  part  of  their  compact 
that  the  King  should  take  her  for  his  wife. 

But,  although  she  was  a  gentle  lady,  in  all  things  worthy 
to  be  beloved — good,  beautiful,  sensible,  and  kind — the 
King  from  the  first  neglected  her.  Her  father  and  her  six 
proud  brothers,  resenting  this  cold  treatment,  harassed  the 
King  greatly  by  exerting  all  their  power  to  make  him  un- 
popular. Having  lived  so  long  in  ^N  ormandy,  he  preferred 
the  Normans  to  the  English.  He  made  a  Norman  Arch- 
bishop, and  Norman  Bishops;  his  great  officers  and 
favourites  were  all  Normans;  he  introduced  the  Norman 
fashions  and  the  Norman  language;  in  imitation  of  the 
state  custom  of  Normandy,  he  attached  a  great  seal  to  his 


36  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

state  documents,  instead  of  merely  marking  them,  as  the 
Saxon  Kings  had  done,  with  the  sign  of  the  cross — just  as 
poor  people  who  have  never  been  taught  to  write,  now 
make  the  same  mark  for  their  names.  All  this,  the  power- 
ful Earl  Godwin  and  his  six  proud  sons  represented  to  the 
people  as  disfavour  shown  towards  the  English ;  and  thus 
they  daily  increased  their  own  power,  and  daily  diminished 
the  power  of  the  King. 

They  were  greatly  helped  by  an  event  that  occurred 
when  he  had  reigned  eight  years.  Eustace,  Earl  of  Bou- 
logne, who  had  married  the  King's  sister,  came  to  England 
on  a  visit.  After  staying  at  the  court  some  time,  he  set 
forth,  with  his  numerous  train  of  attendants,  to  return 
home.  They  were  to  embark  at  Dover.  Entering  that 
peaceful  town  in  armour,  they  took  possession  of  the  best 
houses,  and  noisily  demanded  to  be  lodged  and  entertained 
without  payment.  One  of  the  bold  men  of  Dover,  who 
would  not  endure  to  have  these  domineering  strangers  jing- 
ling their  heavy  swords  and  iron  corselets  up  and  down  his 
house,  eating  his  meat,  and  drinking  his  strong  liquor, 
stood  in  his  doorway  and  refused  admission  to  the  first 
armed  man  who  came  there.  The  armed  man  drew,  and 
wounded  him.  The  man  of  Dover  struck  the  armed  man 
dead.  Intelligence  of  what  he  had  done,  spreading  through 
the  streets  to  where  the  Count  Eustace  and  his  men  were 
standing  by  their  horses,  bridle  in  hand,  they  passionately 
mounted,  galloped  to  the  house,  surrounded  it,  forced  their 
way  in  (the  doors  and  windows  being  closed  when  they 
came  up),  and  killed  the  man  of  Dover  at  his  own  fireside. 
They  then  clattered  through  the  streets,  cutting  down  and 
riding  over  men,  women,  and  children.  This  did  not  last 
long,  you  may  believe.  The  men  of  Dover  set  upon  them 
with  great  fury,  killed  nineteen  of  the  foreigners,  wounded 
many  more,  and,  blockading  the  road  to  the  port  so  that 
they  should  not  embark,  beat  them  out  of  the  town  by  the 
way  they  had  come.  Hereupon,  Count  Eustace  rides  as 
hard  as  man  can  ride  to  Gloucester,  where  Edward  is,  sur- 
rounded by  Norman  monks  and  Norman  lords.  "  Justice !  " 
cries  the  Count,  "  upon  the  men  of  Dover,  who  have  set 
upon  and  slain  my  people !  "  The  King  sends  immediately 
for  the  powerful  Earl  Godwin,  who  happens  to  be  near ; 
reminds  him  that  Dover  is  under  his  government ;  and  or- 
ders him  to  repair  to  Dover  and  do  military  execution  on 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  37 

the  inhabitants.  "  It  does  not  become  you,"  says  the  proud 
Earl  in  reply,  "  to  condemn  without  a  hearing  those  whom 
you  have  sworn  to  protect.     I  will  not  do  it." 

The  King,  therefore,  summoned  the  Earl,  on  pain  of 
banishment  and  loss  of  his  titles  and  property,  to  appear 
before  the  court  to  answer  this  disobedience.  The  Earl  re- 
fused to  appear.  He,  his  eldest  son  Harold,  and  his  second 
son  Sweyn,  hastily  raised  as  many  lighting  men  as  their 
utmost  power  could  collect,  and  demanded  to  have  Count 
Eustace  and  his  followers  surrendered  to  the  justice  of  the 
country.  The  King,  in  his  turn,  refused  to  give  them  up, 
and  raised  a  strong  force.  After  some  treaty  and  delay, 
the  troops  of  the  great  Earl  and  his  sons  began  to  fall  off. 
The  Earl,  with  a  part  of  his  family  and  abundance  of  treas- 
ure, sailed  to  Flanders;  Harold  escaped  to  Ireland;  and 
the  power  of  the  great  family  was  for  that  time  gone  in 
England.     But,  the  people  did  not  forget  them. 

Then,  Edward  the  Confessor,  with  the  true  meanness  of 
a  mean  spirit,  visited  his  dislike  of  the  once  poAverful  father 
and  sons  upon  the  helpless  daughter  and  sister,  his  unof- 
fending wife,  whom  all  who  saw  her  (lier  husband  and 
his  monks  excepted)  loved.  He  seized  rapaciously  upon 
her  fortune  and  her  jewels,  and  allowing  her  only  one 
attendant,  confined  her  in  a  gloomy  convent,  of  which  a 
sister  of  his — no  doubt  an  unpleasant  lady  after  his  own 
heart — was  abbess  or  jailer. 

Having  got  Earl  Godwin  and  his  six  sons  well  out  of  his 
way,  the  King  favoured  the  Normans  more  than  ever.  He 
invited  over  William,  Duke  of  Normandy,  the  son  of 
that  Duke  who  had  received  him  and  his  murdered  brother 
long  ago,  and  of  a  peasant  girl,  a  tanner's  daughter,  with 
whom  that  Duke  had  fallen  in  love  for  her  beauty  as  he 
saw  her  washing  clothes  in  a  brook.  William,  who  was  a 
great  warrior,  with  a  passion  for  fine  horses,  dogs,  and 
arms,  accepted  the  invitation ;  and  the  Normans  in  Eng- 
land, finding  themselves  more  numerous  than  ever  when  he 
arrived  with  his  retinue,  and  held  in  still  greater  honour 
at  court  than  before,  became  more  and  more  haughty  tow- 
ards the  people,  and  were  more  and  more  disliked  by  them. 

The  old  Earl  Godwin,  though  he  was  abroad,  knew  well 
how  the  people  felt ;  for,  with  part  of  the  treasure  he  had 
carried  away  with  him,  he  kept  spies  and  agents  in  his  pay 
all  over  England.     Accordingly,  he  thought  the  time  was 


&S  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

come  for  fitting  out  a  great  expedition  against  the  Norman- 
loving  King.  With  it,  he  sailed  to  the  Isle  of  Wight, 
where  he  was  joined  by  his  son  Harold,  the  most  gallant 
and  brave  of  all  his  family.  And  so  the  father  and  son 
came  sailing  up  the  Thames  to  Southwark ;  great  numbers 
of  the  people  declaring  for  them,  and  shouting  for  the  Eng- 
lish Earl  and  the  English  Harold,  against  the  Norman 
favourites ! 

The  King  was  at  first  as  blind  and  stubborn  askings  usu- 
ally have  been  whensoever  they  have  been  in  the  hands  of 
monks.  But  the  people  rallied  so  thickly  round  the  old  Earl 
and  his  son,  and  the  old  Earl  was  so  steady  in  demanding 
without  bloodshed  the  restoration  of  himself  and  his  family 
to  their  rights,  that  at  last  the  court  took  the  alarm.  The 
Norman  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  and  the  Norman  Bishop 
of  London,  surrounded  by  their  retainers,  fought  their  way 
out  of  London,  and  escaped  from  Essex  to  France  in  a  fish- 
ing-boat. The  other  Norman  favourites  dispersed  in  all 
directions.  The  old  Earl  and  his  sons  (except  Sweyn,  w])o 
had  committed  crimes  against  the  law)  were  restored  to 
their  possessions  and  dignities,  Editha,  the  virtuous  and 
lovely  Queen  of  the  insensible  King,  was  triumphantly  re- 
leased from  her  prison,  the  convent,  and  once  more  sat  in 
her  chair  of  state,  arrayed  in  the  jewels  of  which,  when 
she  had  no  champion  to  support  her  rights,  her  cold-blooded 
husband  had  deprived  her. 

The  old  Earl  Godwin  did  not  long  enjoy  his  restored 
fortune.  He  fell  down  in  a  fit  at  the  King's  table,  and 
died  upon  the  third  day  afterwards.  Harold  succeeded  to 
his  power,  and  to  a  far  higher  place  in  the  attachment  of 
the  people  than  his  father  had  ever  held.  By  his  valour 
he  subdued  the  King's  enemies  in  many  bloody  fights.  He 
was  vigorous  against  rebels  in  Scotland — this  was  the  time 
when  Macbeth  slew  Duncan,  upon  which  event  our  English 
Shakespeare,  hundreds  of  years  afterwards,  wrote  his  great 
tragedy ;  and  he  killed  the  restless  Welsh  King  Griffith, 
and  brought  his  head  to  England. 

What  Harold  was  doing  at  sea,  when  he  was  driven  on 
the  French  coast  by  a  tempest,  is  not  at  all  certain ;  nor 
does  it  at  all  matter.  That  his  ship  was  forced  by  a  storm 
on  that  shore,  and  that  he  was  taken  prisoner,  there  is  no 
doubt.  In  those  barbarous  days,  all  shipwrecked  strangers 
were  taken  prisoners,  and  obliged  to  pay  ransom.     So,  a 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND.  39 

certain  Count  Guy,  who  was  the  Lord  of  Ponthieu  where 
Harold's  disaster  happened,  seized  him,  instead  of  reliev- 
ing him  like  a  hospitable  and  Christian  lord  as  he  ought 
to  have  done,  and  expected  to  make  a  very  good  thing 
of  it. 

But  Harold  sent  off  immediately  to  Duke  William  of 
Normandy,  complaining  of  this  treatment;  and  the  Duke 
no  sooner  heard  of  it  than  he  ordered  Harold  to  be  escorted 
to  the  ancient  town  of  Rouen,  where  he  then  was,  and 
where  he  received  him  as  an  honoured  guest.  Now,  some 
writers  tell  us  that  Edward  the  Confessor,  who  was  by  this 
time  old  and  had  no  children,  had  made  a  will,  appointing 
Duke  William  of  Normandy  his  successor,  and  had  in- 
formed the  Duke  of  his  having  done  so.  There  is  no  doubt 
that  he  was  anxious  about  his  successor ;  because  he  had 
even  invited  over,  from  abroad,  Edward  the  Outlaw,  a 
son  of  Ironside,  who  had  come  to  England  with  his  wife 
and  three  children,  but  whom  the  King  had  strangely  re- 
fused to  see  when  he  did  come,  and  who  had  died  in  Lon- 
don suddenly  (princes  were  terribly  liable  to  sudden  death 
in  those  days),  and  had  been  buried  in  St.  Paul's  Cathe- 
dral. The  King  might  possibly  have  made  such  a  will ; 
or,  having  always  been  fond  of  the  Normans,  he  might 
have  encouraged  Norman  William  to  aspire  to  the  English 
crown,  by  something  that  he  said  to  him  when  he  was  stay- 
ing at  the  English  court.  But,  certainly  William  did  now 
aspire  to  it ;  and  knowing  that  Harold  would  be  a  powerful 
rival,  he  called  together  a  great  assembly  of  his  nobles, 
offered  Harold  his  daughter  Adele  in  marriage,  informed 
him  that  he  meant  on  King  Edward's  death  to  claim  the 
English  crown  as  his  own  inheritance,  and  required  Harold 
then  and  there  to  swear  to  aid  him.  Harold,  being  in  the 
Duke's  power,  took  this  oath  upon  the  Missal,  or  Prayer- 
book.  It  is  a  good  example  of  the  superstitions  of  the 
monks,  that  this  Missal,  instead  of  being  placed  upon  a 
table,  was  placed  upon  a  tub;  which,  when  Harold  had 
SAvorn,  was  uncovered,  and  shown  to  be  full  of  dead  men's 
bones — bones,  as  the  monks  pretended,  of  saints.  This 
was  supposed  to  make  Harold's  oath  a  great  deal  more 
impressive  and  binding.  As  if  the  great  name  of  the 
Creator  of  Heaven  aiid  earth  could  be  made  more  solemn 
by  a  knuckle-bone,  or  a  double-tooth,  or  a  finger-nail,  of 
Dunstan  1 


40  A     child's     history     of     ENGLAND. 

Within  a  week  or  ,two  after  Harold's  return  to  England, 
the  dreary  old  Confessor  was  found  to  be  dying.  After 
wandering  in  his  mind  like  a  very  weak  old  man,  he  died. 
As  he  had  put  himself  entirely  in  the  hands  of  the  monks 
when  he  was  alive,  they  praised  him  lustily  when  he  was 
dead.  They  had  gone  so  far,  already,  as  to  persuade  him 
that  he  could  work  miracles;  and  had  brought  people 
afflicted  with  a  bad  disorder  of  the  skin,  to  him,  to  be 
touched  and  cured.  This  was  called  "touching  for  the 
King's  Evil,"  which  afterwards  became  a  royal  custom. 
You  know,  however,  Who  really  touched  the  sick,  and 
healed  them ;  and  you  know  His  sacred  name  is  not  among 
the  dusty  line  of  human  kings. 


CHAPTER    VII. 

ENGLAND    UNDER    HAROLD  THE    SECOND,   AND  CON- 
QUERED BY  THE  NORMANS. 

Harold  was  crowned  King  of  England  on  the  very  day 
of  the  maudlin  Confessor's  funeral.  He  had  good  need  to 
be  quick  about  it.  When  the  news  reached  Norman  Will- 
iam, hunting  in  his  park  at  Rouen,  he  dropped  his  bow, 
returned  to  his  palace,  called  his  nobles  to  council,  and 
presently  sent  ambassadors  to  Harold,  calling  on  him  to 
keep  his  oath  and  resign  the  Crown.  Harold  would  do  no 
such  thing.  The  barons  of  France  leagued  together  round 
Duke  William  for  the  invasion  of  England.  Duke  William 
promised  freely  to  distribute  English  wealth  and  English 
lands  among  them.  The  Pope  sent  to  Normandy  a  conse- 
crated banner,  and  a  ring  containing  a  hair  which  he  war- 
ranted to  have  grown  on  the  head  of  Saint  Peter.  He 
blessed  the  enterprise ;  and  cursed  Harold ;  and  requested 
that  the  Normans  would  pay  "Peter's  Pence" — or  a  tax 
to  himself  of  a  penny  a  year  on  every  house — a  little  more 
regularly  in  future,  if  they  could  make  it  convenient. 

King  Harold  had  a  rebel  brother  in  Flanders,  who  was 
a  vassal  of  Harold  Hardrada,  King  of  Norway.  This 
brother,  and  this  Norwegian  King,  joining  their  forces 
against  England,  with  Duke  William's  help,  won  a  fight  in 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  41 

which  the  English  were  commanded  by  two  nobles ;  and 
then  besieged  York.  Harold,  who  was  waiting  for  the 
Normans  on  the  coast  at  Hastings,  with  his  army,  marched 
to  Stamford  Bridge  upon  the  river  Derwent  to  give  them 
instant  battle. 

He  found  them  drawn  up  in  a  hollow  circle,  marked  out 
by  their  shining  spears.  Riding  round  this  circle  at  a  dis- 
tance, to  survey  it,  he  saw  a  brave  figure  on  horseback,  in 
a  blue  mantle  and  a  bright  helmet,  whose  horse  suddenly 
stumbled  and  threw  him. 

"  Who  is  that  man  who  has  fallen?  "  Harold  asked  of 
one  of  his  captains. 

"The  King  of  Norway,"  he  replied. 

"He  is  a  tall  and  stately  king,"  said  Harold,  "but  his 
end  is  near." 

He  added,  in  a  little  while,  "  Go  yonder  to  my  brother, 
and  tell  him,  if  he  withdraw  his  troops,  he  shall  be  Earl 
of  Northumberland,  and  rich  and  powerful  in  England." 

The  captain  rode  away  and  gave  the  message. 

"  What  win  he  give  to  my  friend  the  King  of  Norway?  " 
asked  the  brother. 

"  Seven  feet  of  earth  for  a  grave,"  replied  the  captain. 

"No  more?  "  returned  the  brother,  with  a  smile. 

"The  King  of  Norway  being  a  tall  man,  perhaps  a  little 
more,"  replied  the  captain. 

"  Ride  back !  "  said  the  brother,  "  and  tell  King  Harold 
to  make  ready  for  the  fight !  " 

He  did  so,  very  soon.  And  such  a  fight  King  Harold 
led  against  that  force,  that  his  brother,  and  the  Norwegian 
King,  and  every  chief  of  note  in  all  their  host,  except  the 
Norwegian  King's  son  Olave,  to  whom  he  gave  honourable 
dismissal,  were  left  dead  upon  the  field.  The  victorious 
army  marched  to  York.  As  King  Harold  sat  there  at  the 
feast,  in  the  midst  of  all  his  company,  a  stir  was  heard  at 
the  doors ;  and  messengers  all  covered  with  mire  from  rid- 
ing far  and  fast  through  broken  ground  came  hurrying  in, 
to  report  that  the  Normans  had  landed  in  England. 

The  intelligence  was  true.  They  had  been  tossed  about 
by  contrary  winds,  and  some  of  their  ships  had  been 
wrecked.  A  part  of  their  own  shore,  to  which  they  had 
been  driven  back,  was  strewn  with  Norman  bodies.  But 
they  had  once  more  made  sail,  led  by  the  Duke's  own  gal- 
ley, a  present  from  his  wife,  upon  the  prow  whereof  the 


42  'i^  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

figure  of  a  golden  boy  stood  pointing  towards  England. 
By  day,  the  banner  of  the  three  Lions  of  Normandy,  the 
diverse  coloured  sails,  the  gilded  vanes,  .the  many  decora- 
tions of  this  gorgeous  ship,  had  glittered  in  the  sun  and 
sunny  waters ;  by  night,  a  light  had  sparkled  like  a  star  at 
her  mast-head.  And  now,  encamped  near  Hastings,  with 
their  leader  lying  in  the  old  Roman  castle  of  Pevensey,  the 
English  retiring  in  all  directions,  the  land  for  miles  around 
scorched  and  smoking,  fired  and  pillaged,  was  the  whole 
Norman  power,  hopeful  and  strong  on  English  ground, 

Harold  broke  up  the  feast  and  hurried  to  London.  With- 
in a  week,  his  army  was  ready.  He  sent  out  spies  to  ascer- 
tain the  Norman  strength.  William  took  them,  caused 
them  to  be  led  through  his  whole  camp,  and  then  dismissed. 
"The  Normans,"  said  these  spies  to  Harold,  "are  not 
bearded  on  the  upper  lip  as  we  English  are,  but  are  shorn. 
They  are  priests."  "My  men,"  replied  Harold,  with  a 
laugh,  "will  find  those  priests  good  soldiers!  " 

"The  Saxons,"  reported  Duke  William's  outposts  of 
Norm  an  soldiers,  who  were  instructed  to  retire  as  King 
Harold's  army  advanced,  "rush  on  us  through  their  pil- 
laged country  with  the  fury  of  madmen." 

"Let  them  come,  and  come  soon!  "  said  Duke  William. 

Some  proposals  for  a  reconciliation  were  made,  but  were 
soon  abandoned.  In  the  middle  of  the  month  of  October, 
'in  the  year  one  thousand  and  sixty-six,  the  Normans  and 
the  English  came  front  to  front.  All  night  the  armies  lay 
encamped  before  each  other,  in  a  part  of  the  country  then 
called  Senlac,  now  called  (in  remembrance  of  them)  Battle. 
With  the  first  dawn  of  day,  they  arose.  There,  in  the 
faint  light,  were  the  English  on  a  hill;  a  wood  behind 
them;  in  their  midst,  the  Royal  banner,  representing  a 
fighting  warrior,  woven  in  gold  thread,  adorned  with  pre- 
cious stones;  beneath  the  banner,  as  it  rustled  in  the  wind, 
stood  King  Harold  on  foot,  with  two  of  his  remaining 
brothers  by  his  side;  around  them,  still  and  silent  as  the 
dead,  clustered  the  whole  English  army — every  soldier 
covered  by  his  shield,  and  bearing  in  his  hand  his  dreaded 
English  battle-axe. 

On  an  opposite  hill,  in  three  lines,  archers,  foot-soldiers, 
horsemen,  was  the  Norman  force.  Of  a  sudden,  a  great 
battle-crj'',  "  God  help  us ! "  burst  from  the  Norman  lines. 
The  English  answered  with  their  own  battle-cry,  "God's 


A  CHILD'S   HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND:  43 

Rood !  Holy  Rood !  "  The  Normaus  then  came  sweeping 
down  the  hill  to  attack  the  English. 

There  was  one  tall  Norman  Knight  who  rode  before  th^ 
Norman  army  on  ;i  prancing  horse,  throwing  up  his  heavy 
sword  and  catching  it,  and  singing  of  the  bravery  of  his 
countrymen.  An  English  Knight,  who  rode  out  from  the 
English  force  to  meet  him,  fell  by  this  Knight's  hand. 
Another  English  Knight  rode  out,  and  he  fell  too.  But 
then  a  third  rode  out,  and  killed  the  Norman.  This  was  in 
the  lirst  beginning  of  the  tight.     It  soon  raged  every whei'e. 

The  English,  keeping  side  by  side  in  a  great  mass, 
cared  no  more  for  the  shov/ers  of  Norman  arrows  than  if 
they  if  they  had  been  showers  of  Norman  raui.  When  the 
Norman  horsemen  rode  against  them,  with  their  battle-axts 
they  cut  men  and  horses  down.  The  Normans  gave  way. 
The  English  pressed  forward.  A  cry  went  forth  among 
the  Norman  troops  that  Duke  William  was  killed.  Duke 
William  took  off  his  helmet,  in  order  that  his  face  might 
be  distinctly  seen,  and  rode  along  the  line  before  his  mei!. 
This  gave  them  courage.  As  they  turned  again  to  face  tlwe 
Engiisli,  some  of  their  Norman  horse  divided  the  pursuing 
body  of  the  English  from  the  rest,  and  tlius  all  that  fore- 
most portion  of  the  English  aiiuy  fell,  tigliting  bravely. 
The  main  body  still  remaining  firm,  heedleisS  of  the  Nory 
man  arrows,  and  with  their  battle-axes  cutting  down  the 
crowds  of  horsemen  when  tliey  rode  uj),  like  forests  of 
young  trees,  Duke  William  pretended  to  retreat.  The 
eager  English  followed.  The  Norman  army  closed  again, 
and  fell  uiK)n  them  Avith  great  slaughter. 

"Still,"  said  Duke  William,  "there  are  thousands  of  the 
English,  firm  as  rock  around  their  King.  Shoot  upward, 
Norman  archers,  that  your  arrows  may  fall  down,  upon 
their  faces  I"  .   ' 

The  sun  rose  high,  and  sank,  and  the  battle  still  raged. 
Througli  all  the  wild  October  day,  the  clash  and  din  re- 
sounded in  the  air.  In  the  red  sunset,  and  in  the  whit? 
moonlight,  heaps  upon  heaps  of  dead  men  lay  strewn,  a 
dreadful  spectacle,  all  over  the  ground.  King  Harold.^ 
wounded  with  an  arrow  in  the  eye,  was  nearly  blind.  Hip 
brothers  were  already  killed.  Twenty  Norman  Knights, 
whose  battered  armour  had  flashed  fiery  and  golden  in  the 
sunshine  all  day  long,  and  now  looked  silvery  in  the  moon- 
light, dashed  forward  to  seiije  the  Royal  banner  from  the 


44  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

English  Knights  and  soldiers,  still  faithfully  collected 
round  their  blind  King.  The  King  received  a  mortal  wound, 
j^nd  dropped.  The  English  broke  and  fled.  The  Normans 
iHllied,  and  the  day  was  lost. 

0  what  a  sight  beneath  the  moon  and  stars,  when  lights 
were  shining  in  the  tent  of  the  victorious  Duke  William, 
which  was  pitched  near  the  spot  where  Harold  fell — and 
he  and  his  knights  were  carousing,  within — and  soldiers 
with  torches,  going  slowly  to  and  fro,  without,  sought  for 
th!<i  corpse  of  Harold  among  piles  of  dead — and  the  War- 
riot,  worked  in  golden  thread  and  precious  stones,  lay  low, 
all  torn  and  soiled  with  blood — and  the  three  Norman  Lions 
kept  watch  over  the  field! 


CHAPTER    VIII 

E»  GUiAND  UNDER  WILLIAM  THE  FIRST,  THE  NORMAN 
CONQUEROR. 

'^JpoN  the  ground  where  the  brave  Harold  fell,  William 
the  Norman  afterwards  founded  an  abbey,  which,  under 
the  name  of  Battle  Abbey,  was  a  rich  and  splendid  place 
through  many  a  troubled  year,  though  now  it  is  a  grey  ruin 
overgrown  with  ivy.  But  the  first  work  he  had  to  do,  was 
to  conquer  the  English  thoroughly ;  and  that,  as  you  know 
by  this  time,  was  hard  work  for  any  man. 

He  ravaged  several  counties ;  he  burned  and  plundered 
ma&y  towns ;  he  laid  waste  scores  upon  scores  of  miles  of 
pleasant  country;  he  destroyed  innumerable  lives.  At 
length  Stigand,  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  with  other 
representatives  of  the  clergy  and  the  people,  went  to  his 
camp,  and  submitted  to  him.  Edgar,  the  insignificant  son 
of  Edmund  Ironside,  was  proclaimed  King  by  others,  but 
nothing  came  of  it.  He  fled  to  Scotland  afterwards,  where 
his  sister,  who  was  young  and  beautiful,  married  the  Scot- 
tish King.  Edgar  himself  was  not  important  enough  for 
anybody  to  care  much  about  him. 

On  Christmas  Day,  William  was  crowned  in  Westminster 
Abbey,  under  the  title  of  William  the  First;  but  he  is 
be*^  known  as  William  the  Conqueror.     It  was  a  strange 


A    child's     history     of     ENGLAND.  45 

coronation.  One  of  the  bishops  who  performed  the  cere- 
mony asked  the  Normans,  in  French,  if  they  would  have 
Duke  William  for  their  king?  They  answered  Yes. 
Another  of  the  bishops  put  the  same  question  to  the  Sax- 
ons, in  English.  They  too  answered  Yes,  with  a  loud 
shout.  The  noise  being  heard  by  a  guard  of  Norman  horse- 
soldiers  outside,  was  mistaken  for  resistance  on  the  part  of 
the  English.  The  guard  instantly  set  fire  to  the  neigh- 
bouring houses,  and  a  tumult  ensued;  in  the  midst  of 
which  the  King,  being  left  alone  in  the  Abbey,  with  a  few 
priests  (and  they  all  being  in  a  terrible  fright  together), 
was  hurriedly  crowned.  When  the  crown  was  placed  upon 
his  head,  he  swore  to  govern  the  English  as  well  as  the 
best  of  their  own  monarchs.  I  dare  say  you  think,  as  I 
do,  that  if  we  except  the  Great  Alfred,  he  might  pretty 
easily  have  done  that. 

Numbers  of  the  English  nobles  had  been  killed  in  the 
last  disastrous  battle.  Their  estates,  and  the  estates  of  all 
the  nobles  who  had  fought  against  him  there.  King  Will- 
iam seized  upon,  and  gave  to  his  own  Norman  knights  and 
nobles.  Many  great  English  families  of  the  present  time 
acquired  their  English  lands  in  this  way,  and  are  very 
proud  of  it. 

But  what  is  got  by  force  must  be  maintained  by  force. 
These  nobles  were  obliged  to  build  castles  all  over  Eng- 
land, to  defend  their  new  property ;  and,  do  what  he  would, 
the  King  could  neither  soothe  nor  quell  the  nation  as  he 
wished.  He  gradually  introduced  the  Norman  language 
and  the  Norman  customs;  yet,  for  a  long  time  the  great 
body  of  the  English  remained  sullen  and  revengeful.  On 
his  going  over  to  Normandy,  to  visit  his  subjects  there,  the 
oppressions  of  his  half-brother  Odo,  whom  he  left  in  charge 
of  his  English  kingdom,  drove  the  people  mad.  The  men  of 
Kent  even  invited  over,  to  take  possession  of  Dover,  their 
old  enemy  Count  Eustace  of  Boulogne,  who  had  led  the 
fray  when  the  Dover  man  was  slain  at  his  own  fireside. 
The  men  of  Hereford,  aided  by  the  Welsh,  and  commanded 
by  a  chief  named  Edric  the  Wild,  drove  the  Normans  out 
of  their  country.  Some  of  those  who  had  been  dispossessed 
of  their  lands,  banded  together  in  the  North  of  England ; 
some,  in  Scotland ;  some,  in  the  thick  woods  and  marshes ; 
and  whensoever  they  could  fall  upon  the  Normans,  or  upon 
the    English    who  had  submitted  to  the  Normans,  they 


IB  A.  CHILD'S  ftlSTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

fought,  despoiled,  and  murdered,  like  the  desperate  out* 
laws  that  they  were.  Conspiracieo  were  set  on  foot  for  a 
general  massacre  of  the  Normans,  like  the  old  massacre  of 
the  Danes.  In  short,  the  English  were  in  a  murderous 
mood  all  through  the  kingdom. 

King  William,  fearing  he  might  lose  his  conquest,  came 
back,  and  tried  to  pacify  the  London  people  by  soft  words. 
He  then  set  forth  to  repress  the  country  people  by  stern 
deeds.  Among  the  towns  which  he  besieged,  and  where  he 
killed  and  maimed  the  inhabitants  without  any  distinction, 
sparing  none,  young  or  old,  armed  or  unarmed,  were  Oxford, 
Warwick,  Leicester,  Nottingham,  Derby,  Lincoln,  York. 
In  all  these  places,  and  in  many  others,  fire  and  sword 
worked  their  utmost  horrors,  and  made  the  land  dreadful 
to  behold.  The  streams  and  rivers  were  discoloured  with 
blood ;  the  sky  was  blackened  with  smoke ;  the  fields  were 
wastes  of  ashes ;  the  waysides  were  heaped  up  with  dead. 
Such  are  the  fatal  results  of  conquest  and  ambition !  Al- 
though William  was  a  harsh  and  angry  man,  I  do  not  sup- 
pose that  he  deliberately  meant  to  work  tliis  shocking  ruin, 
when  he  invaded  England.  But  what  he  had  got  by  the 
strong  hand,  he  could  only  keep  by  the  strong  hand,  and 
in  so  doing  he  made  England  a  great  grave. 

Two  sons  of  Harold,  by  name  Edmund  and  Godwin, 
came  over  from  Ireland,  with  some  ships,  against  the  Nor- 
mans, but  were  defeated.  This  was  scarcely  done,  when 
the  outlaws  in  the  w^oods  so  harassed  York,  tliat  the  Gov- 
ernor sent  to  the  King  for  help.  Tlie  King  dispatched  a 
general  and  a  large  force  to  occupy  the  town  of  Durham. 
The  Bishop  of  that  place  met  the  general  outside  the  town, 
and  warned  him  not  to  enter,  as  he  would  be  in  danger 
there.  The  general  cared  nothing  for  the  warning,  and 
went  in  with  all  his  men.  That  night,  on  every  hill  within 
sight  of  Durham,  signal  fires  were  seen  to  blaze.  When 
the  morning  dawned,  the  English,  Avho  had  assembled  in 
great  strength,  forced  the  gates,  rushed  into  the  town,  and 
slew  the  Normans  every  one.  The  English  afterwards  be- 
sought the  Danes  to  come  and  help  them.  The  Danes 
came,  with  two  hundred  and  forty  ships.  The  outlawed 
nobles  joined  them ;  they  captured  York,  and  drove  the 
Normans  out  of  that  city.  Then,  William  bribed  the 
Danes  to  go  away ;  and  took  such  vengeance  on  the  Eng- 
lish, that  all  the  former  fire  and  sword,  smoke  and  aslies, 


A  CHILD  S  HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND.  4V, , 

death  and  ruin,  were  uotliiiig  compared  with  it.  lu  luelau-  ^ 
choly  songs,  and  doleful  stories,  it  was  still  sung  and  told.^^ 
by  cottage  lires  on  winter  evenings,  a  hundred  years  after- 
wards, how,  in  those  dreadful  days  of  the  Normans,  there 
was  not,  from  the  River  Huniber  to  the  River  Tyne,  one 
inhabited  village  left,  nor  one  cultivated  held — how  there 
was  nothing  but  a  dismal  ruin,  wlaere  the  human  creatures 
and  the  beasts  lay  dead  together. 

The  outlaws  had,  at  thio  time,  what  they  called  a  Camp 
of  Refuge,  in  tlie  midst  of  the  fens  of  Cambridgeshire. 
Protected  by  those  marshy  grounds  which  were  ditiicult  of 
approach,  they  lay  among  the  reeds  and  rushes,  and  were 
hidden  by  the  mists  that  rose  up  from  the  watery  earth. 
Now,  there  also  was,  at  that  time,  over  the  sea  in  Flanders, 
an  Englishman  named  Hekewaud,  whose  father  had  died 
in  his  absence,  and  whose  property  had  been  given  to  a 
Norman.  When  he  heard  of  this  wrong  that  had  been, 
done  him  (from  such  of  the  exiled  English  as  chanced  to 
wander  into  that  country),  he  longed  for  revenge ;  and  join- 
ing the  outlaws  in  their  camp  of  refuge,  became  their  com- 
mander. He  was  so  good  a  soldier,  that  the  Normans  sup- 
posed him  to  be  aided  by  enchantment.  William,  even 
after  he  had  made  a  road  three  miles  in  length  across  the 
Cambridgeshire  marshes,  on  purpose  to  attack  this  supposed 
enchanter,  thought  it  necessary  to  engage  an  old  lady,  who 
pretended  to  be  a  sorceress,  to  come  and  do  a  little  enchant- 
ment in  the  royal  cause..  For  this  purpose  she  was  pushed 
on  before  the  troops  in  a  wooden  tower;  but  Hereward 
very  soon  disposed  of  this  unfortunate  sorceress,  by  burn- 
ing her,  tower  and  all.  The  monks  of  the  convent  of  Ely 
near  at  hand,  however,  who  were  fond  of  good  living,  and 
who  found  it  very  uncomfortable  to  have  the  countr}'  block- 
aded and  their  supplies  of  meat  and  drink  cut  off,  showed 
the  Khig  a  secret  way  of  surprising  the  camp.  So  Here- 
ward was  soon  defeated.  Whether  he  afterwards  died 
quietly,  or  whether  he  was  killed  after  killing  sixteen  of 
the  men  who  attacked  him  (as  some  old  rhymes  relate  that 
he  did),  I  cannot  say.  His  defeat  put  an  end  to  the  Camp 
of  Refuge;  and,  very  soon  afterwards,  the  King,  victorious 
both  in  Scotland  and  in  England,  quelled  the  last  rebel- 
lious English  noble.  He  tlien  surrounded  himself  with 
Norman  lords,  enriched  by  the  property  of  English  nobles; 
had  a  great  survey  made  of  all  the  land  in  England,  which 


4M  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

was  entered  as  the  property  of  its  new  owners,  on  a  roll 
ealled  Doomsday  Book ;  obliged  the  people  to  put  out  their 
fires  and  candles  at  a  certain  hour  every  night,  on  the  ring- 
ing of  a  bell  which  was  called  The  Curfew ;  introduced  the 
Korman  dresses  and  manners ;  made  the  Normans  masters 
everywhere,  and  the  English,  servants;  turned  out  the 
English  bishops,  and  put  Normans  in  their  places;  and 
showed  himself  to  be  the  Conqueror  indeed. 

But,  even  with  his  own  Normans,  he  had  a  restless  life. 
They  were  always  hungermg  and  thirsting  for  the  riches  of 
the  English ;  and  the  more  he  gave,  the  more  they  wanted. 
His  priests  were  as  greedy  as  his  soldiers.  We  know  of 
only  one  Norman  who  plainly  told  his  master,  the  King, 
that  he  had  come  with  him  to  England  to  do  his  duty  as  a 
faithful  servant,  and  that  property  taken  by  force  from 
other  men  had  no  charms  for  him.  His  name  was  Guil- 
BEBT.  We  should  not  forget  his  name,  for  it  is  good  to 
remember  and  to  honour  honest  men. 

Besides  all  these  troubles,  William  the  Conqueror  was 
troubled  by  quarrels  among  his  sons.  He  had  three  living. 
Egbert,  called  Cubthose,  because  of  his  short  legs ;  Will- 
iam, called  EuFus  or  the  Eed,  from  the  colour  of  his 
hair;  and  Henbt,  fond  of  learning,  and  called,  in  the 
Norman  language,  Beauclebc,  or  Fine-Scholar.  When 
Eobert  grew  up,  he  asked  of  his  father  the  government  of 
Normandy,  which  he  had  nominally  possessed,  as  a  child, 
under  his  mother,  Matilda.  The  King  refusing  to  grant 
it,  Eobert  became  jealous  and  discontented ;  and  happening 
one  day,  while  in  this  temper,  to  be  ridiculed  by  his  broth- 
ers, who  threw  water  on  him  from  a  balcony  as  he  was 
walking  before  the  door,  he  drew  his  sword,  rushed  up- 
stairs, and  was  only  prevented  by  the  King  himself  from 
putting  them  to  death.  That  same  night,  he  hotly  de- 
parted with  some  followers  from  his  father's  court,  and 
endeavoured  to  take  the  Castle  of  Eouen  by  surprise. 
Failing  in  this,  he  shut  himself  up  in  another  Castle  in 
Normandy,  which  the  King  besieged,  and  where  Eobert 
one  day  unhorsed  and  nearly  killed  him  without  knowing 
who  he  was.  His  submission  when  he  discovered  his  father, 
and  the  intercession  of  the  Queen  and  others,  reconciled 
them;  but  not  soundly;  for  Eobert  soon  strayed  abroad, 
and  went  from  court  to  court  with  his  complaints.  He  was 
a  gay,  careless,  thoughtless  fellow,  spending  all  he  got  on 


A  CHILD  S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  49 

musicians  and  dancers;  but  his  mother  loved  him,  and 
often,  against  the  King's  command,  supplied  him  with 
money  through  a  messenger  named  Samson.  At  length 
the  incensed  King  swore  he  would  tear  out  Samson's  eyes; 
and  Samson,  thinking  that  his  only  hope  of  safety  was  in 
becoming  a  monk,  became  one,  went  on  such  errands  no 
more,  and  kept  his  eyes  in  his  head. 

All  this  time,  from  the  turbulent  day  of  his  strange  coro- 
nation, the  Conqueror  had  been  struggling,  you  see,  at  any 
cost  of  cruelty  and  bloodshed,  to  maintain  what  he  had 
seized.  All  his  reign,  he  struggled  still,  with  the  same 
object  ever  before  him.  He  was  a  stern  bold  man,  and  he 
succeeded  in  it. 

He  loved  money,  and  was  particular  in  his  eating,  but  he 
had  only  leisure  to  indulge  one  other  passion,  and  that  was 
his  love  of  hunting.  He  carried  it  to  such  a  height  that  he 
ordered  whole  villages  and  towns  to  be  swept  away  to  make 
forests  for  the  deer.  Not  satisfied  with  sixty-eight  Royal 
Forests,  he  laid  waste  an  immense  district,  to  form  another 
in  Hampshire,  called  the  New  Forest.  The  many  thou- 
sands of  miserable  peasants  who  saw  their  little  houses 
pulled  down,  and  themselves  and  children  turned  into  the 
open  country  without  a  shelter,  detested  him  for  his  merci- 
less addition  to  their  many  sufferings ;  and  when,  in  the 
twenty-first  year  of  his  reign  (which  proved  to  be  the  last), 
he  went  over  to  Rouen,  England  was  as  full  of  hatred 
against  him,  as  if  every  leaf  on  every  tree  in  all  his  Royal 
Forests  had  been  a  curse  upon  his  head.  In  the  New  For- 
est, his  son  Richard  (for  he  had  four  sons)  had  been  gored 
to  death  by  a  Stag ;  and  the  people  said  that  this  so  cruelly- 
made  Forest  would  yet  be  fatal  to  others  of  the  Conqueror's 
race. 

He  was  engaged  in  a  dispute  with  the  King  of  France 
about  some  territory.  Wliile  he  stayed  at  Rouen,  negotiat- 
ing with  that  King,  he  kept  his  bed  and  took  medicines : 
being  advised  by  his  physicians  to  do  so,  on  account  of 
having  grown  to  an  unwieldly  size.  Word  being  brought 
to  him  that  the  King  of  France  made  light  of  this,  and 
joked  about  it;,  he  swore  in  a  great  rage  that  he  should  rue 
his  jests.  He  assembled  his  army,  marched  into  the  dis- 
puted territoi-y,  burnt — his  old  way  !^-the  vines,  the  crops, 
and  fruit,  and  set  the  town  of  Mantes  on  fire.  But, 
in  an  evil  hour;  for,  as  he  rode  over  the  hot  ruins, 
4 


90  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAM). 

his  horse,  setting  his  hoofs  upon  some  burning  embers, 
started,  threw  him  forward  against  the  pommel  of  the  sad- 
dle, and  gave  him  a  mortal  hurt.  For  six  weeks  he  lay 
dying  in  a  monastery  near  Rouen,  and  then  made  his  will, 
giving  England  to  William,  Normandy  to  Robert,  and  five 
thousand  pounds  to  Henry.  And  now,  his  violent  deeds 
lay  heavy  on  his  mind.  He  ordered  money  to  be  given  to 
many  English  churches  and  monasteries,  and— which  was 
much  better  repentance — released  his  prisoners  of  state, 
some  of  whom  had  been  confined  in  his  dungeons  twenty 
years. 

It  was  a  September  morning,  and  the  sun  was  rising, 
when  the  King  was  awakened  from  slumber  by  the  sound 
of  a  church  bell.  "  What  bell  is  that?  "  he  faintly  asked. 
They  told  him  it  was  the  bell  of  the  chapel  of  Saint  Mary. 
"I  commend  my  soul,"  said  he,  "to  Mary!  "  and  died. 

Think  of  his  name,  The  Conqueror,  and  then  consider 
how  he  lay  in  death !  The  moment  he  was  dead,  his  phy- 
sicians, priests,  and  nobles,  not  knowing  what  contest  for 
the  throne  might  now  take  place,  or  what  might  happen  in 
it,  hastened  away,  each  man  for  himself  and  his  own  prop- 
erty;  the  mercenary  servants  of  the  court  began  to  rob  and 
plunder ;  the  body  of  the  King,  in  the  indecent  strife,  was 
rolled  from  the  bed,  and  lay  alone,  for  hours,  upon  the 
ground.  O  Conqueror,  of  whom  so  many  great  names  are 
proud  now,  of  whom  so  many  great  names  thought  nothing 
then,  it  were  better  to  have  conquered  one  true  heart,  than 
England ! 

By-and-bye,  the  priests  came  creeping  in  with  prayers 
and  candles ;  and  a  good  knight,  named  Hebluin,  under- 
took (which  no  one  else  would  do)  to  convey  the  body  to 
Caen,  in  Normandy,  in  order  that  it  might  be  buried  in  St, 
Stephen's  church  there,  which  the  Conqueror  had  founded. 
But  fire,  of  which  he  had  made  such  bad  use  in  his  life, 
seemed  to  follow  him  of  itself  in  death.  A  great  conflagra- 
tion broke  out  in  the  town  when  the  body  was  placed  in 
the  church ;  and  those  present  running  out  to  extinguish 
the  flames,  it  was  once  again  left  alone. 

It  was  not  even  buried  in  peace.  It  was  about  to  be  let 
down,  in  its  Royal  robes,  into  a  tomb  near  the  higli  altar, 
in  presence  of  a  great  concourse  of  people,  when  a  lond 
voice  in  the  crowd  cried  out,  "This  ground  is  mine!  Upon 
it,  stood  my  father's  house.     This  King  despoiled  me  of 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  51 

both  ground  and  house  to  build  this  church.  In  the  great 
name  of  God,  I  here  forbid  his  body  to  be  covered  with 
the  earth  that  is  my  right ! "  The  priests  and  bishops 
present,  knowing  the  speaker's  right,  and  knowing  that 
the  King  had  often  denied  him  justice,  paid  him  down  sixty 
shillings  for  the  grave.  Even  then,  the  corpse  was  not  at 
rest.  The  tomb  was  too  small,  and  they  tried  to  force  it 
in.  It  broke,  a  dreadful  smell  arose,  the  people  hurried 
out  ipto  the  air,  and,  for  the  third  time,  it  was  left  alone. 
Where  were  the  Conqueror's  three  sons,  that  they  were 
not  at  their  father's  burial?  Robert  was  lounging  among 
minstrels,  dancers,  and  gamesters,  in  France  or  Germany. 
Henry  was  carrying  his  five  thousand  pounds  safely  away 
in  a  convenient  chest  he  had  got  made.  William  the  Red 
was  hurrying  to  England,  to  lay  hands  upon  the  Royal 
treasure  and  the  crown. 


CHAPTER    IX. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  WILLIAM  THE  SECOND,  CALLED 
RUFUS. 

William  the  Red,  in  breathless  haste,  secured  the  three 
great  forts  of  Dover,  Pevensey,  and  Hastings,  and  made 
with  hot  speed  for  Winchester,  where  the  Royal  treasure 
was  kept.  The  treasurer  delivering  him  the  keys,  he  found 
that  it  amounted  to  sixty  thousand  pounds  in  silver,  be- 
sides gold  and  jewels.  Possessed  of  this  wealth,  he  soon 
persuaded  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  to  crown  him,  and 
became  William  the  Second,  King  of  England. 

Rufus  was  no  sooner  on  the  throne,  than  he  ordered  into 
prison  again  the  unhappy  state  captives  wlioni  his  father 
had  set  free,  and  directed  a  goldsmith  to  ornament  his 
father's  tomb  profusely  with  gold  and  silver.  It  would 
have  been  more  dutiful  in  him  to  have  attended  the  sick 
Conqueror  when  he  was  dying;  but  England,  itself,  like 
this  Red  King,  who  once  governed  it,  has  sometimes  made 
expensive  tombs  for  dead  men  whom  it  treated  shabbily 
when  they  were  alive. 

The  King's  brother,  Uobertof  i>lormandy,  seeming  quite 


52  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

content  to  be  only  Duke  of  that  country;  and  the  King's 
other  brother,  Fine-Scholar,  being  quiet  enough  with  his 
five  thousand  pounds  in  a  chest;  the  King  flattered  him- 
self, we  may  suppose,  with  the  hope  of  an  easy  reign.  But 
easy  reigns  were  difficult  to  have  in  those  days.  The  tur- 
bulent Bishop  Odo  (who  had  blessed  the  Norman  army  at 
the  Battle  of  Hastings,  and  who,  I  dare  say,  took  all  the 
credit  of  the  victory  to  himself)  soon  began,  in  concert 
with  some  powerful  Norman  nobles,  to  trouble  the  Eed 
King. 

The  truth  seems  to  be  that  this  bishop  and  his  friends, 
who  had  lands  in  England  and  lands  in  Normandy,  wished 
to  hold  both  under  one  Sovereign ;  and  greatly  preferred  a 
thoughtless  good-natured  person,  such  as  Robert  was,  to 
Rufus ;  who,  though  far  from  being  an  amiable  man  in  any 
respect,  was  keen,  and  not  to  be  imposed  upon.  They  de- 
clared in  Robert's  favour,  and  retired  to  their  castles  (those 
castles  were  very  troublesome  to  kings)  in  a  sullen  humour. 
The  Red  King,  seeing  the  Normans  thus  falling  from  him, 
revenged  himself  upon  them  by  appealing  to  the  English ; 
to  whom  he  made  a  variety  of  promises,  which  he  never 
meant  to  perform — in  particular,  promises  to  soften  the 
cruelty  of  the  Forest  Laws ;  and  who,  in  return,  so  aided 
him  with  their  valour,  that  Odd  was  besieged  in  the  Castle 
of  Rochester,  and  forced  to  abandon  it,  and  to  depart  from 
England  for  ever :  whereupon  the  other  rebellious  Norman 
nobles  were  soon  reduced  and  scattered. 

Then,  the  Red  King  went  over  to  Normandy,  where  the 
people  suffered  greatly  under  the  loose  rule  of  Duke  Robert. 
The  King's  object  was  to  seize  upon  the  Duke's  dominions. 
This,  the  Duke,  of  course,  prepared  to  resist;  and  miser- 
able war  between  the  two  brothers  seemed  inevitable,  when 
the  powerful  nobles  on  both  sides,  who  had  seen  so  much 
of  war,  interfered  to  prevent  it.  A  treaty  was  made. 
Each  of  the  two  brothers  agreed  to  give  up  something  of 
his  claims,  and  that  the  longer-liver  of  the  two  should  in- 
herit all  the  dominions  of  the  other.  When  they  had 
come  to  this  loving  understanding,  they  embraced  and 
joined  their  forces  against  Fine-Scholar ;  who  had  bought 
some  territory  of  Robert  with  a  part  of  his  five  thou- 
sand pounds,  and  was  considered  a  dangerous  individual  in 
consequence 

St.  Michael's  Mount,  in  Normandy  (there  is  another  St. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  33 

Michael's  Mount,  in  Cornwall,  wonderfully  like  it),  was 
then,  as  it  is  now,  a  strong  place  perched  upon  the  top  of 
a  high  rock,  around  which,  when  the  tide  is  in,  the  sea 
flows,  leaving  no  road  to  the  mainland.  In  this  place, 
Fine-Scholar  shut  himself  up  with  his  soldiers,  and  here  he 
was  closely  besieged  by  his  two  brothers.  At  one  time, 
when  he  was  reduced  to  great  distress  for  want  of  water, 
the  generous  Robert  not  only  permitted  his  men  to  get 
water,  but  sent  Fine-Scholar  wine  from  his  own  table ;  and, 
on  being  remonstrated  with  by  the  Red  King,  said, 
"  What !  shall  we  let  our  own  brother  die  of  thirst?  Where 
shall  we  get  anothei-,  when  he  is  gone?  "  At  another  time, 
the  Red  King  riding  alone  on  the  shore  of  the  bay,  looking 
up  at  the  Castle,  was  taken  by  two  of  Fine-Scholar's  men, 
one  of  whom  was  about  to  kill  him,  when  he  cried  out, 
"Hold,  knave!  I  am  the  King  of  England!"  The  story 
says  that  the  soldier  raised  him  from  the  ground  respect- 
fully and  humbly,  and  that  the  King  took  him  into  his 
service.  The  story  may  or  may  not  be  true ;  but  at  any 
rate  it  is  true  that  Fine-Scholar  could  not  hold  out  against 
his  united  brothers,  and  that  he  abandoned  Mount  St. 
Michael,  and  wandered  about — as  poor  and  forlorn  as  other 
scholars  liave  been  sometimes  known  to  be. 

The  Scotch  became  unquiet  in  the  Red  King's  time,  and 
were  twice  defeated — the  second  time,  with  the  loss  of 
their  King,  IVIalcolm,  and  his  son.  The  Welsh  became  un- 
quiet too.  Against  them,  Rufus  was  less  successful ;  for 
they  fought  among  their  native  mountains,  and  did  great 
execution  on  the  King's  troops.  Robert  of  Normandy  be- 
came unquiet  too ;  and,  complaining  that  his  brother  the 
King  did  not  faithfully  perform  his  part  of  their  agree- 
ment, took  up  arms,  and  obtained  assistance  from  the  King 
of  France,  whom  Rufus,  in  the  end,  bought  off  with  vast 
sums  of  money.  England  became  unquiet  too.  Lord 
Mowbray,  the  powerful  Earl  of  Northumberland,  headed  a 
great  conspiracy  to  depose  the  King,  and  to  place  upon  the 
throne,  Stephen,  the  Conqueror's  near  relative.  The  plot 
was  discovered;  all  the  chief  conspirators  were  seized; 
some  were  fined,  some  were  put  in  prison,  some  were  put 
to  death.  The  Earl  of  Northumberland  himself  was  shut 
up  in  a  dungeon  beneath  Windsor  Castle,  where  he  died, 
an  old  man,  thirty  long  years  afterwards.  The  Priests  in 
England  were  more  unquiet  than  any  other  class  or  power; 


54  A   CHILD'S  PIISTORY   OF  ENGLAND. 

for  the  Red  King  treated  them  with  such  small  ceremony 
that  he  refused  to  appoint  new  bishops  or  archbishops 
when  the  old  oues  died,  but  kept  all  the  wealth  belonging 
to  those  olticers  in  his  own  hands.  In  return  for  this,  the 
Priests  wrote  his  life  when  he  was  dead,  and  abused  him 
well.  I  am  inclined  to  think,  myself,  that  there  was  little 
to  choose  between  the  Priests  and  the  Red  King;  that  both 
sides  were  greedy  and  designing;  and  that  they  were  fairly 
matched. 

The  Red  King  was  false  of  heart,  selfish,  covetous,  and 
mean.  He  had  a  worthy  minister  in  his  favourite,  Ralph, 
nicknamed — for  almost  every  famous  person  had  a  ni<;k- 
name  in  those  rough  days — Flambard,  or  the  Firebrand. 
Once,  the  King  being  ill,  became  penitent,  and  made  Ax- 
SELM,  a  foreign  priest  and  a  good  man,  Archbishop  of  Can- 
terbury. But  he  no  sooner  got  well  again  than  he  repented 
of  his  repentance,  and  persisted  in  wrongfully  keeping  to 
himself  some  of  the  wealth  belonging  to  the  archbishopric 
This  led  to  violent  disputes,  which  were  aggravated  by 
there  being  in  Rome  at  that  time  two  rival  Popes;  each  of 
whom  declared  he  was  the  only  real  original  infallible 
Pope,  who  couldn't  make  a  mistake.  At  last,  Anselm, 
knowing  the  Red  King's  character,  and  not  feeling  himself 
safe  in  England,  asked  leave  to  return  abroad.  The  Ri^d 
King  gladly  gave  it ;  for  he  knew  that  as  soon  as  Anselm 
was  gone,  he  could  begin  to  store  up  all  the  Canterbury 
money  again,  for  his  own  use. 

By  such  means,  and  by  taxing  and  oppre«5sing  the  Eng- 
lish people  in  every  possible  way,  the  Red  King  became 
very  rich.  When  he  wanted  money  for  any  purpose,  he 
raised  it  by  some  means  or  other,  and  cared  nothing  for  the 
injustice  he  did,  or  the  misery  he  caused.  Having  the  op- 
portunity of  buying  from  Robert  the  whole  duchy  of  Nor- 
man dj'-  for  five  years,  he  taxed  the  English  people  more 
than  ever,  and  made  the  very  convents  sell  their  plate  and 
valuables  to  supply  him  with  the  means  to  make  the  pur- 
chase. But  lie  was  as  quick  and  eager  in  putting  down 
revolt  as  he  was  in  raising  money;  for.  a  part  of  the 
Norman  people  objecting— very  naturally,  I  think — to  being 
sold  in  this  way,  he  headed  an  army  against  them  with  all 
the  speed  and  energy  of  his  father.  He  was  so  impatient, 
that  he  embarked  for  Normandy  in  a  great  gale  of  wind. 
And  when  the  sailors  told  him  it  was  dangerous  to  go  to 


LEADERS   OF  THE   FIRST  CRUSADE. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  55 

sea  in  such  angry  weather,  he  replied,  "Hoist  sail  and 
away !     Did  you  ever  hear  of  a  king  who  was  drowned?  " 

You  will  wonder  how  it  was  that  even  the  careless  Robert 
came  to  sell  his  dominions.  It  happened  thus.  It  had 
long  been  the  custom  for  many  English  people  to  make 
journeys  to  Jerusalem,  which  were  called  pilgrimages,  in 
order  that  they  might  pray  beside  the  tomb  of  Our  Saviour 
there.  Jerusalem  belonging  to  the  Turks,  and  the  Turks 
hating  Christianity,  these  Christian  travellers  were  often 
insulted  and  ill  used.  The  Pilgrims  bore  it  patiently  for 
some  time,  but  at  length  a  remarkable  man,  of  great  ear- 
nestness and  eloquence,  called  Peter  the  Hermit,  began 
to  preach  in  various  places  against  the  Turks,  and  to  de- 
clare that  it  was  the  duty  of  good  Christians  to  drive  away 
those  unbelievers  from  the  tomb  of  Our  Saviour,  and  to 
take  possession  of  it,  and  protect  it.  An  excitement  such 
as  the  world  had  never  known  before  was  created.  Thou- 
sands and  thousands  of  men  of  all  ranks  and  conditions  de- 
parted for  Jerusalem  to  make  war  against  the  Turks.  The 
war  is  called  in  history  the  first  Crusade ;  and  every  Cru- 
sader wore  a  cross  marked  on  his  right  shoulder. 

All  the  Crusaders  were  not  zealous  Christians.  Among 
them  were  vast  numbers  of  the  restless,  idle,  profligate,  and 
adventurous  spirits  of  the  time.  Some  became  Crusaders 
for  the  love  of  change ;  some,  in  the  hope  of  plunder ;  some, 
because  they  had  nothing  to  do  at  home ;  some,  iDecause 
they  did  what  the  priests  told  them ;  some,  because  they 
liked  to  see  foreign  countries;  some,  because  they  were 
fond  of  knocking  men  about,  and  would  as  soon  knock  a 
Turk  about  as  a  Christian.  Robert  of  Normandy  may  have 
been  influenced  by  all  these  motives;  and  by  a  kind  desire, 
besides,  to  save  the  Christian  Pilgrims  from  bad  treatment 
in  future.  He  wanted  to  raise  a  number  of  armed  men, 
and  to  go  to  the  Crusade.  He  could  not  do  so  without 
money.  He  had  no  money;  and  he  sold  his  dominions  to 
his  brother,  the  Red  King,  for  five  years.  With  the  large 
sum  he  thus  obtained,  he  fitted  out  his  Crusaders  gallantly, 
and  went  away  to  Jerusalem  in  martial  state.  The  Red 
King,  who  made  money  out  of  everything,  stayed  at  home, 
busily  squeezing  more  money  out  of  Normans  and  English. 

After  three  years  of  great  hardship  and  suffering — from 
shipwreck  at  sea;  from  travel  in  strange  lands;  from  hun- 
ger, thirsty  and  fever,  upon  the  burning  sands  of  the  desert  j 


56  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

and  from  the  fury  of  the  Turks — the  valiant  Crusaders  got 
possession  of  Our  Saviour's  tomb.  The  Turks  were  still 
resisting  and  fighting  bravely,  but  this  success  increased  the 
general  desire  in  Europe  to  join  the  Crusade.  Another 
great  French  Duke  was  proposing  to  sell  his  dominions  for 
a  term  to  the  rich  Hed  King,  when  the  Red  King's  reign 
came  to  a  sudden  and  violent  end. 

You  ha'»e  not  forgotten  the  New  Forest  which  the  Con- 
queror made,  and  which  the  miserable  people  whose  homes 
he  had  laid  waste,  so  hated.  The  cruelty  of  the  Forest 
Laws,  and  the  torture  and  death  they  brought  upon  the 
peasantry,  increased  this  hatred.  The  poor  persecuted 
country  people  believed  that  the  New  Forest  was  enchanted. 
They  said  that  in  thunder-storms,  and  on  dark  nights,  de- 
mons appeared,  moving  beneath  the  branches  of  the  gloomy 
trees.  They  said  that  a  terrible  spectre  had  foretold  to 
Norman  hunters  that  the  Eed  King  should  be  punished 
there.  And  now,  in  the  pleasant  season  of  May,  when  the 
Red  King  had  reigned  almost  thirteen  years ;  and  a  second 
Prince  of  the  Conqueror's  blood — another  Richard,  the  son 
of  Duke  Robert — was  killed  by  an  arrow  in  this  dreaded 
Forest ;  the  people  said  that  the  second  time  was  not  the 
last,  and  that  there  was  another  death  to  come. 

It  was  a  lonely  forest,  accursed  in  the  people's  hearts 
for  the  wicked  deeds  that  had  been  done  to  make  it ;  and 
no  man  save  the  King  and  his  Courtiers  and  Huntsmen, 
liked  to  stray  there.  But,  in  reality,  it  was  like  any  other 
forest.  In  the  spring,  the  green  leaves  broke  out  of  the 
buds;  in  the  summer,  flourished  heartily,  and  made  deep 
shades ;  in  the  winter,  shrivelled  and  blew  down,  and  lay 
in  brown  heaps  on  the  moss.  Some  trees  were  stately,  and 
grew  high  and  strong;  some  had  fallen  of  themselves; 
some  were  felled  by  the  forester's  axe;  some  were  hollow, 
and  the  rabbits  burrowed  at  their  roots ;  some  few  were 
struck  by  lightning,  and  stood  white  and  bare.  There  were 
hill-sides  covered  with  rich  fern,  on  which  the  morning 
dew  so  beautifully  sparkled;  there  were  brooks,  where  the 
deer  went  down  to  drink,  or  over  which  the  whole  herd 
bounded,  flying  from  the  arrows  of  the  huntsmen;  there 
were  sunny  glades,  and  solemn  places  where  but  little  light 
came  through  the  rustling  leaves.  The  songs  of  the  birds 
in  the  New  Forest  were  pleasanter  to  hear  than  the  shouts 
of  fighting  men  outside ;  and  even  when  the  Red  King  and 


A  CHILD  S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  57 

his  Court  came  hunting  through  its  solitudes,  cursing  loud 
and  riding  hard,  with  a  jingling  of  stirrups  and  bridles  and 
knives  and  daggers,  they  did  much  less  harm  there  than 
among  the  English  or  Normans,  and  the  stags  died  (as 
they  lived)  far  easier  than  the  people. 

Upon  a  day  in  August,  the  Red  King,  now  reconciled  to 
his  brother,  Fine-Scholar,  came  with  a  great  train  to  hunt 
in  the  New  Forest.  Fine-Scholar  was  of  the  party.  They 
were  a  merry  party,  and  had  lain  all  night  at  Malwood- 
Keep,  a  hunting-lodge  in  the  forest,  where  they  had  made 
good  cheer,  both  at  supper  and  breakfast,  and  had  drunk 
a  deal  of  wine.  The  party  dispersed  in  various  directions, 
as  the  custom  of  hunters  then  was.  The  King  took  with 
him  only  Sir  Walter  Tyrrel,  who  was  a  famous  sports- 
man, and  to  whom  he  had  given,  before  they  mounted 
horse  that  morning,  two  fine  arrows. 

The  last  time  the  King  was  ever  seen  alive,  he  was  rid- 
ing with  Sir  Walter  Tyrrel, .and  their  dogs  were  hunting 
together. 

It  was  almost  night,  when  a  poor  charcoal-burner,  pass- 
ing through  the  forest  with  his  cart,  came  upon  the  solitary 
body  of  a  dead  man,  shot  with  an  arrow  in  the  breast,  and 
still  bleeding.  He  got  it  into  his  cart.  It  was  the  body 
of  the  King.  Shaken  and  tumbled,  with  its  red  beard  all 
whitened  with  lime  and  clotted  with  blood,  it  was  driven 
in  the  cart  by  the  charcoal-burner  next  day  to  Winchester 
Cathedral,  where  it  was  received  and  buried. 

Sir  Walter  Tyrrel,  who  escaped  to  Normandy,  and 
claimed  the  protection  of  the  King  of  France,  swore  in 
France  that  the  Red  King  was  suddenly  shot  dead  by  an 
arrow  from  an  unseen  hand,  while  they  were  hunting  to- 
gether ;  that  he  was  fearful  of  being  suspected  as  the  King's 
murderer;  and  that  he  instantly  set  spurs  to  his  horse,  and 
fled  to  the  sea-shore.  Others  declared  that  the  King  and 
Sir  Walter  Tyrrel  were  hunting  in  company,  a  little  before 
sunset,  standing  in  bushes  opposite  one  another,  when  a 
stag  came  between  them.  That  the  King  drew  his  bow 
and  took  aim,  but  the  string  broke.  That  the  King  then 
cried,  "  Shoot,  Walter,  in  the  Devil's  name !  "  That  Sir 
Walter  shot.  That  the  arrow  glanced  against  a  tree,  was 
turned  aside  from  the  stag,  and  struck  the  King  from  his 
horse,  dead. 

By  whose  hand  the  Red  King  really  fell,  and  whether 


58  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

that  hand  despatched  the  arrow  to  his  breast  by  accident  or 
by  design,  is  only  known  to  God.  Some  think  his  brother 
may  have  caused  him  to  be  killed ;  but  the  Red  King  had 
made  so  many  enemies,  both  among  priests  and  people, 
that  suspicion  may  reasonably  rest  upon  a  less  unnatural 
murderer.  Men  know  no  more  than  that  he  was  found 
dead  in  the  New  Forest,  which  the  suffering  people  had 
regarded  as  a  doomed  ground  for  his  race. 


CHAPTER   X. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  HENRY  THE  FIRST,  CALLED  FINE- 
SCHOLAR. 

Fine-Scholar,  on  hearing  of  the  Red  King's  death,  hur- 
ried to  Winchester  with  as  much  speed  as  Rufus  himself 
had  made,  to  seize  the  Royal  treasure.  But  the  keeper  of 
the  treasure,  who  had  been  one  of  the  hunting-party  in  the 
Forest,  made  haste  to  Winchester  too,  and,  arriving  there 
at  about  the  same  time,  refused  to  yield  it  up.  Upon  this, 
Fine-Scholar  drew  his  sword,  and  threatened  to  kill  the 
treasurer ;  who  might  have  paid  for  his  fidelity  with  his 
life,  but  that  he  knew  longer  resistance  to  be  useless  when 
he  found  the  Prince  supported  by  a  company  of  powerful 
barons,  who  declared  they  were  determined  to  make  him 
King.  The  treasurer,  therefore,  gave  up  the  money  and 
jewels  of  the  Crown :  and  on  the  third  day  after  the  death 
of  the  Red  King,  being  a  Sunday,  Fine-Scholar  stood  be- 
fore the  high  altar  in  Westminster  Abbey,  and  made  a  sol- 
emn declaration  that  he  would  resign  the  Church  property 
which  his  brother  had  seized ;  that  he  would  do  no  wrong 
to  the  nobles;  and  that  he  would  restore  to  the  people  the 
laws  of  Edward  the  Confessor,  with  all  the  improvements 
of  William  the  Conqueror.  So  began  the  reign  of  King 
Henry  the  First. 

The  people  were  attached  to  their  new  King,  both  be- 
cause he  had  known  distresses,  and  because  he  was  an  Eng- 
lishman by  birth  and  not  a  Norman.  To  strengthen  this 
last  hold  upon  them,  the  King  wished  to  marry  an  English 
lady ;  and  could  think  of  no    other  wife  than  Maud  the 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND.  59 

Good,  the  daughter  of  the  King  of  Scotland.  Although 
this  good  Princess  did  not  love  the  King,  she  was  so  affected 
by  the  representations  the  nobles  made  to  her  of  the  great 
charity  it  would  be  in  her  to  unite  the  Korman  and  Saxon 
races,  and  prevent  hatred  and  bloodshed  between  them  for 
the  future,  that  she  consented  to  become  his  wife.  After 
some  disputing  among  the  priests,  who  said  that  as  she  had 
been  in  a  convent  in  her  youth,  and  had  worn  the  veil  of  a 
nun,  she  could  not  lawfully  be  married — against  which  the 
Princess  stated  that  her  aunt,  with  whom  she  had  lived  in 
her  youth,  had  indeed  sometimes  thrown  a  piece  of  black 
stuff  over  her,  but  for  no  other  reason  than  because  the 
nan's  veil  was  the  only  dress  the  conquering  Normans  re- 
spected in  girl  or  woman,  and  not  because  she  had  taken 
the  vows  of  a  nun,  which  she  never  had — she  was  declared 
free  to  marry,  and  was  made  King  Henry's  Queen.  A 
good  Queen  she  was;  beautiful,  kind-hearted,  and  worthy 
of  a  better  husband  than  the  King. 

For  he  was  a  cunning  and  unscrupulous  man,  though 
firm  and  clever.  He  cared  very  little  for  his  word,  and 
took  any  means  to  gain  his  ends.  All  this  is  shown  in  his 
treatment  of  his  brother  Robert — Eobert,  who  had  suffered 
him  to  be  refreshed  with  water,  and  who  had  sent  him  the 
wine  from  his  own  table,  when  he  was  shut  up,  with  the 
crows  flying  below  him,  parched  with  thirst,  in  the  castle 
on  the  top  of  St.  Michael's  Mount,  where  his  Red  brother 
would  have  let  him  die. 

Before  the  King  began  to  deal  with  Robert,  he  removed 
and  disgraced  all  the  favourites  of  the  late  King;  who 
were  for  the  most  part  base  characters,  much  detested  by 
the  people  Flambard,  or  Firebrand,  whom  the  late  King 
had  made  Bishop  of  Durham,  of  all  things  in  the  world, 
Henry  imprisoned  in  the  Tower;  but  Firebrand  was  a  great 
joker  and  a  jolly  companion,  and  made  himself  so  popular 
with  his  guards  that  they  pretended  to  know  nothing  about 
a  long  rope  that  was  sent  into  his  prison  at  the  bottom  of 
a  deep  flagon  of  wine.  The  guards  took  the  wine,  and 
Firebrand  took  the  rope ;  with  which,  when  they  were  fast 
asleep,  he  let  himself  down  from  a  window  in  the  night, 
and  so  got  cleverly  aboard  ship  and  away  to  Normandy. 

Now  Robert,  when  his  brother  Fine-Scholar  came  to  the 
throne,  was  still  absent  in  the  Holy  Land.  Henry  pre- 
tended that  Robert  had  keen  made  Sovereign  of  that  coun- 


.60  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

try ;  and  he  had  been  away  so  long,  that  the  ignorant  people 
believed  it.  But,  behold,  when  Henry  had  been  some  time 
King  of  England,  Kobert  came  home  to  Normandy ;  having 
leisurely  returned  from  Jerusalem  through  Italy,  in  which 
beautiful  country  he  had  enjoyed  himself  very  much,  and 
had  married  a  lady  as  beautiful  as  itself !  In  Normandy, 
he  found  Firebrand  waiting  to  urge  him  to  assert  his  claim 
to  the  English  crown,  and  declare  war  against  King  Henry. 
This,  after  great  loss  of  time  in  feasting  and  dancing  with 
his  beautiful  Italian  wife  among  his  Norman  friends,  he  at 
last  did. 

The  English  in  general  were  on  King  Henry's  side, 
though  many  of  the  Normans  were  on  Robert's.  But  the 
English  sailors  deserted  the  King,  and  took  a  great  part  of 
the  English  fleet  over  to  Normandy ;  so  that  Robert  came 
to  invade  this  country  in  no  foreign  vessels,  but  in  English 
ships.  The  virtuous  Anselm,  however,  whom  Henry  had 
invited  back  from  abroad,  and  made  Archbishop  of  Canter- 
bury, was  steadfast  in  the  King's  cause ;  and  it  was  so  well 
supported  that  the  two  armies,  instead  of  fighting,  made  a 
peace.  Poor  Robert,  who  trusted  anybody  and  everybody, 
readily  trusted  his  larother,  the  King;  and  agreed  to  go 
home  and  receive  a  pension  from  England,  on  condition 
that  all  his  followers  were  fully  pardoned.  This  the  King 
very  faithfully  promised,  but  Robert  was  no  sooner  gone 
than  he  began  to  punish  them. 

Among  them  was  the  Earl  of  Shrewsbury,  who,  on  being 
summoned  by  the  King  to  answer  to  five-and-forty  accusa- 
tions, rode  away  to  one  of  his  strong  castles,  shut  himself 
up  therein,  called  around  him  his  tenants  and  vassals,  and 
fought  for  his  liberty,  but  was  defeated  and  banished. 
Robert,  with  all  his  faults,  was  so  true  to  his  word,  that 
when  he  first  heard  of  this  nobleman  having  risen  against 
his  brother,  he  laid  waste  the  Earl  of  Shrewsbury's  estates 
in  Normandy,  to  show  the  King  that  he  would  favour  no 
breach  of  their  treaty.  Finding,  on  better  information, 
afterwards,  that  the  Earl's  only  crime  was  having  been  his 
friend,  he  came  over  to  England,  in  his  old  thoughtless 
warm-hearted  way,  to  intercede  with  the  King,  and  remind 
him  of  the  solemn  promise  to  pardon  all  his  followers. 

This  confidence  might  have  put  the  false  King  to  the 
blush,  but  it  did  not.  Pretending  to  be  very  friendly,  he 
so  surrounded  his  brother  with  spies  and  traps,  that  Robert, 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  61 

who  was  quite  in  his  power,  had  nothing  for  it  but  to  re- 
nounce his  pension  and  escape  while  he  could.  Getting 
home  to  Normandy,  and  understanding  the  King  better 
now,  he  naturally  allied  himself  with  his  old  friend  the 
Earl  of  Shrewsbury,  who  had  still  thirty  castles  in  that 
country.  This  was  exactly  what  Henry  wanted.  He  im- 
mediately declared  that  Robert  had  broken  the  treaty,  and 
next  year  invaded  Normandy. 

He  pretended  that  he  came  to  deliver  the  Normans,  at 
their  own  request,  from  his  brother's  misrule.  There  is 
reason  to  fear  that  his  misrule  was  bad  enough ;  for  his 
beautiful  wife  had  died,  leaving  him  with  an  infant  son, 
and  his  court  was  again  so  careless,  dissipated,  and  ill- 
regulated,  that  it  was  said  he  sometimes  lay  iu  bed  of  a  day 
for  want  of  clothes  to  put  on — his  attendants  having  stolen 
all  his  dresses.  But  he  headed  his  army  like  a  brave  prince 
and  a  gallant  soldier,  though  he  had  the  misfortune  to  be 
taken  prisoner  by  King  Henry,  with  four  hundred  of  his 
Knights.  Among  them  was  poor  harmless  Edgar  Atheling, 
who  loved  Robert  well.  Edgar  was  not  important  enough 
to  be  severe  with.  The  King  afterwards  gave  him  a  small 
pension,  which  he  lived  upon  and  died  upon,  in  peace, 
among  the  quiet  woods  and  fields  of  England. 

And  Robert — poor,  kind,  generous,  wasteful,  heedless 
Robert,  with  so  many  faults,  and  yet  with  virtues  that 
might  have  made  a  better  and  a  happier  man — what  was 
the  end  of  him?  If  the  King  had  had  the  magnanimity  to 
say  with  a  kind  air,  "  Brother,  tell  me,  before  these  noble- 
men, that  from  this  time  you  will  be  my  faithful  follower 
and  friend,  and  never  raise  your  hand  against  me  or  my 
forces  more !  "  he  might  have  trusted  Robert  to  the  death. 
But  the  King  was  not  a  magnanimous  man.  He  sentenced 
his  brother  to  be  confined  for  life  in  one  of  the  Royal  Cas- 
tles. In  the  beginning  of  his  imprisonment,  he  was  al- 
lowed to  ride  out,  guarded ;  but  he  one  day  broke  away 
from  his  guard  and  galloped  off.  He  had  the  evil  fortune 
to  ride  into  a  swamp,  where  his  horse  stuck  fast  and  he 
was  taken.  When  the  King  heard  of  it  he  ordered  him  to 
be  blinded,  which  was  done  by  putting  a  red-hot  metal 
basin  on  his  eyes. 

And  so,  in  darkness  and  in  prison,  many  years,  he 
thought  of  all  his  past  life,  of  the  time  he  had  wasted,  of 
the  treasure  he  had  squandered,  of  the  opportunities  he 


62  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAJiTD. 

had  lost,  of  the  youth  he  had  thrown  away,  of  the  talents 
he  had  neglected.  Sometimes,  on  fine  autumn  mornings, 
he  would  sit  and  think  of  the  old  hunting  parties  in  the 
free  Forest,  where  he  had  been  the  foremost  and  the  gayest. 
Sometimes,  in  the  still  nights,  he  would  wake,  and  mourn 
for  the  many  nights  that  had  stolen  past  him  at  the  gam- 
ing-table ;  sometimes,  would  seem  to  hear,  upon  the  melan- 
choly wind,  the  old  songs  of  the  minstrels;  sometimes, 
would  dream,  in  his  blindness,  of  the  light  and  glitter  of 
the  Norman  Court.  Many  and  many  a  time,  he  groped 
back,  in  his  fancy,  to  Jerusalem,  where  he  had  fouglit  so 
well;  or,  at  the  head  of  his  brave  companions,  bowed  his 
feathered  helmet  to  the  shouts  of  welcome  greeting  him  in 
Italy,  and  seemed  again  to  walk  among  the  sunny  vine- 
yards, or  on  the  shore  of  the  blue  sea,  with  his  lovely  wife. 
And  then,  thinking  of  her  grave,  and  of  his  fatherless  boy, 
he  would  stretch  out  his  solitary  arms  and  weep. 

At  length,  one  day,  there  lay  in  prison,  dead,  with  cruel 
and  disfiguring  scars  upon  his  eyelids,  bandaged  from  his 
jailer's  sight,  but  on  which  the  eternal  Heavens  looked 
down,  a  worn  old  man  of  eighty.  He  had  once  been 
Robert  of  Normandy.     Pity  him ! 

At  the  time  when  Robert  of  Normandy  was  taken  pris- 
oner by  his  brother,  Robert's  little  son  was  only  five  years 
old.  This  child  was  taken,  too,  and  carried  before  the  King, 
sobbing  and  crying;  for,  young  as  he  was,  he  knew  he  had 
good  reason  to  be  afraid  of  his  Royal  uncle.  The  King 
was  not  much  accustomed  to  pit}''  those  who  were  in  his 
power,  but  his  cold  heart  seemed  for  the  moment  to  soften 
towards  the  boy.  He  was  observed  to  make  a  great  effort, 
as  if  to  prevent  himself  from  being  cruel,  and  order  the 
child  to  be  taken  away;  whereupon  a  certain  Baron,  who 
had  married  a  daughter  of  Duke  Robert's  (by  name,  Helie 
of  Saint  Saen),  took  charge  of  him,  tenderly.  The  King's 
gentleness  did  not  last  long.  Before  two  years  were  over, 
he  sent  messengers  to  this  lord's  Castle  to  seize  the  chil'^ 
and  bring  him  away.  The  Baron  was  not  there  at  the  time, 
but  his  servants  were  faithful,  and  carried  the  boy  oft'  in 
his  sleep  and  hid  him.  When  the  Baron  came  home,  and 
was  told  what  the  King  had  done,  he  took  the  child  abroad, 
and,  leading  him  by  the  hand,  went  from  King  to  King 
and  from  Court  to  Court,  relating  how  the  child  had  a  claim 
CO  the  throne  of  England,  and  how  his  uncle  the  King, 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND  63 

knowing  that  lie  had  that  claim,  would  have  murdered  him, 
perhaps,  but  for  his  escape. 

The  youth  and  innocence  of  the  pretty  little  William 
FiTZ-RoBERT  (for  that  was  his  name)  made  him  many 
friends  at  that  time.  When  he  became  a  young  man,  the 
King  of  France,  uniting  with  the  French  Counts  of  Anjou 
and  Flanders,  supported  his  cause  against  the  King  of 
England,  and  took  many  of  the  King's  towns  and  castles 
in  Normandy.  But,  King  Henry,  artful  and  cunning 
always,  bribed  some  of  William's  friends  with  money, 
some  with  promises,  some  with  power.  He  bought  oif  the 
Count  of  Anjou,  by  proiuising  to  marry  his  eldest  son,  also 
named  William,  to  the  Count's  daughter;  and  indeed  the 
Avhole  trust  of  this  King's  life  was  in  such  bargains,  and 
he  believed  (as  many  another  King  has  done  since,  and  as 
one  King  did  in  France  a  very  little  time  ago)  that  every 
man's  truth  and  honour  can  be  bought  at  some  price.  For 
all  this,  he  was  so  afraid  of  William  Fitz-Robert  and  his 
friends,  that,  for  a  long  time,  he  believed  his  life  to  be  in 
danger ;  and  never  lay  down  to  sleep,  even  in  his  palace 
surrounded  by  his  guards,  without  having  a  sword  and 
buckler  at  his  bedside. 

To  strengthen  his  power,  the  King  with  great  ceremony 
betrothed  his  eldest  daughter  Matilda,  then  a  child  only 
eight  years  old,  to  be  the  wife  of  Henry  the  Fifth,  the  Em- 
peror of  Germany.  To  raise  her  marriage-portion,  he  taxed 
the  English  people  in  a  most  oppressive  manner;  then 
treated  them  to  a  great  procession,  to  restore  their  good 
humour;  and  sent  Matilda  away,  in  fine  state,  with  the 
German  ambassadors,  to  be  educated  in  the  country  of  her 
future  husband. 

And  now  his  Queen,  Maud  the  Good,  unhappily  died. 
It  was  a  sad  thought  for  that  gentle  lady,  that  the  only 
hope  with  which  she  had  married  a  man  whom  she  had 
never  loved — the  hope  of  reconciling  the  Norman  and  Eng- 
lish races — had  failed.  At  the  very  time  of  her  death, 
Normandy  and  all  France  was  in  arms  against  England; 
for,  so  soon  as  his  last  danger  was  over.  King  Henry  had 
been  false  to  all  the  French  powers  he  had  promised,  bribed, 
and  bought,  and  they  had  naturally  united  against  him. 
After  some  fighting,  however,  in  which  few  suffered  but 
the  unhappy  common  people  (who  always  suffered,  whatso- 
ever was  the  matter),  he  began  to  promise,  bribe,  and  buy 


64  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

again ;  and  by  those  means,  and  by  the  help  of  the  PopC; 
who  exerted  himself  to  save  more  bloodshed,  and  by  sol- 
emnly declaring,  over  and  over  again,  that  he  really  was 
in  earnest  this  time,  and  would  keep  his  word,  the  King 
made  peace. 

One  of  the  first  consequences  of  this  peace  was,  that  the 
King  went  over  to  Normandy  with  his  son  Prince  William 
and  a  great  retinue,  to  have  the  Prince  acknowledged  as 
his  successor  by  the  Norman  Nobles,  and  to  contract  the 
promised  marriage  (this  was  one  of  the  many  promises  the 
King  had  broken)  between  him  and  the  daughter  of  the 
Count  of  Anjou.  Both  these  things  were  triumphantly 
done,  with  great  show  and  rejoicing;  and  on  the  twenty- 
fifth  of  November,  in  the  year  one  thousand  one  hundred 
and  twenty,  the  whole  retinue  prepared  to  embark  at  the 
Port  of  Barfleur,  for  the  voyage  home. 

On  that  day,  and  at  that  place,  there  came  to  the  King, 
Pitz-Stephen,  a  sea-captain,  and  said: 

"  My  liege,  my  father  served  your  father  all  his  life, 
upon  the  sea.  He  steered  the  ship  with  the  golden  boy 
upon  the  prow,  in  which  your  father  sailed  to  conquer 
England.  I  beseech  you  to  grant  me  the  same  office.  I 
have  a  fair  vessel  in  the  harbour  here,  called  The  White 
Ship,  manned  by  fifty  sailors  of  renown.  I  pray  you.  Sire, 
to  let  your  servant  have  the  honour  of  steering  you  in  The 
White  Ship  to  England! " 

"I  am  sorry,  friend,"  replied  the  King,  "that  my  vessel 
is  already  chosen,  and  that  I  cannot  (therefore)  sail  with 
the  son  of  the  man  who  served  my  father.  But  the  Prince 
and  all  his  company  shall  go  along  with  you,  in  the  fair 
White  Ship,  manned  by  the  fifty  sailors  of  renown." 

An  hour  or  two  afterwards,  the  King  set  sail  in  the  ves- 
sel he  had  chosen,  accompanied  by  other  vessels,  and,  sail- 
ing all  night  with  a  fair  and  gentle  wind,  arrived  upon  the 
coast  of  England  in  the  morning.  While  it  was  yet  night, 
the  people  in  some  of  those  ships  heard  a  faint  wild  cry 
come  over  the  sea,  and  wondered  what  it  was. 

Now,  the  Prince  was  a  dissolute,  debauched  young  man 
of  eighteen,  who  bore  no  love  to  the  English,  and  had  de- 
clared that  when  he  came  to  the  throne  he  would  yoke 
them  to  the  plough  like  oxen.  He  went  aboard  The  White 
Ship,  with  one  hundred  and  forty  youthful  Nobles  like 
himself,  among  whom  were  eighteen  noble  ladies  of  the 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  66 

highest  rank.  All  this  gay  company,  with  their  servants 
and  the  lifty  sailors,  made  three  hundred  souls  aboard  the 
fair  White  Ship. 

"  Give  three  casks  of  wine,  Fitz- Stephen,"  said  the  Prince, 
"  to  the  fifty  sailors  of  renown !  My  father  the  King  has 
sailed  out  of  the  harbour.  What  time  is  there  to  make 
merry  here,  and  yet  reach  England  with  the  rest?  " 

"Prince,"  said  Fitz-Stephen,  "before  morning,  my  fifty 
and  The  White  Ship  shall  overtake  the  swiftest  vessel  in 
attendance  on  your  father  the  King,  if  we  sail  at  mid- 
night ! " 

Then,  the  Prince  commanded  to  make  merry ;  and  the 
sailors  drank  out  the  three  casks  of  wine ;  and  the  Prince 
and  all  the  noble  company  danced  in  the  moonlight  on  the 
deck  of  The  White  Ship. 

When,  at  last,  she  shot  out  of  the  harbour  of  Barfleur, 
there  was  not  a  sober  seaman  on  board.  But  the  sails  were 
all  set,  and  the  oars  all  going  merrily.  Fitz-Stephen  had 
the  helm.  The  gay  young  Nobles  and  the  beautiful  ladies, 
wrapped  in  mantles  of  various  bright  colours  to  protect 
them  from  the  cold,  talked,  laughed,  and  sang.  The  Prince 
encouraged  the  fifty  sailors  to  row  harder  yet,  for  the  hon- 
our of  The  White  Ship. 

Crash !  A  terrific  cry  broke  from  three  hundi-ed  hearts. 
It  was  the  cry  the  people  in  the  distant  vessels  of  the  King 
heard  faintly  on  the  water.  The  White  Ship  had  struck 
upon  a  rock — was  filling — going  down ! 

Fitz-Stephen  hurried  the  Prince  into  a  boat,  with  some 
few  Nobles.  "Push  off,"  he  whispered;  "and  row  to  the 
land.  It  is  not  far,  and  the  sea  is  smooth.  The  rest  of 
us  must  die." 

But,  as  they  rowed  away,  fast,  from  the  sinking  ship, 
the  Prince  heard  the  voice  of  his  sister  Marie,  the  Count- 
ess of  Perche,  calling  for  help.  He  never  in  his  life  had 
been  so  good  as  he  was  then.  He  cried  in  an  agony, 
"  Row  back  at  any  risk !     I  cannot  bear  to  leave  her !  " 

They  rowed  back.  As  the  Prince  held  out  his  arms  to 
catch  his  sister,  such  numbers  leaped  in,  that  the  boat  was 
overset.  And  in  the  same  instant  The  White  Ship  went 
down. 

Only  two  men  floated.  They  both  clung  to  the  main 
yard  of  the  ship,  which  had  broken  from  the  mast,  and 
now  supported  them.  One  asked  the  other  who  he  was? 
5 


ee  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

He  said,  "I  am  a  nobleman,  Godfrey  byname,  the  son  of 
Gilbert  de  l'Aigle.  And  you?  "  said  he.  "  I  am  Be- 
ROLD,  a  poor  butcher  of  Eouen,"  was  the  answer.  Then, 
they  said  together,  "  Lord  be  merciful  to  us  both ! "  and 
tried  to  encourage  one  another,  as  they  drifted  in  the  cold 
benumbing  sea  on  that  unfortunate  November  night. 

By-and-bye,  another  man  came  swimming  towards  them, 
whom  they  knew,  when  he  pushed  aside  his  long  wet  hair, 
to  be  Fitz-Stephen.  "Where  is  the  Prince?"  said  he. 
"  Gone !  Gone !  "  the  two  cried  together.  "  Neither  he, 
nor  his  brother,  nor  his  sister,  nor  the  King's  niece,  nor 
her  brother,  nor  any  one  of  all  the  brave  three  hundred, 
noble  or  commoner,  except  we  three,  has  risen  above  the 
water !  "  Fitz-Stephen,  with  a  ghastly  face,  cried,  "  Woe ! 
woe,  to  me !  "  and  sunk  to  the  bottom. 

The  other  two  clung  to  the  yard  for  some  hours.  At 
length  the  young  noble  said  faintly,  "  I  am  exhausted,  and 
chilled  with  the  cold,  and  can  hold  no  longer.  Farewell, 
good  friend !  God  preserve  you !  "  So,  he  dropped  and 
sunk ;  and  of  all  the  brilliant  crowd,  the  poor  Butcher  of 
Kouen  alone  was  saved.  In  the  morning,  some  fishermen 
saw  him  floating  in  his  sheep-skin  coat,  and  got  him  into 
their  boat — the  sole  relater  of  the  dismal  tale. 

For  three  days,  no  one  dared  to  carry  the  intelligence  to 
the  King.  At  length,  they  sent  into  his  presence  a  little 
boy,  who,  weeping  bitterly,  and  kneeling  at  his  feet,  told 
him  that  The  White  Ship  was  lost  with  all  on  board.  The 
King  fell  to  the  ground  like  a  dead  man,  and  never,  never 
afterwards,  was  seen  to  smile. 

But  he  plotted  again,  and  promised  again,  and  bribed 
and  bought  again,  in  his  old  deceitful  way.  Having  no 
son  to  succeed  him,  after  all  his  pains  ("The  Prince  will 
never  yoke  us  to  the  plough,  now ! "  said  the  English  peo- 
ple), he  took  a  second  wife — Adelais  or  Alice,  a  duke's 
daughter,  and  the  Pope's  niece.  Having  no  more  children, 
however,  he  proposed  to  the  Barons  to  swear  that  they 
would  recognise  as  his  successor,  his  daughter  Matilda, 
whom,  as  she  was  now  a  widow,  he  married  to  the  eldest 
son  of  the  Count  of  Anjou,  Geoffrey,  surnamed  Plan- 
TAGEXET,  from  a  custom  he  had  of  wearing  a  sprig  of 
flowering  broom  (called  Gen§t  in  French)  in  his  cap  for  a 
feather.  As  one  false  man  usually  makes  many,  and  as  a 
false  King,  in  particular,  is  pretty  certain  to  make  a  false 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLANP.  67 

Court,  the  Barons  took  the  oath  about  the  succession  of 
Matilda  (and  her  children  after  her),  twice  over,  without 
in  the  least  intending  to  keep  it.  The  King  was  now  re- 
lieved from  any  remaining  fears  of  William  Fitz-Robert, 
by  his  death  in  the  Monastery  of  St..  Omer,  in  France,  at 
twenty-six  years  old,  of  a  pike-wound  in  the  hand.  And 
as  Matilda  gave  birth  to  three  sons,  he  thought  the  succes- 
sion to  the  throne  secure. 

He  spent  most  of  the  latter  part  of  his  life,  which  was 
troubled  by  family  quarrels,  in  Normandy,  to  be  near  Ma- 
tilda. When  he  had  reigned  upwards  of  thirty-five  years, 
and  was  sixty-seven  years  old,  he  died  of  an  indigestion 
and  fever,  brought  on  by  eating,  when  he  was  far  from 
well,  of  a  fish  called  Lamprey,  against  which  he  had  often 
been  cautioned  by  his  physicians.  His  remains  were 
brought  over  to  Reading  Abbey  to  be  buried. 

You  may  perhaps  hear  the  cunning  and  promise-breaking 
of  King  Henry  the  First  called  "  policy  "  by  some  people, 
and  "  diplomacy  "  by  others.  Neither  of  these  fine  words 
will  in  the  least  mean  that  it  was  true;  and  nothing  that  is 
not  true  can  possibly  be  good. 

His  greatest  merit,  that  I  know  of,  was  his  love  of  learn- 
ing. I  should  have  given  him  greater  credit  even  for  that, 
if  it  had  been  strong  enough  to  induce  him  to  spare  the  eyes 
of  a  certain  poet  he  once  took  prisoner,  who  was  a  knight 
besides.  But  he  ordered  the  poet's  eyes  to  be  torn  from 
his  head,  because  he  had  laughed  at  him  in  his  verses; 
and  the  poet,  in  the  pain  of  that  torture,  dashed  out  his 
own  brains  against  his  prison  wall.  King  Henry  the 
First  was  avaricious,  revengeful,  and  so  false,  that  I  sup- 
pose a  man  never  lived  whose  word  was  less  to  be  relied 
upon. 


CHAPTER    XI. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  MATILDA  AND  STEPHEN. 

The  King  was  no  sooner  dead  than  all  the  plans  and 
schemes  he  had  laboured  at  so  long,  and  lied  so  much  for, 
crumbled  away  like  a  hollow  heap  of  sand.  Stephen, 
whom  he  had  never  mistrusted  or  suspected,  started  up  to 
claim  the  throne. 


68  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

Stephen  was  the  son  of  Adela,  the  Conqueror's  daugh- 
ter, married  to  the  Count  of  Blois.  To  Stephen,  and  to  his 
brother  Henby,  the  late  King  had  been  liberal;  making 
Henry  Bishop  of  Winchester,  and  finding  a  good  marriage 
for  Stephen,  and  much  enriching  him.  This  did  not  pre- 
vent Stephen  from  hastily  producing  a  false  witness,  a  ser- 
vant of  the  late  King,  to  swear  that  the  King  had  named 
him  for  his  heir  upon  his  death-bed.  On  this  evidence  the 
Archbishop  of  Canterbury  crowned  him.  The  new  King, 
so  suddenly  made,  lost  not  a  moment  in  seizing  the  Royal 
treasure,  and  hiring  foreign  soldiers  with  some  of  it  to  pro- 
tect his  throne. 

If  the  dead  King  had  even  done  as  the  false  witness  said, 
he  would  have  had  small  right  to  will  away  the  English 
people,  like  so  many  sheep  or  oxen,  without  their  consent. 
But  he  had,  in  fact,  bequeathed  all  his  territory  to  Matil- 
da; who,  supported  by  Robert,  Earl  of  Gloucester,  soon 
began  to  dispute  the  crown.  Some  of  the  powerful  barons 
and  priests  took  her  side;  some  took  Stephen's;  all  forti- 
fied their  castles;  and  again  the  miserable  English  people 
were  involved  in  war,  from  which  they  could  never  derive 
advantage  whosoever  was  victorious,  and  in  which  all  par- 
ties plundered,  tortured,  starved,  and  ruined  them 

Five  years  had  passed  since  the  death  of  Henry  the  First 
— and  during  those  five  years  there  had  been  two  terrible 
invasions  by  the  people  of  Scotland  under  their  King,  Da- 
vid, who  was  at  last  defeated  with  all  his  army — when  Ma- 
tilda, attended  by  her  brother  Robert  and  a  large  force, 
appeared  in  England  to  maintain  her  claim.  A  battle 
was  fought  between  her  troops  and  King  Stephen's  at  Lin- 
coln; in  which  the  King  himself  was  taken  prisoner,  after 
bravely  fighting  until  his  battle-axe  and  sword  were  broken, 
and  was  carried  into  strict  confinement  at  Gloucester. 
Matilda  then  submitted  herself,  to  the  Priests,  and  the 
Priests  crowned  her  Queen  of  England. 

She  did  not  long  enjoy  this  dignity.  The  people  of  Lon- 
don had  a  great  affection  for  Stephen;  many  of  the  Barons 
considered  it  degrading  to  be  ruled  by  a  woman;  and  the 
Queen's  temper  was  so  haughty  that  she  made  innumerable 
enemies.  The  people  of  London  revolted;  and,  in  alliance 
with  the  troops  of  Stephen,  besieged  her  at  Winchester, 
where  they  took  her  brother  Robert  prisoner,  whom,  as  her 
best  soldier  and  chief  general,  she  was  glad  to  exchange  for 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  69 

Stephen  himself,  who  thus  regained  his  liberty.  Then,  the 
long  war  went  on  afresh.  Once,  she  was  pressed  so  hai'd 
in  the  Castle  of  Oxford,  in  the  winter  weather  when  the 
snow  lay  thick  upon  the  ground,  that  her  only  chance  of 
escape  was  to  dress  herself  all  in  white,  and,  accompanied 
by  no  more  than  three  faithful  Knights,  dressed  in  like 
manner  that  their  figures  might  not  be  seen  from  Stephen's 
camp  as  they  passed  over  the  snow,  to  steal  away  on  foot, 
across  the  frozen  Thames,  walk  a  long  distance,  and  at  last 
gallop  away  on  horseback.  All  this  she  did,  but  to  no 
great  purpose  then;  for  her  brother  dying  while  the  strug- 
gle was  yet  going  on,  she  at  last  withdrew  to  Normandy. 

In  two  or  three  years  after  her  withdrawal  her  cause  ap- 
peared in  England,  afresh,  in  the  person  of  her  son  Henry, 
young  Plantagenet,  who,  at  only  eighteen  years  of  age,  was 
very  powerful :  not  only  on  account  of  his  mother  having 
resigned  all  Normandy  to  him,  but  also  from  his  having 
married  Eleanor,  the  divorced  wife  of  the  French  King, 
a  bad  woman,  who  had  great  possessions  in  France.  Louis, 
the  French  King,  not  relishing  this  arrangement,  helped 
Eustace,  King  Stephen's  son,  to  invade  Normandy:  but 
Henry  drove  their  united  forces  out  of  that  country,  and 
then  returned  here,  to  assist  his  partisans,  whom  the  King 
was  then  besieging  at  Wallingford  upon  the  Thames. 
Here,  for  two  days,  divided  only  by  the  river,  the  two 
armies  lay  encamped  opposite  to  one  another — on  the  eve, 
as  it  seemed  to  all  men,  of  another  desperate  fight^  when 
the  Earl  of  Arundel  took  heart  and  said  "  that  it  was  not 
reasonable  to  prolong  the  unspeakable  miseries  of  two  king- 
doms to  minister  to  the  ambition  of  two  princes." 

Many  other  noblemen  repeating  and  supporting  this  when 
it  was  once  uttered,  Stephen  and  young  Plantagenet  went 
down,  each  to  his  own  bank  of  the  river,  and  held  a  conver- 
sation across  it,  in  which  they  arranged  a  truce;  very  much 
to  the  dissatisfaction  of  Eustace,  who  swaggered  away  with 
some  followers,  and  laid  violent  hands  on  the  Abbey  of 
Saint  Edmund' s-Bury,  where  he  presently  died  mad.  The 
truce  led  to  a  solemn  council  at  Winchester,  in  which  it 
was  agreed  that  Stephen  should  retain  the  crown,  on  condi- 
tion of  his  declaring  Henry  his  successor;  that  William, 
another  son  of  the  King's,  should  inherit  his  father's  right- 
ful possessions;  and  that  all  the  Crown  lands  which  Ste- 
phen had  given  away  should  be  recalled,  and  all  the  Cas- 


70  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND. 

ties  he  had  permitted  to  be  built  demolished.  Thus 
terminated  the  bitter  war,  which  had  now  lasted  fifteen 
years,  and  had  again  laid  England  waste.  In  the  next 
year  Stephen  died,  after  a  troubled  reign  of  nineteen 
years. 

Although  King  Stephen  was,  for  the  time  in  which  he 
lived,  a  humane  and  moderate  man,  with  many  excellent 
qualities;  and  although  nothing  worse  is  known  of  him 
than  his  usurpation  of  the  Crown,  which  he  probably  ex- 
cused to  himself  by  the  consideration  that  King  Henry  the 
First  was  an  usurper  too — which  was  no  excuse  at  all;  the 
people  of  England  suffered  more  in  these  dread  nineteen 
years,  than  at  any  former  period  even  of  their  suffering 
history.  In  the  division  of  the  nobility  between  the  two 
rival  claimants  of  the  Crown,  and  in  the  growth  of  what  is 
called  the  Feudal  System  (which  made  the  peasants  the 
born  vassals  and  mere  slaves  of  the  Barons),  every  Noble 
had  his  strong  Castle,  where  he  reigned  the  cruel  king  of 
all  the  neighbouring  people.  Accordingly,  he  perpetrated 
whatever  cruelties  he  chose.  And  never  were  worse  cruel- 
ties committed  upon  earth  than  in  wretched  England  in 
those  nineteen  years. 

The  writers  who  were  living  then  describe  them  fear- 
fully. They  say  that  the  castles  were  filled  with  devils 
rather  than  with  men;  that  the  peasants,  men  and  women, 
were  put  into  dungeons  for  their  gold  and  silv-er,  were  tor- 
tured with  fire  and  smoke,  were  hung  up  by  the  thumbs, 
were  hung  up  by  the  heels  with  great  weights  to  their 
heads,  were  torn  with  jagged  irons,  killed  with  hunger, 
broken  to  death  in  narrow  chests  filled  with  sharp-pointed 
stones,  murdered  in  countless  fiendish  ways.  In  England 
there  was  no  corn,  no  meat,  no  cheese,  no  butter,  there  were 
no  tilled  lands,  no  harvests.  Ashes  of  burnt  towns,  and 
dreary  wastes,  were  all  that  the  traveller,  fearful  of  the 
robbers  who  prowled  abroad  at  all  hours,  would  see  in  a 
long  day's  journey;  and  from  sunrise  until  night,  he  would 
not  come  upon  a  home. 

The  clergy  sometimes  suffered,  and  heavily  too,  from 
pillage,  but  many  of  them  had  castles  of  their  own,  and 
fought  in  helmet  and  armour  like  the  barons,  and  drew  lots 
with  other  fighting  men  for  their  share  of  booty.  The 
Pope  (or  Bishop  of  Rome),  on  King  Stephen's  resisting  his 
ambition,  laid  England  under  an  Interdict  at  one  period  of 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  71 

this  reign;  which  means  that  he  allowed  no  service  to  be 
performed  in  the  churches,  no  couples  to  be  married,  no 
bells  to  be  rung,  no  dead  bodies  to  be  buried.  Any  man 
having  the  power  to  refuse  these  things,  no  matter  whether 
he  were  called  a  Pope  or  a  Poulterer,  would,  of  course, 
have  the  power  of  afflicting  numbers  of  innocent  people. 
That  nothing  might  be  wanting  to  the  miseries  of  King 
Stephen's  time,  the  Pope  threw  in  this  contribution  to  the 
public  store — not  very  like  the  widow's  contribution,  as  I 
think,  when  Our  Saviour  sat  in  Jerusalem  over-against  the 
Treasury,  "and  she  threw  in  two  mites,  which  make  a 
farthing." 


CHAPTER    XII. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  HENRY  THE  SECOND, 

PABT    THE    FIRST. 

Henry  Plantagenet,  when  he  was  but  twenty-one 
years  old,  quietly  succeeded  to  the  throne  of  England,  ac- 
cording to  his  agreement  made  with  the  late  King  at  Win- 
chester. Six  weeks  after  Stephen's  death,  he  and  his 
Queen,  Eleanor,  were  crowned  in  that  city;  into  which 
they  rode  on  horseback  in  great  state,  side  by  side,  amidst 
much  shouting  and  rejoicing,  and  clashing  of  music,  and 
strewing  of  flowers. 

The  reign  of  King  Henry  the  Second  began  well.  The 
King  had  great  possessions,  and  (what  with  his  own 
rights,  and  what  with  those  of  his  wife)  was  lord  of  one- 
third  part  of  France.  He  was  a  young  man  of  vigour,  abil- 
ity, and  resolution,  and  immediately  applied  himself  to  re- 
move some  of  the  evils  which  had  arisen  in  the  last  unhappy 
reign.  He  revoked  all  the  grants  of  land  that  had  been 
hastily  made,  on  either  side,  during  the  late  struggles;  he 
obliged  numbers  of  disorderly  soldiers  to  depart  from  Eng- 
land; he  reclaimed  all  the  castles  belonging  to  the  Crown; 
and  he  forced  the  wicked  nobles  to  pull  down  their  own 
castles,  to  the  number  of  eleven  hundred,  in  which  such 
dismal  cruelties  had  been  inflicted  on  the  people.  The 
King's  brother,  Geoffrey,  rose  against  him  in  France, 
while  he  was  so  well  employed,  and  rendered  it  necessaxj^ 


72  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

for  him  to  repair  to  that  country;  where,  after  he  had 
subdued  and  made  a  friendly  arrangement  with  his  brother 
(who  did  not  live  long),  his  ambition  to  increase  his  pos- 
sessions involved  him  in  a  war  with  the  French  King, 
Louis,  with  whom  he  had  been  on  such  friendly  terms  just 
before,  that  to  the  French  King's  infant  daughter,  then  a 
baby  in  the  cradle,  he  had  promised  one  of  his  little  sons  in 
marriage,  who  was  a  child  of  five  years  old.  However,  the 
war  came  to  nothing  at  last,  and  the  Pope  made  the  two 
Kings  friends  again. 

Now,  the  clergy,  in  the  troubles  of  the  last  reign,  had 
gone  on  very  ill  indeed.  There  were  all  kinds  of  criminals 
among  them — murderers,  thieves,  and  vagabonds;  and  the 
worst  of  the  matter  was,  that  the  good  priests  would  not 
give  up  the  bad  priests  to  justice,  when  they  committed 
crimes,  but  persisted  in  sheltering  and  defending  them. 
The  King,  well  knowing  that  there  could  be  no  peace  or 
rest  in  England  while  such  things  lasted,  resolved  to  reduce 
the  power  of  the  clergy;  and,  when  he  had  reigned  seven 
years,  found  (as  he  considered)  a  good  opportunity  for 
doing  so,  in  the  death  of  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury. 
"I  will  have  for  the  new  Archbishop,"  thought  the  King, 
"  a  friend  in  whom  I  can  trust,  who  will  help  me  to  hum- 
ble these  rebellious  priests,  and  to  have  them  dealt  with, 
when  they  do  wrong,  as  other  men  who  do  wrong  are  dealt 
with."  So,  he  resolved  to  make  his  favourite,  the  new 
Archbishop;  and  this  favourite  was  so  extraordinary  a  man, 
and  his  story  is  so  curious,  that  I  must  tell  you  all  about 
him. 

Once  upon  a  time,  a  worthy  merchant  of  London,  named 
Gilbert  1  Becket,  made  a  pilgrimage  to  the  Holy  Land, 
and  was  taken  prisoner  by  a  Saracen  lord.  This  lord,  who 
treated  him  kindly  and  not  like  a  slave,  had  one  fair 
daughter,  who  fell  in  love  with  the  merchant;  and  who  told 
him  that  she  wanted  to  become  a  Christian,  and  was  will- 
ing to  marry  him  if  they  could  fly  to  a  Christian  country. 
The  merchant  returned  her  love,  until  he  found  an  oppor- 
tunity to  escape,  when  he  did  not  trouble  himself  about  the 
Saracen  lady,  but  escaped  with  his  servant  Richard,  who 
had  been  taken  prisoner  along  with  him,  and  arrived  in 
England  and  forgot  her.  The  Saracen  lady,  who  was  more 
loving  than  the  merchant,  left  her  father's  house  in  dis- 
guise to  follow  him,  and  made  her  way,  under  many  hard- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  73 

ships,  to  the  sea-shore.  The  merchant  had  taught  her  only 
two  English  words  (for  I  suppose  he  must  have  learnt  the 
Saracen  tongue  himself,  and  made  love  in  that  language), 
of  which  London  was  one,  and  his  own  name,  Gilbert, 
the  other.  She  went  among  the  ships,  saying,  "  London ! 
London ! "  over  and  over  again,  imtil  the  sailors  understood 
that  she  wanted  to  find  an  English  vessel  that  would  carry 
her  there;  so  they  showed  her  such  a  ship,  and  she  paid 
for  her  passage  with  some  of  her  jewels,  and  sailed  away. 
Well !  The  merchant  was  sitting  in  his  counting-house  in 
London  one  day,  when  he  heard  a  great  noise  in  the  street; 
and  presently  Richard  came  running  in  from  the  warehouse, 
with  his  eyes  wide  open  and  his  breath  aLnost  gone,  saying, 
"  Master,  master,  here  is  the  Saracen  lady ! "  The  mer- 
chant thought  Richard  was  mad;  but  Richard  said,  "No, 
master!  As  I  live,  the  Saracen  lady  is  goiug  up  and  down 
the  city,  calling  Gilbert !  Gilbert ! "  Then,  he  took  the 
merchant  by  the  sleeve,  and  pointed  out  at  window;  and 
there  they  saw  her  among  the  gables  and  water-spouts  of 
tlie  dark  dirty  street,  in  her  foreign  dress,  so  forlorn,  sur- 
rounded by  a  wondering  crowd,  and  passing  slowly  along, 
calling  Gilbert,  Gilbert!  When  the  merchant  saw  her, 
and  thought  of  the  tenderness  she  had  shown  him  in  his 
captivity,  and  of  her  constancy,  his  heart  was  moved,  and 
he  ran  down  into  the  street;  and  she  saw  him  coming,  and 
with  a  great  cry  fainted  in  his  arms.  They  were  married 
without  loss  of  time,  and  Richard  (who  was  an  excellent 
man)  danced  with  joy  the  whole  day  of  the  wedding;  and 
they  all  lived  happy  ever  afterwards. 

This  merchant  and  this  Saracen  lady  had  one  son, 
Thomas  a  Becket.  He  it  was  who  became  the  Favourite 
of  King  Henry  the  Second. 

He  had  become  Chancellor,  when  the  King  thought  of 
making  him  Archbishop.  He  was  clever,  gay,  well  edu- 
cated, brave;  had  fought  in  several  battles  in  France;  had 
defeated  a  French  knight  in  single  combat,  and  brought  his 
horse  away  as  a  token  of  the  victory.  He  lived  in  a  noble 
palace,  he  was  the  tutor  of  the  young  Prince  Henry,  he 
was  served  by  one  hundred  and  forty  knights,  his  riches 
were  immense.  The  King  once  sent  him  as  his  ambassa- 
dor to  France;  and  the  French  people,  beholding  in  what 
state  he  travelled,  cried  out  in  the  streets,  "  How  splendid 
must  the  King  of  England  be,  when  this  is  only  the  Chan- 


74  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

cellor ! "  They  had  good  reason  to  wonder  at  the  magnifi- 
cence of  Thomas  a  Becket,  for,  when  he  entered  a  French 
town,  his  procession  was  headed  by  two  hundred  and  fifty 
singing  boys;  then,  came  his  hounds  in  couples;  then, 
eight  waggons,  each  drawn  by  five  horses  driven  by  five 
drivers :  two  of  the  waggons  filled  with  strong  ale  to  be 
given  away  to  the  people;  four,  with  his  gold  and  silver 
plate  and  stately  clothes;  two,  with  the  dresses  of  his  nu- 
merous servants.  Then,  came  twelve  horses,  each  with  a 
monkey  on  his  back;  then,  a  train  of  people  bearing  shields 
and  leading  fine  war-horses  splendidly  equipped;  then,  fal- 
coners with  hawks  upon  their  wrists;  then,  a  host  of 
knights,  and  gentlemen  and  priests;  then,  the  Chancellor 
with  his  brilliant  garments  flashing  in  the  sun,  and  all  the 
people  ca.pering  and  shouting  with  delight. 

The  King  was  well  pleased  with  all  this,  thinking  that  it 
only  made  himself  the  more  magnificent  to  have  so  magnifi- 
cent a  favourite;  but  he  sometimes  jested  with  the  Chan- 
cellor upon  his  splendour  too.  Once,  when  they  were  rid- 
ing together  through  the  streets  of  London  in  hard  winter 
weather,  they  saw  a  shivering  old  man  in  rags.  "  Look  at 
the  poor  object ! "  said  the  King.  "  Would  it  not  be  a 
charitable  act  to  give  that  aged  man  a  comfortable  warm 
cloak?  "  "  Undoubtedly  it  would, "  said  Thomas  a  Becket, 
"and  you  do  well.  Sir,  to  think  of  such  Christian  duties." 
"  Come ! "  cried  the  King,  "  then  give  him  your  cloak !  "  It 
was  made  of  rich  crimson  trimmed  with  ermine.  The  King 
tried  to  pull  it  off,  the  Chancellor  tried  to  keep  it  on,  both 
were  near  rolling  from  their  saddles  in  the  mud,  when  the 
Chancellor  submitted,  and  the  King  gave  the  cloak  to  the 
old  beggar:  much  to  the  beggar's  astonishment,  and  much 
to  the  merriment  of  all  the  courtiers  in  attendance.  For, 
courtiers  are  not  only  eager  to  laugh  when  the  King  laughs, 
but  they  really  do  enjoy  a  laugh  against  a  Favourite. 

"I  will  make,"  thought  King  Henry  the  Second,  "this 
Chancellor  of  mine,  Thomas  a  Becket,  Archbishop  of  Can- 
terbury. He  will  then  be  the  head  of  the  Church,  and, 
being  devoted  to  me,  will  help  me  to  correct  the  Church. 
He  has  always  upheld  my  power  against  the  power  of  the 
clergy,  and  once  publicly  told  some  bishops  (I  remember), 
that  men  of  the  Church  were  equally  bound  to  me  with  men 
of  the  sword.  Thomas  a  Becket  is  the  man,  of  all  other 
men  in  England,  to  help  me  in  my  great  design."     So  the 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND  75 

King,  regardless  of  all  objection,  either  that  he  was  a  fight- 
ing man,  or  a  lavish  man,  or  a  courtly  man,  or  a  man  of 
pleasure,  or  anything  but  a  likely  man  for  the  office,  made 
him  Archbishop  accordingly. 

Now,  Thomas  a  Becket  was  proud  and  loved  to  be  fa- 
mous. He  was  already  famous  for  the  pomp  of  his  life, 
for  his  riches,  his  gold  and  silver  plate,  his  waggons, 
horses,  and  attendants.  He  could  do  no  more  in  that  way 
than  he  had  done;  and  being  tired  of  that  kind  of  fame 
(which  is  a  very  poor  one),  he  longed  to  have  his  name 
celebrated  for  something  else.  Nothing,  he  knew,  would 
render  him  so  famous  in  the  world,  as  the  setting  of  his 
utmost  power  and  ability  against  the  utmost  power  and 
ability  of  the  King.  He  resolved  with  the  whole  strength 
of  his  mind  to  do  it. 

He  may  have  had  some  secret  grudge  against  the  King 
besides.  The  King  may  have  offended  his  proud  humour 
at  some  time  or  other,  for  anything  I  know.  I  think  it 
likely,  because  it  is  a  common  thing  for  Kings,  Princes, 
and  other  great  people,  to  try  the  tempers  of  their  favour- 
ites rather  severely.  Even  the  little  aifair  of  the  crimson 
cloak  must  have  been  anything  but  a  pleasant  one  to  a 
haughty  man.  Thomas  a  Becket  knew  better  than  any  one 
in  England  what  the  King  expected  of  him.  In  all  his 
sumptuous  life,  he  had  never  yet  been  in  a  position  to  dis- 
appoint the  King.  He  could  take  up  that  proud  stand 
now,  as  head  of  the  Church;  and  he  determined  that  it 
should  be  written  in  history,  either  that  he  subdued  the 
King,  or  that  the  King  subdued  him. 

So,  of  a  sudden,  he  completely  altered  the  whole  manner 
of  his  life.  He  turned  off  all  his  brilliant  followers,  ate 
coarse  food,  drank  bitter  water,  wore  next  his  skin  sack- 
cloth covered  with  dirt  and  vermin  (for  it  was  then 
thought  very  religious  to  be  very  dirty),  flogged  his  back 
to  punish  himself,  lived  chiefly  in  a  little  cell,  washed  the 
feet  of  thirteen  poor  people  every  day,  and  looked  as  mis- 
erable as  he  possibly  could.  If  he  had  put  twelve  hundred 
monkeys  on  horseback  instead  of  twelve,  and  had  gone  in 
procession  with  eight  thousand  waggons  instead  of  eight, 
he  could  not  have  half  astonished  the  people  so  much  as  by 
this  great  change.  It  soon  caused  him  to  be  more  talked 
about  as  an  Archbishop  than  he  had  been  as  a  Chancellor. 

The  King  was  very  angry;  and  was  made  still  more  S0| 


76  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

when  the  new  Archbishop,  claiming  various  estates  from 
the  nobles  as  being  rightfully  Church  property,  required 
the  King  himself,  for  the  same  reason,  to  give  up  Roches- 
ter Castle,  and  Rochester  City  too.  Not  satisfied  with 
this,  he  declared  that  no  power  but  himself  should  appoint 
a  priest  to  any  Church  in  the  part  of  England  over  which 
he  was  Archbishop;  and  when  a  certain  gentleman  of  Kent 
made  such  an  appointment,  as  he  claimed  to  have  the  right 
to  do,  Thomas  a  Becket  excommunicated  him. 

Excommunication  was,  next  to  the  Interdict  I  told  you 
of  at  the  close  of  the  last  chapter,  the  great  weapon  of  the 
clergy.  It  consisted  in  declaring  the  person  who  was  ex- 
communicated, an  outcast  from  the  Church  and  from  all 
religious  offices;  and  in  cursing  him  all  over,  from  the  top 
of  his  head  to  the  sole  of  his  foot,  whether  he  was  stand- 
ing up,  lying  down,  sitting,  kneeling,  walking,  running, 
hopping,  jumping,  gaping,  coughing,  sneezing,  or  what- 
ever else  he  was  doing.  This  unchristian  nonsense  would 
of  course  have  made  no  sort  of  difference  to  the  person 
cursed — who  could  say  his  prayers  at  home  if  he  were  shut 
out  of  church,  and  whom  none  but  God  co\ild  judge — but 
for  the  fears  and  superstitions  of  the  people,  who  avoided 
excommunicated  persons,  and  made  their  lives  unhappy. 
So,  the  King  said  to  the  New  Archbishop,  "  Take  off  this 
Excommunication  from  this  gentleman  of  Kent."  To 
which  the  Archbishop  replied,  "I  shall  do  no  such  thing." 

The  quarrel  went  on.  A  priest  in  Worcestershire  com- 
mitted a  most  dreadful  murder,  that  aroused  the  horror  of 
the  whole  nation.  The  King  demanded  to  have  this  wretch 
delivered  up,  to  be  tried  in  the  same  court  and  in  the  same 
way  as  any  other  murderer.  The  Archbishop  refused,  and 
kept  him  in  the  Bishop's  prison.  The  King,  holding  a  sol- 
emn assembly  in  Westminster  Hall,  demanded  that  in  fu- 
ture all  priests  found  guilty  before  their  Bishops  of  crimes 
against  the  law  of  the  land  should  be  considered  priests  no 
longer,  and  should  be  delivered  over  to  the  law  of  the  land 
for  punishment  The  Archbishop  again  refused.  Tlie 
King  required  to  know  whether  the  clergy  would  obey  the 
ancient  customs  of  the  country?  Every  priest  there,  but 
one,  said,  after  Thomas  a  Becket,  "Saving  my  order," 
This  really  meant  that  they  would  only  obey  those  customs 
when  they  did  not  interfere  with  their  own  claims;  and 
the  King  went  out  of  the  Hall  in  great  wrath 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  77 

Some  of  the  clergy  began  to  be  afraid,  now,  that  they 
were  going  too  far.  Though  Thomas  a  Becket  was  other- 
wise as  unmoved  as  Westminster  Hall,  they  prevailed  upon 
him,  for  the  sake  of  their  fears,  to  go  to  the  King  at  Wood- 
stock, and  promise  to  observe  the  ancient  customs  of  the 
country,  without  saying  anything  about  his  order.  The 
King  received  this  submission  favourably,  and  summoned 
a  great  council  of  the  clergy  to  meet  at  the  Castle  of  Clar- 
endon, by  Salisbury.  But  when  the  council  met,  the  Arch- 
bishop again  insisted  on  the  words  "  saving  my  order;  "  and 
he  still  insisted,  though  lords  entreated  him,  and  priests 
wept  before  him  and  knelt  to  him,  and  an  adjoining  room 
was  thrown  open,  filled  with  armed  soldiers  of  the  King, 
to  threaten  him.  At  length  he  gave  way,  for  that  time, 
and  the  ancient  customs  (which  included  what  the  King 
had  demanded  in  vain)  were  stated  in  writing,  and  were 
signed  and  sealed  by  the  chief  of  the  clergy,  and  were 
called  the  Constitutions  of  Clarendon. 

The  quarrel  went  on,  for  all  that.  The  Archbishop  tried 
to  see  the  King.  The  King  would  not  see  him.  The 
Archbishop  tried  to  escape  from  England.  The  sailors  on 
the  coast  would  launch  no  boat  to  take  him  away.  Then, 
he  again  resolved  to  do  his  worst  in  opposition  to  the  King, 
and  began  openly  to  set  the  ancient  customs  at  defiance. 

Tlie  King  summoned  him  before  a  great  council  at 
Northampton,  where  he  accused  him  of  high  treason,  and 
made  a  claim  against  him,  which  was  not  a  just  one,  for  an 
enormous  sum  of  money.  Thomas  a  Becket  was  alone 
against  the  whole  assembly,  and  the  very  Bishops  advised 
him  to  resign  his  office  and  abandon  his  contest  with  the 
King.  His  great  anxiety  and  agitation  stretched  him  on  a 
sick-bed  for  two  days,  but  he  was  still  undaunted.  He 
went  to  the  adjourned  council,  carrying  a  great  cross  in  his 
right  hand,  and  sat  down  holding  it  erect  before  him.  The 
King  angrily  retired  into  an  inner  room.  The  whole  as- 
sembly angrily  retired  and  left  him  there.  But  there  he 
sat.  The  Bishops  came  out  again  in  a  body,  and  renoiinced 
him  as  a  traitor.  He  only  said,  "  I  hear !  "  and  sat  there 
still.  They  retired  again  into  the  inner  room,  and  his  trial 
proceeded  without  him.  By-and-bye,  the  Earl  of  Leices- 
ter, heading  the  barons,  came  out  to  read  his  sentence. 
He  refused  to  hear  it,  denied  the  power  of  the  court,  and 
said  he  would  tefer  his  cause  to  the  Pope.     As  he  walked 


7S  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

out  of  the  hall,  with  the  cross  in  his  hand,  some  of  those 
present  picked  up  rushes — rushes  were  strewn  upon  the 
floors  in  those  days  by  way  of  carpet — and  threw  them  at 
him.  He  proudly  turned  his  head,  and  said  that  were  he 
not  Archbishop,  he  would  chastise  those  cowards  with  the 
sword  he  had  known  how  to  use  in  bygone  days.  He  then 
mounted  his  horse,  and  rode  away,  cheered  and  surrounded 
by  the  common  people,  to  whom  he  threw  open  his  house 
that  night  and  gave  a  supper,  supping  with  them  himself. 
That  same  night  he  secretly  departed  from  the  town ;  and 
so,  travelling  by  night  and  hiding  by  day,  and  calling  him- 
self "  Brother  Dearman,"  got  away,  not  without  difficulty, 
to  Flanders. 

The  struggle  still  went  on.  The  angry  King  took  pos- 
session of  the  revenues  of  the  archbishopric,  and  banished 
all  the  relations  and  servants  of  Thomas  a  Becket,  to  the 
number  of  four  hundred.  The  Pope  and  the  French  King 
both  protected  him,  and  an  abbey  was  assigned  for  his  res- 
idence. Stimulated  by  this  support,  Thomas  a  Becket,  on 
a  great  festival  day,  formally  proceeded  to  a  great  church 
crowded  with  people,  and  going  up  into  the  pulpit  publicly 
cursed  and  excommunicated  all  who  had  supported  the  Con- 
stitutions of  Clarendon :  mentioning  many  English  noble- 
men by  name,  and  not  distantly  hinting  at  the  King  of 
England  himself. 

When  intelligence  of  this  new  affront  was  carried  to  the 
King  in  his  chamber,  his  passion  was  so  furious  that  he 
tore  his  clothes,  and  rolled  like  a  madman  on  his  bed  of 
straw  and  rushes.  But  he  was  soon  up  and  doing.  He 
ordered  all  the  ports  and  coasts  of  England  to  be  narrowly 
watched,  that  no  letters  of  Interdict  might  be  brought  into 
the  kingdom;  and  sent  messengers  and  bribes  to  the  Pope's 
palace  at  Rome.  Meanwhile,  Thomas  a  Becket,  for  his  part, 
was  not  idle  at  Rome,  but  constantly  employed  his  utmost 
arts  in  his  own  behalf.  Thus  the  contest  stood,  until  there 
tvas  peace  between  France  and  England  (which  had  been  for 
some  time  at  war),  and  until  the  two  children  of  the  two 
Kings  were  married  in  celebration  of  it.  Then,  the  French 
King  brought  about  a  meeting  between  Henry  and  his  old 
favourite,  so  long  his  enemy. 

Even  then,  though  Thomas  a  Becket  knelt  before  the 
King,  he  was  obstinate  and  immovable  as  to  those  words 
about  his  order.     King  Louis  of  France  was  weak  enough 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  79 

in  his  veneration  for  Thomas  a  Becket  and  such  men,  but 
this  was  a  little  too  much  for  him.  He  said  that  a  Becket 
"  wanted  to  be  greater  than  the  saints  and  better  than  St. 
Peter,"  and  rode  away  from  him  with  the  King  of  Eng- 
land. His  poor  French  Majesty  asked  a  Becket' s  pardon 
for  so  doing,  however,  soon  afterwards,  and  cut  a  very  piti- 
ful figure. 

At  last,  and  after  a  world  of  trouble,  it  came  to  this. 
There  was  another  meeting  on  French  ground  between  King 
Henry  and  Thomas  a  Becket,  and  it  was  agreed  that 
Thomas  a  Becket  should  be  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  ac- 
cording to  the  customs  of  former  Archbishops,  and  that  the 
King  should  put  him  in  possession  of  the  revenues  of  that 
post.  And  now,  indeed,  you  might  suppose  the  struggle 
at  an  end,  and  Thomas  a  Becket  at  rest.  No,  not  even  yet. 
For  Thomas  a  Becket  hearing,  by  some  means,  that  King 
Henry,  when  he  was  in  dread  of  his  kingdom  being  placed 
under  an  interdict,  had  had  his  eldest  son  Prince  Henry 
secretly  crowned,  not  only  persuaded  the  Pope  to  suspend 
the  Archbishop  of  York  who  had  performed  that  ceremony, 
and  to  excommunicate  the  Bishops  who  had  assisted  at  it, 
but  sent  a  messenger  of  his  own  into  England,  in  spite  of 
all  the  King's  precautions  along  the  coast,  who  delivered 
the  letters  of  excommunication  into  the  Bishops'  own 
hands.  Thomas  a  Becket  then  came  over  to  England  him- 
self, after  an  absence  of  seven  years.  He  was  privately 
warned  that  it  was  dangerous  to  come,  and  that  an  ireful 
knight,  named  Ranulf  de  Broc,  had  threatened  that  he 
should  not  live  to  eat  a  loaf  of  bread  in  England ;  but  he 
came. 

The  common  people  received  him  well,  and  marched 
about  with  him  in  a  soldierly  way,  armed  with  such  rustic 
weapons  as  they  could  get.  He  tried  to  see  the  young 
prince  who  had  once  been  his  pupil,  but  was  prevented. 
He  hoped  for  some  little  support  among  the  nobles  and 
priests,  but  found  none.  He  made  the  most  of  the  peas- 
ants who  attended  him,  and  feasted  them,  and  went  from 
Canterbury  to  Harrow-on-the-Hill,  and  from  Harrow-on- 
the-Hill  back  to  Canterbury,  and  on  Christmas  Day 
preached  in  the  Cathedral  there,  and  told  the  people  in  his 
sermon  that  he  had  come  to  die  among  them,  and  that  it 
was  likely  he  would  be  murdered.  He  had  no  fear,  how- 
ever— or,  if  he  had  any,  he  had  much  more  obstinacy — for 


80  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

he,  then  and  there,  excommunicated  three  of  his  enemies, 
of  whom  Ranulf  de  Broc  the  ireful  knight  was  one. 

As  men  in  general  had  no  fancy  for  being  cursed,  in  their 
sitting  and  walking,  and  gaping  and  sneezing,  and  all  the 
rest  of  it,  it  was  very  natural  in  the  persons  so  freely  ex- 
communicated to  complain  to  the  King.  It  was  equally 
natural  in  the  King,  who  had  hoped  that  this  troublesome 
opponent  was  at  last  quieted,  to  fall  into  a  mighty  rage 
when  he  heard  of  these  new  aifronts;  and,  on  the  Arch- 
bishop of  York  telling  him  that  he  never  could  hope  for 
rest  while  Thomas  a  Becket  lived,  to  cry  out  hastily  before 
his  court,  "  Have  I  no  one  here  who  will  deliver  me  from 
this  man?  "  There  were  fo^^r  knights  present,  who,  hear- 
ing the  King's  words,  looked  at  one  another,  and  went  out. 

The  names  of  these  knights  were,  Eeginald  Fitzurse, 
William  Tracy,  Hugh  de  Morville,  and  Richard 
Brito;  three  of  whom  had  been  in  the  train  of  Thomas  a 
Becket  in  the  old  days  of  his  splendour.  They  rode  away 
on  horseback,  in  a  very  secret  manner,  and  on  the  third 
day  after  Christmas  Day  arrived  at  Saltwood  House,  not 
far  from  Canterbury,  which  belonged  to  the  family  of  Ran- 
ulf  de  Broc.  They  quietly  collected  some  followers  here, 
in  case  they  should  need  any;  and  proceeding  to  Canter- 
bury, suddenly  appeared  (the  four  knights  and  twelve  men) 
before  the  Archbishop,  in  his  own  house,  at  two  o'clock  in 
the  afternoon.  They  neither  bowed  nor  spoke,  but  sat 
down  on  the  floor  in  silence,  staring  at  the  Archbishop. 

Thomas  a  Becket  said,  at  length,  "  What  do  you  want?  " 

"We  want,"  said  Reginald  Fitzurse,  "the  excommuni- 
cation taken  from  the  Bishops,  and  you  to  answer  for  your 
offences  to  the  King." 

Thomas  a  Becket  defiantly  replied,  that  the  power  of  the 
clergy  was  above  the  power  of  the  King.  That  it  was  not 
for  such  men  as  they  were,  to  threaten  him.  That  if  he 
were  threatened  by  all  the  swords  in  England,  he  would 
never  yield. 

"  Then  we  will  do  more  than  threaten ! "  said  the  knights. 
And  they  went  out  with  the  twelve  men,  and  put  on  their 
armour,  and  drew  their  shining  swords,  and  came  back. 

His  servants,  in  the  meantime,  had  shut  up  and  barred 
the  great  gate  of  the  palace.  At  first,  the  knights  tried  to 
shatter  it  with  their  battle-axes;  but,  being  shown  a  win- 
dow by  which  they  could  enter,  they  let  the  gate  alone, 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  81 

and  climbed  in  that  way.  While  they  were  battering  at 
the  door,  the  attendants  of  Thomas  a  Becket  had  implored 
him  to  take  refuge  in  the  Cathedral;  in  which,  as  a  sanctu- 
ary or  sacred  place,  they  thought  the  knights  would  dare 
to  do  no  violent  deed.  He  told  them,  again  and  again, 
that  he  would  not  stir.  Hearing  the  distant  voices  of  the 
monks  singing  the  evening  service,  however,  he  said  it  was 
now  his  duty  to  attend,  and  therefore,  and  for  no  other 
reason,  he  would  go. 

There  was  a  near  way  between  his  Palace  and  the  Cathe- 
dral, by  some  beautiful  old  cloisters  which  you  may  yet 
see.  He  went  into  the  Cathedral,  without  any  hurry,  and 
having  the  Cross  carried  before  him  as  usual.  When  he 
was  safely  there,  his  servants  would  have  fastened  the 
door,  but  he  said  No !  it  was  the  house  of  God  and  not  a 
fortress. 

As  he  spoke,  the  shadow  of  Reginald  Fitzurse  appeared 
in  the  Cathedral  doorway,  darkening  the  little  light  there 
was  outside,  on  the  dark  winter  evening.  This  knight 
said,  in  a  strong  voice,  "  Follow  me,  loyal  servants  of  the 
King ! "  The  rattle  of  the  armour  of  the  oth  3r  knights 
echoed  through  the  Cathedral,  as  they  came  clashing  in. 

It  was  so  dark,  in  the  lofty  aisles  and  among  the  stately 
pillars  of  the  church,  and  there  were  so  many  hiding-places 
in  the  crypt  below  and  in  the  narrow  passages  above,  that 
Thomas  a  Becket  might  even  at  that  pass  have  saved  him- 
self if  he  would.  But  he  would  not.  He  told  the  monks 
resolutely  that  he  would  not.  And  though  they  all  dis- 
persed and  left  him  there  with  no  other  follower  than  Ed- 
ward Gryme,  his  faithful  cross-bearer,  he  was  as  firm 
then,  as  ever  he  had  been  in  his  life. 

The  knights  came  on,  through  the  darkness,  making  a 
terrible  noise  with  their  armed  tread  upon  the  stone  pave- 
ment of  the  church.  "  Where  is  the  traitor?  "  they  cried 
out.  He  made  no  answer.  But  when  they  cried,  "  Where 
is  the  Archbishop?  "  he  said  proudly,  "  I  am  here ! "  and 
came  out  of  the  shade  and  stood  before  them. 

The  knights  had  no  desire  to  kill  him,  if  they  could  rid 
the  King  and  themselves  of  him  by  any  other  means. 
They  told  him  he  must  either  fly  or  go  with  them.  He 
said  he  would  do  neither;  and  he  threw  William  Tracy  off 
with  such  force  when  he  took  hold  of  his  sleeve,  that  Tracy 
reeled  again.  By  his  reproaches  and  his  steadiness,  he  so 
6 


82  A  CHILD  S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

incensed  them,  and  exasperated  their  fierce  humour,  that 
Reginald  Fitzurse,  whom  he  called  by  an  ill  name,  said, 
"  Then  die ! "  and  struck  at  his  head.  But  the  faithful 
Edward  Gryme  put  out  his  arm,  and  there  received  the 
main  force  of  the  blow,  so  that  it  only  made  his  master 
bleed.  Another  voice  from  among  the  knights  again 
called  to  Thomas  a  Becket  to  fly;  but,  with  his  blood  run- 
ning down  his  face,  and  his  hands  clasped,  and  his  head 
bent,  he  commended  himself  to  God,  and  stood  firm.  Then 
they  cruelly  killed  him  close  to  the  altar  of  St  Bennet; 
and  his  body  fell  upon  the  pavement,  which  was  dirtied 
with  his  blood  and  brains. 

It  is  an  awful  thing  to  think  of  the  murdered  mortal, 
who  had  so  showered  his  curses  about,  lying,  all  disfigured, 
in  the  church,  where  a  few  lamps  here  and  there  were  but 
red  specks  on  a  pall  of  darkness;  and  to  think  of  the 
guilty  knights  riding  away  on  horseback,  looking  over  their 
shoulders  at  the  dim  Cathedral,  and  remembering  what 
they  had  left  inside. 

PART  THE   SECOND. 

When  the  King  heard  how  Thomas  a  Becket  had  lost  his 
life  in  Canterbury  Cathedral,  through  the  ferocity  of  the 
four  Knights,  he  was  filled  with  dismay.  Some  have  sup- 
posed that  when  the  King  spoke  those  hasty  words,  "  Have 
I  no  one  here  who  will  deliver  me  from  this  man?  "  he 
wished,  and  meant  a  Becket  to  be  slain.  But  few  things 
are  more  unlikely;  for,  besides  that  the  King  was  not  nat- 
urally cruel  (though  very  passionate),  he  was  wise,  and 
must  have  known  full  well  what  any  stupid  man  in  his 
dominions  must  have  known,  namely,  that  such  a  murder 
would  rouse  the  Pope  and  the  whole  Church  against  him. 

He  sent  respectful  messengers  to  the  Pope,  to  represent 
his  innocence  (except  in  having  uttered  the  hasty  words); 
and  he  swore  solemnly  and  publicly  to  his  innocence,  and 
contrived  in  time  to  make  his  peace.  As  to  the  four  guilty 
Knights,  who  fled  into  Yorkshire,  and  never  again  dared  to 
show  themselves  at  Court,  the  Pope  excommunicated  them; 
and  they  lived  miserably  fp'*  some  time,  shunned  by  all 
their  countrymen.  At  last,  they  went  humbly  to  Jerusa- 
lem as  a  penance,  and  there  died  and  were  buried. 

It  happened,  fortunately  for  the  pacifying  of  the  Pope, 


t 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  83 

that  an  opportunity  arose  very  soon  after  the  murder  of  4 
Becket,  for  the  King  to  declare  his  power  in  Ireland — which 
was  an  acceptable  undertaking  to  the  Pope,  as  the  Irish, 
w^ho  had  been  converted  to  Christianity  by  one  Patricius 
(otherwise  Saint  Patrick)  long  ago,  before  any  Pope  exist- 
ed, considered  that  the  Pope  had  nothing  at  all  to  do  with 
them,  or  they  with  the  Pope,  and  accordingly  refused  to 
pay  him  Peter's  Pence,  or  that  tax  of  a  penny  a  house 
which  I  have  elsewhere  mentioned.  The  King's  opportu- 
nity arose  in  this  way. 

The  Irish  were,  at  that  time,  as  barbarous  a  people  as 
you  can  well  imagine.  They  were  continually  quarrelling 
and  fighting,  cutting  one  another's  throats,  slicing  one  an- 
other's noses,  burning  one  another's  houses,  carrying  away 
one  another's  wives,  and  committing  all  sorts  of  violence. 
The  country  was  divided  into  five  kingdoms — Desmond, 
Thomond,  Connaught,  Ulster,  and  Leinster — each  gov- 
erned by  a  separate  King,  of  whom  one  claimed  to  be  the 
chief  of  the  rest.  Now,  one  of  these  Kings,  named  Der- 
MOND  Mac  Murrough  (a  wild  kind  of  name,  spelt  in  more 
than  one  wild  kind  of  way),  had  carried  off  the  wife  of  a 
friend  of  his,  and  concealed  her  on  an  island  in  a  bog.  The 
friend  resenting  this  (though  it  was  quite  the  custom  of  the 
country),  complained  to  the  chief  King,  and,  with  the  chief 
King's  help,  drove  Dermond  Mac  Murrough  out  of  his  do- 
minions. Dermond  came  over  to  England  for  revenge;  and 
offered  to  hold  his  realm  as  a  vassal  of  King  Henry,  if 
King  Henry  would  help  him  to  regain  it.  The  King  con- 
sented to  these  terms;  but  only  assisted  him,  then,  with 
what  were  called  Letters  Patent,  authorising  any  English 
subjects  who  were  so  disposed,  to  enter  into  his  service, 
and  aid  his  cause. 

There  was,  at  Bristol,  a  certain  Earl  Kichard  de 
Clare,  called  Strongbow;  of  no  very  good  character; 
needy  and  desperate,  and  ready  for  anything  that  offered 
him  a  chance  of  improving  his  fortunes.  There  were,  in 
South  Wales,  two  other  broken  knights  of  the  same  good- 
for-nothing  sort,  called  Robert  Fitz-Stephen,  and  Mau- 
rice Fitz-Gerald.  These  three,  each  with  a  small  band 
of  followers,  took  up  Dermond's  cause;  and  it  was  agreed 
that  if  it  proved  successful,  Strongbow  should  marry  Der- 
mond's daughter  Eva,  and  be  declared  his  heir. 

The  trained  English  followers  of  these  knights  were  so 


84  A  COLD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

superior  in  all  the  discipline  of  battle  to  the  Irish,  that 
they  beat  them  against  immense  superiority  of  numbers. 
In  one  fight,  early  in  the  war,  they  cut  off  three  hundred 
heads,  and  laid  th^m  before  Mac  Murrough;  who  turned 
them  every  one  up  with  his  hands,  rejoicing,  and,  coming 
to  one  which  was  the  head  of  a  man  whom  he  had  much 
disliked,  grasped  it  by  the  hair  and  ears,  and  tore  off  the 
nose  and  lips  with  his  teeth.  You  may  judge  from  this, 
what  kind  of  a  gentleman  an  Irish  King  in  those  times  was. 
The  captives,  all  through  this  war,  were  horribly  treated; 
the  victorious  party  making  nothing  of  breaking  their 
limbs,  and  casting  them  into  the  sea  from  the  tops  of  high 
rocks.  It  was  in  the  midst  of  the  miseries  and  cruelties 
attendant  on  the  taking  of  Waterford,  where  the  dead  lay 
piled  in  the  streets,  and  the  filthy  gutters  ran  with  blood, 
that  Strongbow  married  Eva.  An  odious  marriage-com- 
pany those  mounds  of  corpses  must  have  made,  I  think, 
and  one  quite  worthy  of  the  young  lady's  father 

He  died,  after  Waterford  and  Dublin  had  been  taken, 
and  various  successes  achieved;  and  Strongbow  became 
King  of  Leinster.  Now  came  King  Henry's  opportunity. 
To  restrain  the  growing  power  of  Strongbow,  he  himself 
repaired  to  Dublin,  as  Strongbow' s  Royal  Master,  and  de- 
prived him  of  his  kingdom,  but  confirmed  him  in*the  enjoy- 
ment of  great  possessions.  The  King,  then,  holding  state 
in  Dublin,  received  the  homage  of  nearly  all  the  Irish 
Kings  and  Chiefs,  and  so  came  home  again  with  a  great 
addition  to  his  reputation  as  Lord  of  Ireland,  and  with  a 
new  claim  on  the  favour  of  the  Pope.  And  now,  their  rec- 
onciliation was  completed — more  easily  and  mildly  by  the 
Pope,  than  the  King  might  have  expected,  I  think. 

At  this  period  of  his  reign,  when  his  troubles  seemed  so 
few  and  his  prospects  so  bright,  those  domestic  miseries 
began  which  gradually  made  the  King  the  most  unhappy 
of  men,  reduced  his  great  spirit,  wore  away  his  health,  and 
broke  his  heart. 

He  had  four  sons.  Henry,  now  aged  eighteen — his  se- 
cret crowning  of  whom  had  given  such  offence  to  Thomas  k 
Becket;  Richard,  aged  sixteen;  Geoffrey,  fifteen;  and 
John,  his  favourite,  a  young  boy  whom  the  courtiers  named 
Lackland,  because  he  had  no  inheritance,  but  to  whom 
the  King  meant  to  give  the  Lordship  of  Ireland.  All 
these  misguided  boys,  in  their  turn,  were  unnatural  sons  to 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  EXGLAND.  35 

him,  and  unnatural  brothers  to  each  other.  Prmce  Henry, 
stimulated  by  the  French  King,  and  by  his  bad  mother, 
Queen  Eleanor,  began  the  un dutiful  history. 

First,  he  demanded  that  his  young  wife,  Mabqabet,  the 
French  King's  daughter,  should  be  crowned  as  well  as  he. 
His  father,  the  King,  consented,  and  it  was  done.  It  was 
no  sooner  done,  than  he  demanded  to  have  a  part  of  his 
father's  dominions,  during  his  father's  life.  This  being 
refused,  he  made  off  from  his  father  in  the  night,  with  his 
bad  heart  full  of  bitterness,  and  took  refuge  at  the  French 
King's  Court.  Within  a  day  or  two,  his  brothers  Richard 
and  Geoffrey  followed.  Their  mother  tried  to  join  them — 
escaping  in  man's  clothes — but  she  was  seized  by  King 
Henry's  men,  and  immured  in  prison,  where  she  lay,  de- 
servedly, for  sixteen  years.  Every  day,  however,  some 
grasping  English  noblemen,  to  whom  the  King's  protection 
of  his  people  from  their  avarice  and  oppression  had  given 
offence,  deserted  him  and  joined  the  Princes.  Every  day 
he  heard  some  fresh  intelligence  of  the  Princes  levying  ar- 
mies against  him;  of  Prince  Henry's  wearing  a  crown  be- 
fore his  own  ambassadors  at  the  French  Court,  and  being 
called  the  Junior  King  of  England;  of  all  the  Princes 
swearing  never  to  make  peace  with  him,  their  father,  with- 
out the  consent  and  approval  of  the  Barons  of  France 
But,  with  his  fortitude  and  energy  unshaken,  King  Henry 
met  the  shock  of  these  disasters  with  a  resolved  and  cheer- 
ful face.  He  called  upon  all  Royal  fathers  who  had  sons, 
to  help  him,  for  his  cause  was  theirs;  he  hired,  out  of  his 
riches,  twenty  thousand  men  to  fight  the  false  French 
King,  who  stirred  his  own  blood  against  him;  and  he  car- 
ried on  the  war  with  such  vigour,  that  Louis  soon  proposed 
a  conference  to  treat  for  peace. 

The  conference  was  held  beneath  an  old  wide-spreading 
green  elm-tree,  upon  a  plain  in  France  It  led  to  nothing. 
The  war  recommenced  Prince  Richard  began  his  fighting 
career,  by  leading  an  army  against  his  father;  but  his 
father  beat  him  and  his  army  back;  and  thousands  of  his 
men  would  have  rued  the  day  in  which  they  fought  in  such 
a  wicked  cause,  had  not  the  King  received  news  of  an  in- 
vasion of  England  by  the  Scots,  and  promptly  come  home 
through  a  great  storm  to  repress  it.  And  whether  he 
really  began  to  fear  that  he  suffered  these  troubles  because 
k  Becket  had  been  murdered;  or  whether  he  wished  to  risQ 


86  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

in  the  favour  of  the  Pope,  who  had  now  declared  a  Becket 
to  be  a  saint,  or  in  the  favour  of  his  own  people,  of  whom 
many  believed  that  even  k  Becket' s  senseless  tomb  could 
work  miracles,  I  don't  know :  but  the  King  no  sooner 
landed  in  England  than  he  went  straight  to  Canterbury; 
and  when  he  came  within  sight  of  the  distant  Cathedral, 
he  dismounted  from  his  horse,  took  off  his  shoes,  and 
Avalked  with  bare  and  bleeding  feet  to  k  Becket' s  grave. 
There,  he  lay  down  on  the  ground,  lamenting,  in  the  pres- 
ence of  many  people;  and  by-and-bye  he  went  into  the 
Chapter  House,  and,  removing  his  clothes  from  his  back 
and  shoulders,  submitted  himself  to  be  beaten  with  knotted 
cords  (not  beaten  very  hard,  I  dare  say  though)  by  eighty 
Priests,  one  after  another.  It  chanced  that  on  the  very 
day  when  the  King  made  this  curious  exhibition  of  him- 
self, a  complete  victory  was  obtained  over  the  Scots;  which 
very  much  delighted  the  Priests,  who  said  that  it  was  won 
beacuse  of  his  great  example  of  repentance  For  the 
Priests  in  general  had  found  out,  since  a  Becket' s  death, 
that  they  admired  him  of  all  things — though  they  had 
hated  him  very  cordially  when  he  was  alive. 

The  Earl  of  Flanders,  who  was  at  the  head  of  the  base 
conspiracy  of  the  King's  undutiful  sons  and  their  foreign 
friends,  took  the  opportunity  of  the  King  being  thus  em- 
ployed at  home,  to  lay  siege  to  Kouen,  the  capital  of  Nor- 
mandy. But  the  King,  who  was  extraordinarily  quick  and 
active  in  all  his  movements,  was  at  Kouen,  too,  before  it 
was  supposed  possible  that  he  could  have  left  England; 
and  there  he  so  defeated  the  said  Earl  of  Flanders,  that  the 
conspirators  proposed  peace,  and  his  bad  sons  Henry  and 
Geoffrey  submitted.  Bichard  resisted  for  six  weeks;  but, 
being  beaten  out  of  castle  after  castle,  he  at  last  submitted 
too,  and  his  father  forgave  him. 

To  forgive  these  unworthy  princes  was  only  to  afford 
them  breathing-time  for  new  faithlessness  They  were  so 
false,  disloyal,  and  dishonourable,  that  they  were  no  more 
to  be  trusted  than  common  thieves.  In  the  very  next  year. 
Prince  Henry  rebelled  again,  and  was  again  forgiven.  In 
eight  years  more.  Prince  Richard  rebelled  against  his  elder 
brother;  and  Prince  Geoffrey  infamously  said  that  the 
brothers  could  never  agree  well  together,  unless  they  were 
united  against  their  father.  In  the  very  next  year  after 
their  reconciliation  by  the  King,  Prince  Henry  again  re- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  87 

belled  against  his  father;  and  again  submitted,  swearing  to 
be  true;  and  was  again  forgiven;  and  again  rebelled  with 
Geoffrey. 

But  the  end  of  this  perfidious  Prince  was  come.  He  fell 
sick  at  a  French  town;  and  his  conscience  terribly  re- 
proaching him  with  his  baseness,  he  sent  messengers  to  the 
King  his  father,  imploring  him  to  come  and  see  him,  and 
to  forgive  him  for  the  last  time  on  his  bed  of  death.  The 
generous  King,  who  had  a  royal  and  forgiving  mind  towards 
his  children  always,  would  have  gone;  but  this  Prince  had 
been  so  unnatural,  that  the  noblemen  about  the  King  sus- 
pected treachery,  and  represented  to  him  that  he  could  not 
safely  trust  his  life  with  such  a  traitor,  though  his  own 
eldest  son.  Therefore  the  King  sent  him  a  ring  from  off 
his  finger  as  a  token  of  forgiveness;  and  when  the  Prince 
had  kissed  it,  with  much  grief  and  many  tears,  and  had 
confessed  to  those  around  him  how  bad,  and  wicked,  and 
undutiful  a  son  he  had  been;  he  said  to  the  attendant 
Priests :  "  O,  tie  a  rope  about  my  body,  and  draw  me  out 
of  bed,  and  lay  me  down  upon  a  bed  of  ashes,  that  I  may 
die  with  prayers  to  God  in  a  repentant  manner ! "  And  so 
he  died,  at  twenty-seven  years  old. 

Three  years  afterwards.  Prince  Geoffrey,  being  unhorsed 
at  a  tournament,  had  his  brains  trampled  out  by  a  crowd 
of  horses  passing  over  him.  So,  there  only  remained  Prince 
Kicihard,  and  Prince  John — who  had  grown  to  be  a  young 
man  now,  and  had  solemnly  sworn  to  be  faithful  to  his 
father.  Richard  soon  rebelled  again,  encouraged  by  his 
friend  the  French  King,  Philip  the  Second  (son  of  Louis, 
who  was  dead);  and  soon  submitted  and  was  again  forgiven, 
swearing  on  the  New  Testament-never  to  rebel  again;  and 
in  another  year  or  so,  rebelled  again;  and,  in  the  presence 
of  his  father,  knelt  down  on  his  knee  before  the  King  of 
France;  and  did  the  French  King  homage;  and  declared 
that  with  his  aid  he  would  possess  himself,  by  force,  of  all 
his  father's  French  dominions. 

And  yet  this  Richard  called  himself  a  soldier  of  Our  Sav- 
iour! And  yet  this  Richard  wore  the  Cross,  which  the 
Kings  of  France  and  England  had  both  taken,  in  the  pre- 
vious year,  at  a  brotherly  meeting  underneath  the  old  wide- 
spreading  elm-tree  on  the  plain,  when  they  had  sworn  (like 
him)  to  devote  themselves  to  a  new  Crusade,  for  the  love 
and  honour  of  the  Truth ! 


88    '  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

Sick  at  heart,  wearied  out  by  the  falsehood  of  his  sons, 
and  almost  ready  to  lie  down  and  die,  the  unhappy  King 
who  had  so  long  stood  firm,  began  to  fail.  But  the  Pope, 
to  his  honour,  supported  him;  and  obliged  the  French 
King  and  Richard,  though  successful  in  fight,  to  treat  for 
peace.  Richard  wanted  to  be  crowned  King  of  England, 
and  pretended  that  he  wanted  to  be  married  (which  he 
really  did  not)  to  the  French  King's  sister,  his  promised 
wife,  whom  King  Henry  detained  in  England,  King 
Henry  wanted,  on  the  other  hand,  that  the  French  King's 
sister  should  be  married  to  his  favourite  son,  John :  the  only 
one  of  his  sons  (he  said)  who  had  never  rebelled  against 
him.  At  last  King  Henry,  deserted  by  his  nobles  one  by 
one,  distressed,  exhausted,  broken-hearted,  consented  to 
establish  peace. 

One  final  heavy  sorrow  was  reserved  for  him,  even  yet. 
When  they  brought  him  the  proposed  treaty  of  peace,  in 
writing,  as  he  lay  very  ill  in  bed,  they  brought  him  also 
the  list  of  the  deserters  from  their  allegiance,  whom  he 
was  required  to  pardon.  The  first  name  upon  this  list  was 
John,  his  favourite  son  in  whom  he  had  trusted  to  the 
last. 

"  0  John !  child  of  my  heart !  "  exclaimed  the  King,  in  a 
great  agony  of  mind,  "  0  John,  whom  I  have  loved  the 
best !  0  John,  for  whom  I  have  contended  through  these 
many  troubles !  Have  you  betrayed  me  too ! "  And  then 
he  lay  down  with  a  heavy  groan,  and  said,  "Now  let  the 
world  go  as  it  will.     I  care  for  nothing  more !  " 

After  a  time,  he  told  his  attendants  to  take  him  to  the 
French  town  of  Chinon — a  town  he  had  been  fond  of,  dur- 
ing many  years.  But  he  was  fond  of  no  place  now;  it 
was  too  true  that  he  could  care  for  nothing  more  upon  this 
earth.  He  wildly  cursed  the  hour  when  he  was  born,  and 
cursed  the  children  whom  he  left  behind  him ;  and  expired. 

As,  one  hundred  years  before,  the  servile  followers  of 
the  Court  had  abandoned  the  Conqueror  in  the  hour  of  his 
death,  so  they  now  abandoned  his  descendant.  The  very 
body  was  stripped,  in  the  plunder  of  the  Royal  chamber; 
and  it  was  not  easy  to  find  the  means  of  carrying  it  for 
burial  to  the  abbey  church  of  Fontevraud. 

Richard  was  said  in  after  years,  by  way  of  flattery,  to 
have  the  heart  of  a  Lion.  It  would  have  been  far  better, 
I  think,  to  have  had  the  heart  of  a  Man.     His  heart,  what- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  89 

ever-  it  was,  had  cause  to  beat  remorsefully  within  his 
breast,  when  he  came — as  he  did — into  the  solemn  abbey, 
and  looked  on  his  dead  father's  uncovered  face.  His 
heart,  whatever  it  was,  had  been  a  black  and  perjured 
heart,  in  all  its  dealings  with  the  deceased  King,  and  more 
deficient  in  a  single  touch  of  tenderness  than  any  wild 
beast's  in  the  forest. 

There  is  a  pretty  story  told  of  this  Eeign,  called  the 
story  of  Fair  Rosamond.  It  relates  how  the  King  doted 
on  Fair  Eosamond,  who  was  the  loveliest  girl  in  all  the 
world;  and  how  he  had  a  beautiful  Bower  built  for  her  in 
a  Park  at  Woodstock;  and  how  it  was  erected  in  a  laby- 
rintli,  and  could  only  be  found  by  a  clue  of  silk.  How 
the  bad  Queen  Eleanor,  becoming  jealous  of  Fair  Rosa- 
mond, found  out  the  secret  of  the  clue,  and  one  day,  ap- 
peared before  her,  with  a  dagger  and  a  cup  of  poison,  and 
left  her  to  the  choice  between  those  deaths.  How  Fair 
Rosamond,  after  shedding  many  piteous  tears  and  offering 
many  useless  prayers  to  the  cruel  Queen,  took  the  poison, 
and  fell  dead  in  the  midst  of  the  beautiful  bower,  while 
the  unconscious  birds  sang  gaily  all  around  her. 

Now,  there  was  a  fair  Rosamond  and  she  was  (I  dare 
say)  the  loveliest  girl  in  all  the  world,  and  the  King  was 
certainly  very  fond  of  her,  and  the  bad  Queen  Eleanor  was 
certainly  made  jealous.  But  I  am  afraid — I  say  afraid,  be- 
cause I  like  the  story  so  much — that  there  was  no  bower, 
no  labyrinth,  no  silken  clue,  no  dagger,  no  poison.  I  am 
afraid  fair  Rosamond  retired  to  a  nunnery  near  Oxford, 
and  died  there,  peaceably;  her  sister-nuns  hanging  a  silken 
drapery  over  her  tomb,  and  often  dressing  it  with  flowers, 
in  remembrance  of  the  youth  and  beauty  that  had  enchanted 
the  King  when  he  too  was  young,  and  when  his  life  lay 
fair  before  him. 

It  was  dark  and  ended  now;  faded  and  gone.  Henry 
Plantagenet  lay  quiet  in  the  abbey  church  of  Fontevraud, 
in  the  fifty-seventh  year  of  his  age — never  to  be  completed 
— after  governing  England  well,  for  nearly  thirty-five 
years. 


yO  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND. 


CHAPTER   XIII. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  RICHARD  THE  FIRST,  CALLED  THE 
LION-HEART. 

In  the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  one  hundred  and 
eighty-nine,  Richard  of  the  Lion  Heart  succeeded  to  the 
throne  of  King  Henry  the  Second,  whose  paternal  heart  he 
had  done  so  much  to  break.  He  had  been,  as  we  have 
seen,  a  rebel  from  his  boyhood;  but,  the  moment  he  be- 
came a  king  against  whom  others  might  rebel,  he  found 
out  that  rebellion  Avas  a  great  wickedness.  In  the  heat  of 
this  pious  discovery,  he  punished  all  the  leading  people 
who  had  befriended  him  against  his  father.  He  could 
scarcely  have  done  anything  that  would  have  been  a  better 
instance  of  his  real  nature,  or  a  better  warning  to  fawners 
and  parasites  not  to  trust  in  lion-hearted  princes. 

He  likewise  put  his  late  father's  treasurer  in  chains,  and 
locked  him  up  in  a  dungeon  from  which  he  was  not  set  free 
until  he  had  relinquished,  not  only  all  the  Crown  treasure, 
but  all  his  own  money  too  So,  Richard  certainly  got  the 
Lion's  share  of  the  wealth  of  this  wretched  treasurei-, 
whether  he  had  a  Lion's  heart  or  not. 

He  was  crowned  King  of  England,  with  great  pomp,  at 
Westminster :  walking  to  the  Cathedral  under  a  silken  can- 
opy stretched  on  the  tops  of  four  lances,  each  carried  by  a 
great  lord.  On  the  day  of  his  coronation,  a  dreadful  mur- 
dering of  the  Jews  took  place,  which  seems  to  have  given 
great  delight  to  numbers  of  savage  persons  calling  them- 
selves Christians.  The  King  had  issued  a  proclamation 
forbidding  the  Jews  (who  were  generally  hated,  though 
they  were  the  most  useful  merchants  in  England)  to  appear 
at  the  ceremony;  but  as  they  had  assembled  in  London  from 
all  parts,  bringing  presents  to  show  their  respect  for  the 
new  Sovereign,  some  of  them  ventured  down  to  Westmin- 
ster Hall  with  their  gifts;  which  were  very  readily  accept- 
ed. It  is  supposed,  now,  that  some  noisy  fellow  in  the 
crowd,  pretending  to  be  a  very  delicate  Christian,  set  up  a 
howl  at  this,  and  struck  a  Jew  who  was  trying  to  get  in  at 
the  Hall  door  with  his  present.     A  riot  arose.     The  Jews 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  91 

who  had  got  into  the  Hall,  were  driven  forth;  and  some  of 
the  rabble  cried  out  that  the  new  King  had  commanded  the 
unbelieving  race  to  be  put  to  death.  Thereupon  the  crowd 
rushed  through  the  narrow  streets  of  the  city,  slaughtering 
all  the  Jews  they  met;  and  when  they  could  iind  no  more 
out  of  doors  (on  account  of  their  having  fled  to  their  houses, 
and  fastened  themselves  in),  they  ran  madly  about,  break- 
ing open  all  the  houses  where  the  Jews  lived,  rushing  iu 
and  stabbing  or  spearing  them,  sometimes  even  flinging  old 
people  and  children  out  of  window  into  blazing  tires  they 
had  lighted  up  below.  This  great  cruelty  lasted  four- 
and-twenty  hours,  and  only  three  men  were  punished  for 
it.  Even  they  forfeited  their  lives  not  for  murdering  and 
robbing  the  Jews,  but  for  burning  the  houses  of  some 
Christians. 

King  Richard,  who  was  a  strong  restless  burly  man,  with 
one  idea  always  in  his  head,  and  that  the  very  troublesome 
idea  of  breaking  the  heads  of  other  men,  was  mightily  im- 
patient to  go  on  a  Crusade  to  the  Holy  Land,  with  a  great 
army.  As  great  armies  could  not  be  raised  to  go,  even  to 
the  Holy  Land,  without  a  great  deal  of  money,  he  sold  the 
Crown  domains,  and  even  the  high  offices  of  State;  reck- 
lessly appointing  noblemen  to  rule  over  his  English  sub- 
jects, not  because  they  were  tit  to  govern,  but  because  they 
could  pay  high  for  the  privilege.  In  this  way,  and  by 
selling  pardons  at  a  dear  rate,  and  by  varieties  of  avarice 
and  oppression,  he  scraped  together  a  large  treasure.  He 
then  appointed  two  Bishops  to  take  care  of  his  kingdom  in 
his  absence,  and  gave  great  powers  and  possessions  to  his 
brother  John,  to  secure  his  friendship,  John  would  rather 
have  been  made  Regent  of  England;  but  he  was  a  sly  man, 
and  friendly  to  the  expedition;  -saying to  himself,  no  doubt, 
"  The  more  fighting,  the  more  chance  of  my  brother  being 
killed;  and  when  he  is  killed,  then  I  become  King  John !  " 

Before  the  newly  levied  army  departed  from  England, 
the  recruits  and  the  general  populace  distinguished  them- 
selves by  astonishing  cruelties  on  the  unfortunate  Jews: 
Avhom,  in  many  large  towns,  they  murdered  by  hundreds 
in  the  most  horrible  manner. 

A  t  York,  a  large  body  of  Jews  took  refuge  in  the  Castle, 
in  the  absence  of  its  Governor,  after  the  wives  and  children 
of  many  of  them  had  been  slain  before  their  eyes.  Pres- 
ently came  the  Governor,  and  demanded  admission.     "  How 


92  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

can  we  give  it  thee,  0  Governor !  "  said  the  Jews  upon  the 
walls,  "  when,  if  we  open  the  gate  by  so  much  as  the  width 
of  a  foot,  the  roaring  crowd  behind  thee  will  press  in  and 
kill  us?"    . 

Upon  this,  the  unjust  Governor  became  angry,  and  told 
the  people  that  he  approved  of  their  killing  those  Jews; 
and  a  mischievous  maniac  of  a  friar,  dressed  all  in  white, 
put  himself  at  the  head  of  the  assault,  and  they  assaulted 
the  Castle  for  three  days. 

Then  said  Jocen,  the  head-Jew  (who  was  a  rabbi  or 
Priest),  to  the  rest,  "  Brethren,  there  is  no  hope  for  us  with 
the  Christians  who  are  hammering  at  the  gates  and  walls, 
and  who  must  soon  break  in.  As  we  and  our  wives  and 
children  must  die,  either  by  Christian  hands,  or  by  our  own, 
let  it  be  by  our  own.  Let  us  destroy  by  fire  what  jewels 
and  other  treasure  we  have  here,  then  fire  the  castle,  and 
then  perish ! " 

A  few  could  not  resolve  to  do  this,  but  the  greater  part 
complied.  They  made  a  blazing  heap  of  all  their  valuables, 
and,  when  those  were  consumed,  set  the  castle  in  flames. 
While  the  flames  roared  and  crackled  around  them,  and 
shooting  up  into  the  sky  turned  it  blood-red,  Jocen  cut  the 
throat  of  his  beloved  wife,  and  stabbed  himself.  All  the 
others  who  had  wives  or  children,  did  the  like  dreadful 
deed.  When  the  populace  broke  in,  they  found  (except  the 
trembling  few,  cowering  in  corners,  whom  they  soon  killed) 
only  heaps  of  greasy  cinders,  with  here  and  there  some- 
thing like  part  of  the  blackened  trunk  of  a  burnt  tree,  but 
which  had  lately  been  a  human  creature,  formed  by  the 
beneficent  hand  of  the  Creator  as  they  were. 

After  this  bad  beginning,  Richard  and  his  troops  went 
on,  in  no  very  good  manner,  with  the  Holy  Crusade.  It 
was  undertaken  jointly  by  the  King  of  England  and  his  old 
friend  Philip  of  France.  They  commenced  the  business  by 
reviewing  their  forces,  to  the  number  of  one  hundred  thou- 
sand men.  Afterwards,  they  severally  embarked  their 
troops  for  Messina,  in  Sicily,  which  was  appointed  as  the 
next  place  of  meeting. 

King  Richard's  sister  had  married  the  King  of  this  place, 
but  he  was  dead ;  and  his  uncle  Tancbed  had  usurped  the 
crown,  cast  the  Royal  Widow  into  prison,  and  possessed 
himself  of  her  estates.  Richard  fiercely  demanded  his  sis- 
ter's release,  the  restoration  of  her  lauds,  and  (according 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  93 

to  the  Royal  custom  of  the  Island)  that  she  should  have  a 
golden  chair,  a  golden  table,  four-and-twenty  silver  cups, 
and  four-and-twenty  silver  dishes.  As  he  was  too  power- 
ful to  be  successfully  resisted,  Tancred  yielded  to  his  de- 
mands; and  then  the  French  King  grew  jealous,  and  com- 
plained that  the  English  King  wanted  to  be  absolute  in  the 
Island  of  Messina  and  everywhere  else.  Richard,  how- 
ever, cared  little  or  nothing  for  this  complaint;  and  in  con- 
sideration of  a  present  of  twenty  thousand  pieces  of  gold, 
promised  his  pretty  little  nephew  Arthur,  then  a  child  of 
two  years  old,  in  marriage  to  Tancred' s  daughter.  We 
shall  hear  again  of  pretty  little  Arthur  by-and-bye. 

This  Sicilian  affair  arranged  without  anybody's  brains 
being  knocked  out  (which  must  have  rather  disappointed 
him).  King  Richard  took  his  sister  away,  and  also  a  fair 
ladj'  named  Berengaria,  with  whom  he  had  fallen  in  love 
in  France,  and  whom  his  mother,  Queen  Eleanor  (so  long 
in  prison,  you  remember,  but  released  by  Richard  on  his 
coming  to  the  Throne),  had  brought  out  there  to  be  his 
wife;  and  sailed  with  them  for  Cyprus. 

He  soon  had  the  pleasure  of  lighting  the  King  of  the 
Island  of  Cyprus,  for  allowing  his  subjects  to  pillage  some 
of  the  English  troops  who  were  shipwrecked  on  the  shore; 
and  easily  conquering  this  poor  monarch,  he  seized  his  only 
daughter,  to  be  a  companion  to  the  lady  Berengaria,  and 
put  the  Kmg  himself  into  silver  fetters.  He  then  sailed 
away  again  with  his  mother,  sister,  wife,  and  the  captive 
princess;  and  soon  arrived  before  the  town  of  Acre,  which 
the  French  King  with  his  fleet  was  besieging  from  the  sea. 
But  the  French  King  was  in  no  triumphant  condition,  for 
his  army  had  been  thinned  by  the  swords  of  the  Saracens, 
and  wasted  by  the  plague ;  and  Saladin,  the  brave  Sultan 
of  the  Turks,  at  the  head  of  a  numerous  army,  was  at  that 
time  gallantly  defending  the  place  from  the  hills  that  rise 
above  it. 

Wherever  the  united  army  of  Crusaders  went,  they 
agreed  in  few  points  except  in  gaming,  drinking,  and  quar- 
relling, in  a  most  unholy  manner;  in  debauching  the  peo- 
ple among  whom  they  tarried,  whether  they  were  friends 
or  foes;  and  in  carrying  disturbance  and  ruin  into  quiet 
places.  The  French  King  was  jealous  of  the  English  King, 
and  the  English  King  was  jealous  of  the  French  King,  and 
the  disorderly  and  violent  soldiers  of  the  two  nations  were 


94  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND 

jealous  of  one  another;  consequently,  the  two  Kings  could 
not  at  first  agree,  even  upon  a  jomt  assault  on  Acre;  but 
when  they  did  make  up  their  quarrel  for  that  purpose,  the 
Saracens  promised  to  yield  the  town,  to  give  up  to  the  Chris- 
tians the  wood  of  the  Holy  Cross,  to  set  at  liberty  all  their 
Christian  captives,  and  to  pay  two  hundred  thousand  pieces 
of  gold.  All  tliis  was  to  be  done  within  forty  days;  but, 
not  being  done.  King  Richard  ordered  some  three  thousand 
Saracen  prisoners  to  be  brought  out  in  the  front  of  his 
camp,  and  there,  in  full  view  of  their  own  countrymen,  to 
be  butchered. 

The  French  King  had  no  part  in  this  crime;  for  he  was 
by  that  time  travelling  homeward  with  the  greater  part  of 
his  men;  being  offended  by  the  overbearing  conduct  of  the 
English  King;  being  anxious  to  look  after  his  own  domin- 
ions ;  and  b^ing  ill,  besides,  from  the  unwholesome  air  of 
that  hot  and  sandy  country.  King  Richard  carried  on  the 
war  without  him;  and  remained  in  the  East,  meeting  with 
a  variety  of  adventures,  nearly  a  year  and  a  half  Every 
night  when  his  army  was  on  the  march,  and  came  to  a  halt, 
the  heralds  cried  out  three  times,  to  remind  all  the  soldiers 
of  the  cause  in  which  they  were  engaged,  "  Save  the  Holy 
Sepulchre!"  and  then  all  the  soldiers  knelt  and  said 
"  Amen ! "  Marching  or  encamping,  the  army  had  continu- 
ally to  strive  with  the  hot  air  of  the  glaring  desert,  or  with 
the  Saracen,  soldiers  aniu\ated  and  directed  by  the  brave 
Saladin,  or  with  both  together.  Sickness  and  death,  battle 
and  wounds,  were  always  among  them;  but  through  every 
difficulty  King  Richard  fought  like  a  giant,  and  worked 
like  a  common  labourer.  Long  and  long  after  he  was  quiet 
in  his  grave,  his  terrible  battle-axe,  with  twenty  English 
pounds  of  English  steel  in  its  mighty  head,  was  a  legend 
among  the  Saracens;  and  when  all  the  Saracen  and  Chris- 
tian hosts  had  been  dust  for  many  a  year,  if  a  Saracen 
horse  started  at  any  object  by  the  wayside,  his  rider  would 
exclaim,  "  What  dost  thou  fear,  Fool?  Dost  thou  think 
King  Richard  is  behind  it?  " 

No  one  admired  this  King's  renown  for  bravery  more 
than  Saladin  himself,  who  was  a  generous  and  gallant  ene- 
my. When  Richard  lay  ill  of  a  fever,  Saladin  sent  him 
fi'esh  fruits  from  Damascus,  and  snow  from  the  mountain- 
tops.  Courtly  messages  and  compliments  were  frequently 
exchanged  between  them — and  then  King  Richard  would 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND  98 

mount  his  horse  and  kill  as  many  Saracens  as  he  could; 
and  Saladin  would  mount  his,  and  kill  as  many  Christians 
as  he  could.  In  this  way  King  Eichard  fought  to  his 
heart's  content  at  Arsoof  and  at  Jaffa;  and  finding  himself 
with  nothing  exciting  to  do  at  Ascalon,  except  to  rebuild, 
for  his  own  defence,  some  fortifications  there  which  the 
Saracens  had  destroyed,  he  kicked  his  ally  the  Duke  of 
Austria,  for  being  too  proud  to  work  at  them. 

The  army  at  last  came  within  sight  of  the  Holy  City  of 
Jerusalem;  but,  being  then  a  mere  nest  of  jealousy,  and 
quarrelling  and  fighting,  soon  retired,  and  agreed  with  the 
Saracens  upon  a  truce  for  three  years,  three  months,  three 
days,  and  three  hours.  Then,  the  English  Christians,  pro- 
tected by  the  noble  Saladin  from  Saracen  revenge,  visited 
Our  Saviour's  tomb;  and  then  King  Richard  embarked 
with  a  small  force  at  Acre  to  return  home. 

But  he  was  shipwrecked  in  the  Adriatic  Sea,  and  was 
fain  to  pass  through  Germany,  under  an  assumed  name. 
Now,  there  were  many  people  in  Germany  who  had  served 
in  tlie  Holy  Land  under  that  proud  Duke  of  Austria  who 
had  been  kicked;  and  some  of  them,  easily  recognising  a 
man  so  remarkable  as  King  Richard,  carried  their  intelli- 
gence to  the  kicked  Duke,  who  straightway  took  him  pris- 
oner at  a  little  inn  near  Vienna. 

The  Duke's  master  the  Emperor  of  Germany,  and  the 
King  of  France,  were  equally  delighted  to  have  so  trouble- 
some a  monarch  in  safe  keeping.  Friendships  which  are 
founded  on  a  partnership  in  doing  wrong,  are  never  true; 
and  the  King  of  France  was  now  quite  as  heartily  King 
Richard's  foe,  as  he  had  ever  been  his  friend  in  his  unnat- 
ural conduct  to  his  father.  He  monstrously  pretended  that 
King  Richard  had  designed  to  poison  him  in  the  East;  he 
charged  him  with  having  murdered,  there,  a  man  whom  he 
had  in  truth  befriended;  he  bribed  the  Emperor  of  Ger- 
many to  keep  him  close  prisoner;  and,  finally,  through  the 
plotting  of  these  two  princes,  Richard  was  brought  before 
the  German  legislature,  charged  with  the  foregoing  crimes, 
and  many  others.  But  he  defended  himself  so  Avell,  that 
many  of  the  assembly  were  moved  to  tears  by  his  eloquence 
and  earnestness.  It  was  decided  that  he  should  be  treated, 
during  the  rest  of  his  captivity,  in  a  manner  more  becoming 
his  dignity  than  he  had  been,  and  that  he  should  be  set 
free  on  the  payment  of  a  heavy  ransoia     This  ransom  thft 


96  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND. 

English  people  willingly  raised.  When  Queen  Eleanor 
took  it  over  to  Germany,  it  was  at  first  evaded  and  refused. 
But  she  appealed  to  the  honour  of  all  the  princes  of  the 
German  Empire  in  behalf  of  her  son,  and  appealed  so  well 
that  it  was  accepted,  and  the  King  released.  Thereupon, 
the  King  of  France  wrote  to  Prince  John — "  Take  care  of 
thyself.     The  devil  is  unchained!  " 

Prince  John  had  reason  to  fear  his  brother,  for  he  had 
been  a  traitor  to  him  in  his  captivity.  He  had  secretly 
joined  the  French  King;  had  vowed  to  the  English  nobles 
and  people  that  his  brother  was  dead;  and  had  vainly  tried 
to  seize  the  crown.  He  was  now  in  France,  at  a  place 
called  ^fivreux.  Being  the  meanest  and  basest  of  men,  he 
contrived  a  mean  and  base  expedient  for  making  himself 
acceptable  to  his  brother.  He  invited  the  French  officers 
of  the  garrison  in  that  town  to  dinner,  murdered  them  all, 
and  then  took  the  fortress.  With  this  recommendation  to 
the  good  will  of  a  lion-hearted  monarch,  he  hastened  to 
King  Richard,  fell  on  his  knees  before  him,  and  obtained 
the  intercession  of  Queen  Eleanor.  "  I  forgive  him,"  said 
the  King,  "  and  I  hope  I  may  forget  the  inj'ary  he  has  done 
me,  as  easily  as  I  know  he  will  forget  my  pardon." 

While  King  Eichard  was  in  Sicily,  there  had  been  trouble 
in  his  dominions  at  home :  one  of  the  bishops  whom  he  had 
left  in  charge  thereof,  arresting  the  other;  and  making,  in 
his  pride  and  ambition,  as  great  a  show  as  if  he  were  King 
himself.  But  the  King  hearing  of  it  at  Messina,  and  ap- 
pointing a  new  Regency,  this  Longchamp  (for  that  was  his 
name)  had  fled  to  France  in  a  woman's  dress,  and  had  there 
been  encouraged  and  supported  by  the  French  King.  With 
all  these  causes  of  offence  against  Philip  in  his  mind.  King 
Richard  had  no  sooner  been  welcomed  home  by  his  enthu- 
siastic subjects  with  great  display  and  splendour,  and  had 
no  sooner  been  crowned  afresh  at  Winchester,  than  he  re- 
solved to  show  the  French  King  that  the  devil  was  un- 
chained indeed,  and  made  war  against  him  with  great  fury. 

There  was  fresh  trouble  at  home  about  this  time,  arising 
out  of  the  discontents  of  the  poor  people,  who  complained 
that  they  were  far  more  heavily  taxed  than  the  rich,  and 
who  found  a  spirited  champion  in  William  Fitz-Osbert, 
called  LoNGBEARD.  He  became  the  leader  of  a  secret  so- 
ciety, comprising  fifty  thousand  men;  he  was  seized  by 
surprise;  he  stabbed  the  citizen  who  first  laid  hands  upon 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  97 

him;  and  retreated,  bravely  fighting,  to  a  church,  which  he 
maintained  four  days,  until  he  was  dislodged  by  fire,  and 
run  through  the  body  as  he  came  out.  He  was  not  killed, 
though;  for  he  was  dragged,  half  dead,  at  the  tail  of  a 
horse  to  Smithfield,  and  there  hanged.  Death  was  long  a 
favourite  remedy  for  silencing  the  people's  advocates;  but 
as  we  go  on  with  this  history,  I  fancy  we  shall  find  them 
difficult  to  make  an  end  of,  for  all  that. 

The  French  war,  delayed  occasionally  by  a  truce,  was 
still  in  progress  when  a  certain  Lord  named  Vidomar, 
Viscount  of  Limoges,  chanced  to  find  in  his  ground  a  treas- 
ure of  ancient  coins.  As  the  King's  vassal,  he  sent  the 
King  half  of  it;  but  the  King  claimed  the  whole.  The 
lord  refused  to  yield  the  whole.  The  King  besieged  the 
lord  in  his  castle,  swore  that  he  would  take  the  castle  by 
storm,  and  hang  every  man  of  its  defenders  on  the  battle- 
ments. 

There  was  a  strange  old  song  in  that  part  of  the  country, 
to  the  effect  that  in  Limoges  an  arrow  would  be  made  by 
which  King  Richard  would  die.  It  may  be  that  Bertrand 
DE  GouRDON,  a  young  man  who  was  one  of  the  defenders 
of  the  castle,  had  often  sung  it  or  heard  it  sung  of  a  winter 
night,  and  remembered  it  when  he  saw,  from  his  post  upon 
the  ramparts,  the  King  attended  only  by  his  chief  ofiicer 
riding  below  the  walls  surveying  the  place.  He  drew  an 
arrow  to  the  head,  took  steady  aim,  said  between  his  teeth, 
"  Now  I  pray  God  speed  thee  well,  arrow !  "  discharged  it, 
and  struck  the  King  in  the  left  shoulder. 

Although  the  wound  was  not  at  first  considered  danger- 
ous, it  was  .-severe  enough  to  cause  the  King  to  retire  to  his 
tent,  and  direct  the  assault  to  be  made  without  him.  The 
castle  was  takon;  and  every  man  of  its  defenders  wae 
hanged,  as  the  King  had  sworn  all  should  be,  except  Ber- 
trand de  Gourdon,  who  was  reserved  until  the  royal  pleas- 
ure respecthig  him  should  be  known. 

By  that  time  unskilful  treatment  had  made  the  wound 
mortal,  and  the  King  knew  that  he  was  dying.  He  directed 
Bertrand  to  be  brought  into  his  tent.  The  young  man  was 
brought  there,  heavily  chained.  King  Richard  looked  at 
him  steadily.     He  looked,  as  steadily,  at  the  King. 

"Knave!  "  said  King  Richard.  "What  have  I  done  to 
thee  that  thou  shouldest  take  my  life?  " 

"  What  hast  thou  done  to  me?  "  replied  the  young  man. 


98  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

"  With  thine  own  hands  thou  hast  killed  my  father  and  my 
two  biothers.  Myself  thou  wouldest  have  hanged.  Let 
me  die  now,  by  any  torture  that  thou  wilt.  My  comfort  is, 
that  no  torture  can  save  Thee.  Thou  too  must  die;  and, 
through  me,  the  world  is  quit  of  thee!  *' 

Again  the  King  looked  at  the  young  man  steadily. 
Again  the  young  man  looked  steadily  at  him.  Perhaps 
some  remembrance  of  his  generous  enemy  Saladin,  who  was 
not  a  Christian,  came  into  the  mind  of  the  dying  King, 

"  Youth ! "  he  said,  "  I  forgive  thee.     Go  unhurt ! " 

Then,  turning  to  the  chief  officer  who  had  been  riding  in 
his  company  when  he  received  the  wound,  King  Richard 
said: 

"  Take  ofp  his  chains,  give  him  a  hundred  shillings,  and 
let  him  depart." 

He  sunk  down  on  his  couch,  and  a  dark  mist  seemed  in 
his  weakened  eyes  to  fill  the  tent  wherein  he  had  so  often 
rested,  and  he  died.  His  age  was  forty-two;  he  had 
reigned  ten  years.  His  last  command  was  not  obeyed;  for 
the  chief  officer  flayed  Bertrand  de  Gourdon  alive,  and 
hanged  him. 

There  is  an  old  tune  yet  known — a  sorrowful  air  will 
sometimes  outlive  many  generations  of  strong  men,  and 
even  last  longer  than  battle-axes  with  twenty  pounds  of 
steel  in  the  head — by  which  this  King  is  said  to  have  been 
discovered  in  his  captivity.  Blondel,  a  favourite  Min- 
strel of  King  Richard,  as  the  story  relates,  faithfully  seek- 
ing his  Royal  master,  went  singing  it  outside  the  gloomy 
walls  of  many  foreign  fortresses  and  prisons;  until  at  last 
he  heard  it  echoed  from  within  a  dungeon,  and  knew  the 
voice,  and  cried  out  in  ecstasy,  "  0  Richard,  0  my  King ! " 
You  may  believe  it,  if  you  like;  it  would  be  easy  to  believe 
worse  things.  Richard  was  himself  a  Minstrel  and  a  Poet. 
If  he  had  not  been  a  Prince  too,  he  might  have  been  a  bet- 
ter man  perhaps,  and  might  have  gone  out  of  the  world 
with  less  bloodshed  and  waste  of  life  to  answer  for. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  99 


CHAPTER    XIV. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  KING  JOHN,  CALLED  LACBXAND. 

At  two-and-thirty  years  of  age,  John  became  King  of 
England,  His  pretty  little  nephew  Arthur  had  the  best 
claim  to  the  throne;  but  John  seized  the  treasure,  and 
made  fine  promises  to  the  nobility,  aiid  got  himself  crowned 
at  Westminster  within  a  few  weeks  after  his  brother  Rich- 
ard's death.  I  doubt  whether  the  crown  could  possibly 
have  been  put  upon  the  head  of  a  meaner  coward,  or  a  more 
detestable  villain,  if  England  had  been  searched  from  end 
to  end  to  find  him  out. 

The  French  King,  Philip,  refused  to  acknowledge  the 
right  of  John  to  his  new  dignity,  and  declared  in  favour  of 
Arthur.  You  must  not  suppose  that  he  had  any  generosity 
of  feeling  for  the  fatherless  boy;  it  merely  suited  his  ambi- 
tious schemes  to  oppose  the  King  of  England.  So  John 
and  the  French  King  went  to  war  about  Arthur. 

He  was  a  handsome  boy,  at  that  time  only  twelve  years 
old.  He  was  not  born  when  his  father,  Geoffrey,  had  his 
brains  trampled  out  at  the  tournament;  and,  besides  the 
misfortune  of  never  having  known  a  father's  guidance  and 
protection,  he  had  the  additional  misfortune  to  have  a  fool- 
ish mother  (Constance  by  name),  lately  married  to  her 
third  husband.  She  took  Arthur,  upon  John's  accession, 
to  the  French  King,  who  pretended  to  be  very  much  his 
friend,  and  who  made  him  a  Knight,  and  promised  him  his 
daughter  in  marriage;  but,  who  cared  so  little  about  him  in 
reality,  that  finding  it  his  interest  to  make  peace  with  King 
John  for  a  time,  he  did  so  without  the  least  consideration 
for  the  poor  little  Prince,  and  heartlessly  sacrificed  all  his 
interests. 

Young  Arthur,  for  two  years  afterwards,  lived  quietly; 
and  in  the  course  of  that  time  his  mother  died.  But,  the 
French  King  then  finding  it  his  interest  to  quarrel  with 
,  King  John  again,  again  made  Arthur  his  pretence,  and  in- 
vited the  orphan  boy  to  court.  "  You  know  your  rights. 
Prince,"  said  the  French  King,  "  and  you  would  like  to  be 


100  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

a  King.  Is  it  not  so?  "  "  Truly,"  said  Prince  Arthur,  "  I 
should  greatly  like  to  be  a  King!  "  "Then,"  said  Philip, 
"  you  shall  have  two  hundred  gentlemen  who  are  Knigb  ts 
of  mine,  and  with  them  you  shall  go  to  win  back  the  prov- 
inces belonging  to  you,  of  which  your  uncle,  the  usurping 
King  of  England,  has  taken  possession.  I  myself,  mean- 
while, will  head  a  force  against  him  in  Normandy."  Poor 
Arthur  was  so  flattered  and  so  grateful  that  he  signed  a 
treaty  with  the  crafty  French  King,  agreeing  to  consider 
him  his  superior  Lord,  and  that  the  French  King  should 
keep  for  himself  whatever  he  could  take  from  King  John. 

Now,  King  John  was  so  bad  in  all  ways,  and  King  Philip 
was  so  perfidious,  that  Arthur,  between  the  two,  might  as 
well  have  been  a  lamb  between  a  fox  and  a  wolf.  But, 
being  so  young,  he  was  ardent  and  flushed  with  hope;  and, 
when  the  people  of  Brittany  (which  was  his  inheritance) 
sent  hun  five  hundred  more  knights  and  five  thousand  foot 
soldiers,  he  believed  his  fortune  was  made.  The  people  of 
Brittany  had  been  fond  of  him  from  his  birth,  and  had  re- 
quested that  he  might  be  called  Arthur,  in  remembrance  of 
that  dimly-famous  English  Arthur,  of  whom  1  told  you 
early  in  this  book,  whom  they  believed  to  have  been  the 
brave  friend  and  companion  of  an  old  King  of  their  own. 
They  had  tales  among  them  about  a  prophet  called  Mer- 
lin (of  the  same  old  time),  who  had  foretold  that  their 
own  King  should  be  restored  to  them  after  hundreds  of 
years;  aiid  they  believed  that  the  prophecy  would  be  ful- 
filled in  Arthur;  that  the  time  would  come  when  he  would 
rule  them  with  a  crown  of  Brittany  upon  his  head;  and 
when  neither  King  of  France  nor  King  of  England  would 
have  any  power  over  them.  When  Arthur  found  himself 
riding  in  a  glittering  suit  of  armour  on  a  richly  caparisoned 
horse,  at  the  head  of  his  train  of  knights  and  soldiers,  he 
began  to  believe  this  too,  and  to  consider  old  Merlin  a  very 
superior  prophet. 

He  did  not  know — how  could  he,  being  so  innocent  and 
inexperienced? — that  his  little  army  was  a  mere  nothing 
against  the  power  of  the  King  of  England.  The  French 
King  knew  it;  but  the  poor  boy's  fate  was  little  to  him,  so 
that  the  King  of  England  was  worried  and  distressed. 
Therefore,  King  Philip  went  his  way  into  Normandy,  and 
Prince  Arthur  went  his  way  towards  Mirebeau,  a  French 
town  near  Poictiers,  both  very  well  pleased. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  101 

Prince  Arthur  went  to  attack  the  town  of  Mirebeau,  be- 
cause his  grandmother  Eleanor,  who  has  so  often  made  her 
appearance  in  this  history  (and  who  had  always  been  his 
mother's  enemy),  was  living  there,  and  because  his  Knights 
said,  "Prince,  if  you  can  take  her  prisoner,  you  will  be 
able  to  bring  the  King  your  uncle  to  terms !  "  But  she  was 
not  to  be  easily  taken.  She  was  old  enough  by  this  time 
— eighty — but  she  was  as  full  of  stratagem  as  she  was  full 
of  years  and  wickedness.  Receiving  intelligence  of  young 
Arthur's  approach,  she  shut  herself  up  in  a  high  tower, 
and  encouraged  her  soldiers  to  defend  it  like  men.  Prince 
Arthur  with  his  little  army  besieged  the  high  tower.  King 
John,  hearing  how  matters  stood,  came  up  to  the  rescue, 
with  his  army.  So  here  was  a  strange  family-party!  The 
boy-Prince  besieging  his  grandmother,  and  his  uncle  be- 
sieging him ! 

Tliis  position  of  affairs  did  not  last  long.  One  summer 
night  King  John,  by  treachery,  got  his  men  into  the  town, 
surprised  Prince  Arthur's  force,  took  two  hundred  of  his 
knights,  and  seized  the  Prince  himself  in  his  bed.  The 
Knights  were  put  in  heavy  irons,  and  driven  away  in  open 
carts  drawn  by  bullocks,  to  various  dungeons  where  they 
were  most  inhumanly  treated,  and  where  some  of  them  were 
starved  to  death.  Prince  Arthur  was  sent  to  the  castle  of 
Falaise. 

One  day,  while  he  was  in  prison  at  that  castle,  mourn- 
fully thinking  it  strange  that  one  so  young  should  be  in  so 
much  trouble,  and  looking  out  of  the  small  window  in  the 
deep  dark  wall,  at  the  summer  sky  and  the  birds,  the  door 
was  softly  opened,  and  he  saw  his  uncle  the  King  standing 
in  the  shadow  of  the  archway,  looking  very  grim. 

"Arthur,"  said  the  King,  with  his  wicked  eyes  more  on 
the  stone  floor  than  on  his  nephew,  "  will  you  not  trust  to 
the  gentleness,  the  friendship,  and  the  truthfulness  of  your 
loving  uncle?  " 

"  I  will  tell  my  loving  uncle  that,"  replied  the  boy,  "  when 
he  does  me  right.  Let  him  restore  to  me  my  kingdom  of 
England,  and  then  come  to  me  and  ask  the  question." 

The  King  looked  at  him  and  went  out.  "Keep  that  boy 
close  prisoner,"  said  he  to  the  warden  of  the  castle. 

Then,  the  King  took  secret  counsel  with  the  worst  of  his 
nobles  how  the  Prince  was  to  be  got  rid  of.  Some  said, 
"  Put  out  his  eyes  and  keep  him  in  prison,  as  Robert  o' 


102  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

Normandy  was  kept."  Others  said,  "Have  him  stabbed." 
Others,  "Have  him  hanged."  Others,  "Have  him  poi- 
soned. " 

King  John,  feeling  that  in  any  case,  whatever  was  done 
afterwards,  it  would  be  a  satisfaction  to  his  mind  to  have 
those  hanjisome  eyes  burnt  out  that  had  looked  at  him  so 
proudly  while  his  own  royal  eyes  were  blinking  at  the  stone 
floor,  sent  certain  ruffians  to  Falaise  to  blind  the  boy  with 
red-hot  irons.  But  Arthur  so  pathetically  entreated  them, 
and  shed  such  piteous  tears,  and  so  appealed  to  Hubert  dk 
BouKG  (or  Burgh),  the  warden  of  the  castle,  who  had  a 
love  for  him,  and  was  an  honourable  tender  man,  that  Hu- 
bert could  not  bear  it.  To  his  eternal  honour  he  prevented 
the  torture  from  being  performed,  and,  at  his  own  risk,  sent 
the  savages  away.  • 

The  chafed  and  disappointed  King  bethought  himself  of 
the  stabbing  suggestion  next,  and,  with  his  shuffling  man- 
ner and  his  cruel  face,  proposed  it  to  one  William  de  Bray 
"  I  am  a  gentleman  and  not  an  executioner,"  said  William 
de  Bray,  and  left  the  presence  with  disdain. 

But  it  was  not  difficult  for  a  King  to  hire  a  murderer  in 
those  days.  King  John  found  one  for  his  money,  and  sent 
him  down  to  the  castle  of  Falaise.  "  On  what  errand  dost 
thou  come?  "  said  Hubert  to  this  fellow.  "  To  despatch 
young  Arthur,"  he  returned.  "  Go  back  to  him  who  sent 
thee,"  answered  Hubert,  "  and  say  that  I  will  do  it ! " 

King  John  very  well  knowing  that  Hubert  would  never 
do  it,  but  that  he  courageously  sent  this  reply  to  save  the 
Prince  or  gain  time,  despatched  messengers  to  convey  the 
young  prisoner  to  the  castle  of  Rouen. 

Arthur  was  soon  forced  from  the  good  Hubert — of  whom 
he  had  never  stood  in  greater  need  than  then — carried  away 
by  night,  and  lodged  iu  his  new  prison :  where,  through  his 
grated  window,  he  could  hear  the  deep  waters  of  the  river 
Seine,  rippling  against  the  stone  wall  below. 

One  dark  night,  as  he  lay  sleeping,  dreaming  perhaps  of 
rescue  by  those  unfortunate  gentlemen  who  were  obscurely 
suffering  and  dying  in  his  cause,  he  was  roused,  and  bidden 
by  his  jailer  to  come  down  the  staircase  to  the  foot  of  the 
tower.  He  hurriedly  dressed  himself  and  obeyed.  When 
they  came  to  the  bottom  of  the  winding  stairs,  and  the 
night  air  from  the  river  blew  upon  their  faces,  the  jailer 
trod  upon  his  torch  and  put  it  out.     Then,  Arthur,  in  the 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  103 

darkness,  was  hurriedly  drawn  into  a  solitary  boat.     And 
in  that  boat,  he  found  his  uncle  and  one  other  man. 

He  knelt  to  them,  and  prayed  them  not  to  murder  him. 
Deaf  to  his  entreaties,  they  stabbed  him  and  sunk  his  body 
in  the  river  with  heavy  stones.  When  the  spring-morning 
broke,  the  tower-door  was  closed,  the  boat  was  gone,  the 
river  sparkled  on  its  way,  and  never  more  was  any  trace  of 
the  poor  boy  beheld  by  mortal  eyes. 

The  news  of  this  atrocious  murder  being  spread  in  Eng- 
land, awakened  a  hatred  of  the  King  (already  odious  for 
his  many  vices,  and  for  his  having  stolen  away  and  married 
a  noble  lady  while  his  own  wife  was  living)  that  never 
slept  again  through  his  whole  reign.  In  Brittany,  the  in- 
dignation was  intense.  Arthur's  own  sister  Eleanor  was 
in  the  power  of  John  and  shut  up  in  a  convent  at  Bristol, 
but  his  half-sister  Alice  was  in  Brittany.  The  people 
chose  her,  and  the  murdered  prince's  father-in-law,  the 
last  husband  of  Constance,  to  represent  them;  and  carried 
their  fiery  complaints  to  King  Philip.  King  Philip  sum- 
moned King  John  (as  the  holder  of  territory  in  France)  to 
come  before  him  and  defend  himself.  King  John  refusing 
to  appear,  King  Philip  declared  him  false,  perjured,  and 
guilty;  and  again  made  war.  In  a  little  time,  by  conquer- 
ing the  greater  part  of  his  French  territory,  King  Philip 
deprived  him  of  one-third  of  his  dominions.  And,  through 
all  the  fighting  that  took  place.  King  John  was  always 
found,  either  to  be  eating  and  drinking,  like  a  gluttonous 
fool,  when  the  danger  was  at  a  distance,  or  to  be  running 
away,  like  a  beaten  cur,  when  it  was  near. 

You  might  suppose  that  when  he  was  losing  his  domin- 
ions at  this  rate,  and  when  his  own  nobles  cared  so  little 
for  him  or  his  cause  that  they  plainly  refused  to  follow  his 
banner  out  of  England,  he  had  enemies  enough.  But  he 
made  another  enemy  of  the  Pope,  which  he  did  in  this  way. 

The  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  dying,  and  the  junior 
monks  of  that  place  wishing  to  get  the  start  of  the  senior 
monks  in  the  appointment  of  his  successor,  met  together  at 
midnight,  secretly  elected  a  certain  Reginald,  and  sent 
him  off  to  Rome  to  get  the  Pope's  approval.  The  senior 
monks  and  the  King  soon  finding  this  out,  and  being  very 
angry  about  it,  the  junior  monks  gave  way,  and  all  the 
monks  together  elected  the  Bishop  of  Norwich,  who  was 
the  King's  favourite.     The  Pope,  hearing  the  whole  story, 


104  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAl^D. 

declared  that  neither  election  would  do  for  him,  and  that 
he  elected  Stephen  Langton.  The  monks  submitting  to 
the  Pope,  the  King  turned  them  all  out  bodily,  and  banished 
them  as  traitors.  The  Pope  sent  three  bishops  to  the  King, 
to  threaten  him  with  an  Interdict.  The  King  told  the 
bif»h^ps  that  if  any  Interdict  were  laid  upon  his  kingdom, 
he  would  tear  out  the  eyes  and  cut  off  the  noses  of  all  the 
monks  he  could  lay  hold  of,  and  send  them  over  to  Eome 
in  that  undecorated  state  as  a  present  for  their  master. 
The  bishops,  nevertheless,  soon  published  the  Interdict, 
and  fled. 

After  it  had  lasted  a  year,  the  Pope  proceeded  to  his  next 
step;  which  was  Excommunication  King  John  was  de- 
clared excommunicated,  with  all  the  usual  ceremonies.  The 
King  was  so  incensed  at  this,  and  was  made  so  desperate 
by  the  disaffection  of  his  Barons  and  the  hatred  of  his  peo- 
ple, that  it  is  said  he  even  privately  sent  ambassadors  to 
the  Turks  in  Spain,  offering  to  renounce  his  religion  and 
hold  his  kingdom  of  them  if  they  would  help  him.  It  is 
related  that  the  ambassadors  were  admitted  to  the  presence 
of  the  Turkish  Emir  through  long  lines  of  Moorish  guards, 
and  that  they  found  the  Emir  with  his  eyes  seriously  fixed 
on  the  pages  of  a  large  book,  from  which  he  never  once 
looked  up.  That  they  gave  him  a  letter  from  the  King 
containing  his  proposals,  and  were  gravely  dismissed. 
That  presently  the  Emir  sent  for  one  of  them,  and  conjured 
him,  by  his  faith  in  his  religion,  to  say  what  kind  of  man 
the  King  of  England  truly  was?  That  the  ambassador, 
thus  pressed,  replied  that  the  King  of  England  was  a  false 
tyrant,  against  whom  his  own  subjects  would  soon  rise 
And  that  this  was  quite  enough  for  the  Emir 

Money  being,  in  his  position,  the  next  best  thing  to 
men.  King  John  spared  no  means  of  getting  it.  He  set  on 
foot  another  oppressing  and  torturing  of  the  unhappy  Jews 
(which  was  quite  in  his  way),  and  invented  a  new  punish- 
ment for  one  wealthy  Jew  of  Bristol  Until  such  time  as 
that  Jew  should  produce  a  certain  large  sum  of  money,  the 
King  sentenced  him  to  be  imprisoned,  and,  every  day,  to 
have  one  tooth  violently  wrenched  out  of  his  head — begin- 
ning with  the  double  teeth.  For  seven  days,  the  oppressed 
man  bore  the  daily  pain  and  lost  the  daily  tooth;  but,  on 
the  eighth,  he  paid  the  money.  With  the  treasure  raised 
in  such  ways,  the  King  made  an  expedition  into  Ireland, 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  105 

where  some  English  nobles  had  revolted.  It  was  one  of 
the  very  few  places  from  which  he  did  not  run  away;  be- 
cause no  resistance  was  shown.  He  made  another  expedi- 
tion into  Wales — whence  he  did  run  away  in  the  end :  but 
not  before  he  had  got  from  the  Welsh  people,  as  hostages, 
twenty-seven  young  men  of  the  best  families;  every  one  of 
whom  he  caused  to  be  slain  in  the  following  year. 

To  Interdict  and  Excommunication,  the  Pope  now  added 
his  last  sentence;  Deposition.  He  proclaimed  John  no 
longer  King,  absolved  all  his  subjects  from  their  allegiance, 
and  sent  Stephen  Langton  and  others  to  the  King  of  France 
to  tell  him  that,  if  he  would  invade  England,  he  should  be 
forgiven  all  his  sins — at  least,  should  be  forgiven  them  by 
the  Pope,  if  that  would  do. 

As  there  was  nothing  that  King  Philip  desired  more  than 
to  invade  England,  he  collected  a  great  army  at  Rouen,  and 
a  fleet  of  seventeen  hundred  ships  to  bring  them  over. 
But  the  English  people,  however  bitterly  they  hated  the 
King,  were  not  a  people  to  suffer  invasion  quietly  They 
flocked  to  Dover,  where  tlie  English  standard  was,  in  such 
great  numbers  to  enrol  themselves  as  defenders  of  their 
native  land,  that  there  were  not  provisions  for  them,  and 
the  King  could  only  select  and  retain  sixty  thousand.  But, 
at  this  crisis,  the  Pope,  who  had  his  own  reasons  for  ob- 
jecting to  either  King  John  or  King  Philip  being  too  pow- 
erful, interfered.  He  entrusted  a  legate,  whose  name  was 
Pandolp,  with  the  easy  task  of  frightening  King  John. 
He  sent  him  to  the  English  Camp,  from  France,  to  terrify 
him  with  exaggerations  of  King  Philip's  power,  and  his 
own  weakness  in  the  discontent  of  the  English  Barons  and 
people.  Pandolf  discharged  his  commission  so  well,  that 
King  John,  in  a  wretched  panic,  consented  to  acknowledge 
Stephen  Langton;  to  resign  his  kingdom  "  to  God,  Saint 
Petei*,  and  Saint  Paul" — which  meant  the  Pope;  and  to 
hold  it,  ever  afterwards,  by  the  Pope's  leave,  on  payment 
of  an  annual  sum  of  money.  To  this  shameful  contract  he 
publicly  bound  himself  in  the  church  of  the  Knights  Tem- 
plars at  Dover:  where  he  laid  at  the  legate's  feet  a  part  of 
the  tribute,  which  the  legate  haughtily  trampled  upon. 
But  they  do  say,  that  this  was  merely  a  genteel  flourish, 
and  that  he  was  afterwards  seen  to  pick  it  up  and  pocket 
it. 

There  was  an  iinfortunate  prophet,  of  the  name  of  Peter^ 


106  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND. 

who  had  greatly  increased  King  John's  terrors  by  predict- 
ing that  he  would  be  unknighted  (which  the  King  sup- 
posed to  signify  that  he  would  die)  before  the  Feast  of  the 
Ascension  should  be  past.  That  was  the  day  after  this 
humiliation.  When  the  next  morning  came,  and  the  King, 
who  had  been  trembling  all  night,  found  himself  alive  and 
safe,  he  ordered  the  prophet — and  his  son  too — to  be 
dragged  through  the  streets  at  the  tails  of  horses,  and  then 
hanged,  for  having  frightened  him. 

As  King  John  had  now  submitted,  the  Pope,  to  King 
Philip's  great  astonishment,  took  him  under  his  protection, 
and  informed  King  Philip  that  he  found  he  could  not  give 
him  leave  to  invade  England.  The  angry  Philip  resolved 
to  do  it  without  his  leave;  but  he  gained  nothing  and  lost 
much;  for,  the  English,  commanded  by  the  Earl  of  Salis- 
bury, went  over,  in  five  hundred  ships,  to  the  French  coast, 
before  the  French  fleet  had  sailed  away  from  it,  and  utterly 
defeated  the  whole. 

The  Pope  then  took  off  his  three  sentences,  one  after 
another,  and  empowered  Stephen  Langton  publicly  to  re- 
ceive King  John  into  the  favour  of  the  Church  again,  and 
to  ask  him  to  dinner.  The  King,  who  hated  Langton  with 
all  his  might  and  main — and  with  reason  too,  for  he  was  a 
great  and  a  good  man,  with  whom  such  a  King  could  have 
no  sympathy — pretended  to  cry  and  to  be  very  grateful. 
There  was  a  little  difficulty  about  settling  how  much  the 
King  should  pay  as  a  recompense  to  the  clergy  for  the 
losses  he  had  caused  them;  but,  the  end  of  it  was,  that  the 
superior  clergy  got  a  good  deal,  and  the  inferior  clergy  got 
little  or  nothing — which  has  also  happened  smce  King 
John's  time,  I  believe. 

When  all  these  matters  were  arranged,  the  King  in  his 
triumph  became  more  fierce,  and  false,  and  insolent  to  all 
around  him  than  he  had  ever  been.  An  alliance  of  sover- 
eigns against  King  Philip,  gave  him  an  opportunity  of 
landing  an  army  in  France;  with  which  he  even  took  a 
town!  But,  on  the  French  King's  gaining  a  great  victory, 
he  ran  away,  of  course,  and  made  a  truce  for  five  years. 

And  now  the  time  approached  wheu  he  was  to  be  still 
further  humbled,  and  made  to  feel,  if  he  could  feel  any- 
thing, what  a  wretched  creature  he  was.  Of  all  men  in  the 
world,  Stephen  Langton  seemed  raised  up  by  Heaven  to 
oppose  and  subdue  him.     When  he  ruthlessly  burnt  and 


A  CHILD'S  HISTOKY  OF  ENGLAND.  107 

destroyed  the  property  of  his  own  subjects,  because  theii 
Xords,  the  Barons,  would  not  serve  him  abroad,  Stephen 
Ijangton  fearlessly  reproved  and  threatened  him.  When 
he  swore  to  restore  the  laws  of  King  Edward,  or  the  laws 
of  King  Henry  the  First,  Stephen  Langton  knew  his  false- 
hood, and  pursued  him  through  all  his  evasions.  When 
the  Barons  met  at  the  abbey  of  Saint  Edmund' s-Bury,  to 
consider  their  wrongs  and  the  King's  oppressions,  Stephen 
Langton  roused  them  by  his  fervid  words  to  demand  a  sol- 
emn charter  of  rights  and  liberties  from  their  perjured 
master,  and  to  swear,  one  by  one,  on  the  High  Altar,  that 
they  would  have  it,  or  would  wage  war  against  him  to  the 
•death.  When  the  King  hid  himself  in  London  from  the 
Barons,  and  was  at  last  obliged  to  receive  them,  they  told 
him  roundly  they  would  not  believe  him  unless  Stephen 
Langton  became  a  surety  that  he  would  keep  his  word. 
When  he  took  the  Cross  to  invest  himself  with  some  inter- 
est, and  belong  to  something  that  was  received  with  favour, 
Steplien  Langton  was  still  immovable.  When  he  appealed 
to  the  Pope,  and  the  Pope  wrote  to  Stephen  Langton  in  be- 
half of  his  new  favourite,  Stephen  Langton  was  deaf,  even 
to  the  Pope  himself,  and  saw  before  him  nothing  but  the 
welfare  of  England  and  the  crimes  of  the  English  King. 

At  Easter-time,  the  Barons  assembled  at  Stamford,  in 
Lincolnshire,  in  proud  array,  and,  marching  near  to  Oxford 
where  tiie  King  was,  delivered  into  the  hands  of  Stephen 
Langton  and  two  others,  a  list  of  grievances.  "And  these," 
they  said,  "  he  must  redress,  or  we  will  do  it  for  ourselves ! " 
AVlieu  Stephen  Langton  told  the  King  as  much,  and  read 
the  list  to  him,  he  went  half  mad  with  rage.  But  that  did 
him  no  more  good  than  his  afterwards  trying  to  pacify  the 
Barons  with  lies.  They  called  themselves  and  their  fol- 
lowers, "  The  army  of  God  and  the  Holy  Church. "  March- 
ing through  the  country,  with  the  people  thronging  to 
them  everywhere  (except  at  Northampton,  where  they 
failed  in  an  attack  upon  the  castle),  they  at  last  trium- 
phantly set  up  their  banner  in  London  itself,  whither  the 
whole  land,  tired  of  the  tyrant,  seemed  to  flock  to  join 
them.  Seven  knights  alone,  of  all  the  knights  in  England, 
remained  with  the  King;  who,  reduced  to  this  strait,  at 
last  sent  the  Earl  of  Pembroke  to  the  Barons  to  sny  that 
he  approved  of  everything,  and  would  meet  them  to  sign 
their  charter  when  they  would.     "  Then,"  said  the  Barons, 


108  A.  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND, 

"let  the  day  be  the  fifteenth  of  June,  and  the  place,  Run- 
ny-Mead." 

On  Monday,  the  fifteenth  of  June,  one  thousand  two 
hundred  and  fourteen,  the  King  came  from  Windsor  Castle, 
and  the  Barons  came  from  the  town  of  Staines,  and  they 
met  on  Runny-Mead,  which  is  still  a  pleasant  meadow  by 
the  Thames,  where  rushes  grow  in  the  clear  water  of  the 
winding  river,  and  its  banks  are  green  with  grass  and  trees. 
On  the  side  of  the  Barons,  came  the  General  of  their  army, 
Robert  Fitz-Walter,  and  a  great  concourse  of  the  nobil- 
ity of  England.  With  the  King,  came,  in  all,  some  four- 
and-twenty  persons  of  any  note,  most  of  whom  despised 
him,  and  were  merely  his  advisers  in  form.  On  that  great 
day,  and  in  that  great  company,  the  King  signed  Magna 
Charta — the  great  charter  of  England — by  which  he 
pledged  himself  to  maintain  the  Church  in  its  rights;  to 
relieve  the  Barons  of  oppressive  obligations  as  vassals  of 
the  Crown — of  which  the  Barons,  in  their  turn,  pledged 
themselves  to  relieve  their  vassals,  the  people;  to  respect 
the  liberties  of  London  and  all  other  cities  and  boroughs; 
to  protect  foreign  merchants  who  came  to  England;  to 
imprison  no  man  without  a  fair  trial;  and  to  sell,  delay,  or 
deny  justice  to  none.  As  the  Barons  knew  his  falsehood 
well,  they  further  required,  as  their  securities,  that  he 
should  send  out  of  his  kingdom  all  his  foreign  troops;  that 
for  two  months  they  should  hold  possession  of  the  city  of 
London,  and  Stephen  Langtonof  the  Tower;  and  that  five- 
and-twenty  of  their  body,  chosen  by  themselves,  should  be 
a  lawful  committee  to  watch  the  keeping  of  the  charter,  and 
to  make  war  upon  him  if  he  broke  it. 

All  this  he  was  obliged  to  yield.  He  signed  the  charter 
with  a  smile,  and,  if  he  could  have  looked  agreeable,  would 
have  done  so,  as  he  departed  from  the  splendid  assembly. 
When  he  got  home  to  Windsor  Castle,  he  was  quite  a  mad- 
man in  his  helpless  fury.  And  he  broke  the  charter  imme- 
diately afterwards. 

He  sent  abroad  for  foreign  soldiers,  and  sent  to  the  Pope 
for  help,  and  plotted  to  take  London  by  surprise,  while  the 
Barons  should  be  holding  a  great  tournament  at  Stamford, 
which  they  had  agreed  to  hold  there  as  a  celebration  of  the 
charter.  The  Barons,  however,  found  him  out  and  put  it 
off.  Then,  when  the  Barons  desired  to  see  him  and  tax 
him  with  his  treachery,  he  made  numbers  of  appointments 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  109 

with  them,  and  kept  none,  and  shifted  from  place  to  place, 
and  was  constantly  sneaking  and  skulking  about.  At  last 
he  appeared  at  Dover,  to  join  his  foreign  soldiers,  of  whom 
numbers  came  into  his  pay;  and  with  them  he  besieged  and 
took  Rochester  Castle,  which  was  occupied  by  knights  and 
soldiers  of  the  Barons.  He  would  have  hanged  them 
every  one;  but  the  leader  of  the  foreign  soldiers,  fearful  of 
what  the  English  people  might  afterwards  do  to  him,  inter- 
fered to  save  the  knights;  therefore  the  King  was  fain  to 
satisfy  his  vengeance  with  the  death  of  all  the  common 
men.  Then,  he  sent  the  Earl  of  Salisbury,  with  one  por- 
tion of  his  army,  to  ravage  the  eastern  part  of  his  own  do- 
minions, while  he  carried  fire  and  slaughter  into  the  north- 
ern part;  torturing,  plundering,  killing,  and  inflicting  every 
possible  cruelty  upon  the  people;  and,  every  morning,  set- 
ting a  worthy  example  to  his  men  by  setting  fire,  with  his 
own  monster-hands,  to  the  house  where  he  had  slept  last 
night.  Nor  was  this  all;  for  the  Pope,  coming  to  the  aid 
of  his  precious  friend,  laid  the  kingdom  under  an  Interdict 
again,  because  the  people  took  part  with  the  Barons.  It 
did  not  much  matter,  for  the  people  had  grown  so  used  to 
it  now,  that  they  had  begun  to  think  nothing  about  it.  It 
occurred  to  them — perhaps  to  Stephen  Langton  too — that 
they  could  keep  their  churches  open,  and  ring  their  bells, 
without  the  Pope's  permission  as  well  as  with  it.  So,  they 
tried  the  experiment — and  found  that  it  succeeded  perfectly. 
It  being  now  impossible  to  bear  the  country,  as  a  wilder- 
ness of  cruelty,  or  longer  to  hold  any  term  with  such  a 
forsworn  outlaw  of  a  King,  the  Barons  sent  to  Louis,  son 
of  the  French  monarch,  to  offer  him  the  English  crown. 
Caring  as  little  for  the  Pope's  excommunication  of  him  if 
he  accepted  the  offer,  as  it  is  possible  his  father  may  have 
cared  for  the  Pope's  forgiveness  of  his  sins,  he  landed  at 
Sandwich  (King  John  immediately  running  away  from 
Dover,  where  he  happened  to  be),  and  went  on  to  London. 
The  Scottish  King,  with  whom  many  of  the  Northern  Eng- 
lish Lords  had  taken  refuge;  numbers  of  the  foreign  sol- 
diers, numbers  of  the  Barons,  and  numbers  of  the  people 
went  over  to  him  every  day; — King  John,  the  while,  con- 
tinually running  away  in  all  directions.  The  career  of 
Louis  was  checked,  however,  by  the  suspicions  of  the  Bar- 
ons, founded  on  the  dying  declaration  of  a  French  Lord, 
that  when  the  kingdom  was  conquered  he  was  sworn  to 


ilO  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

banish  them  as  traitors,  and  to  give  their  estates  to  some 
of  his  own  Nobles.  Rather  than  suffer  this,  some  of  the 
Barons  hesitated :  others  even  went  o\  er  to  King  John. 

It  seemed  to  be  the  turning-point  of  King  John's  fort- 
unes, for,  in  his  savage  and  murderous  course,  he  had  now 
taken  some  towns  and  met  with  some  successes.  But,  hap- 
pily for  England  and  humanity,  his  death  was  near.  Cross- 
ing a  dangerous  quicksand,  called  the  Wash,  not  very  far 
from  Wisbeach,  the  tide  came  up  and  nearly  drowned  his 
army.  He  and  his  soldiers  escaped;  but,  looking  back 
from  the  shore  when  he  was  safe,  he  saw  the  roaring  water 
sweep  down  in  a  torrent,  overturn  the  waggons,  horses,  and 
men,  that  carried  his  treasure,  and, engulf  them  in  a  raging 
whirlpool  from  which  nothing  could  be  delivered. 

Cursing,  and  swearing,  and  gnawing  his  fingers,  he  went 
on  to  Swinestead  Abbey,  where  the  monks  set  before  him 
quantities  of  pears,  and  peaches,  and  new  cider — some  say 
poison  too,  but  there  is  very  little  reason  to  suppose  so — of 
which  he  ate  and  drank  in  an  immoderate  and  beastly  way. 
All  night  he  lay  ill  of  a  burning  fever,  and  haunted  with 
horrible  fears.  Next  day,  they  put  him  in  a  horse-litter, 
and  carried  him  to  Sleaford  Castle,  where  he  passed  another 
night  of  pain  and  horror.  Next  day,  they  carried  him, 
with  greater  difficulty  than  on  the  day  before,  to  the  castle 
of  Newark  upon  Trent;  and  there,  on  the  eighteenth  of 
October,  in  the  forty-ninth  year  of  his  age^  and  the  seven- 
teenth of  his  vile  reign,  was  an  end  of  this  miserable  brute. 


CHAPTER    XV. 

ENGLAND  DNDER  HENRY  THE  THIRD,   CALLED  OF 
WINCHESTER. 

■ '  If  any  of  the  English  Barons  remembered  the  murdered 
Arthur's  sister,  Eleanor  the  fair  maid  of  Brittany,  shut  up 
in  her  convent  at  Bristol,  none  among  them  spoke  of  her 
now,  or  maintained  her  right  to  the  Crown.  The  dead 
Usurper's  eldest  boy,  Henry  by  name,  was  taken  by  the 
Earl  of  Pembroke,  the  Marshal  of  England,  to  the  city  of 
Gloucester,  and  there  crowned  in  great  haste  when  he  was 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  HI 

only  ten  years  old.  As  the  Crown  itself  had  been  lost  with 
the  King's  treasure,  in  the  raging  water,  and,  as  there  was 
no  time  to  make  another,  they  put  a  circle  of  plain  gold 
upon  his  head  instead.  "  We  have  been  the  enemies  of  this 
child's  father,"  said  Lord  Pembroke,  a  good  and  true  gen- 
tleman, to  the  few  Lords  who  were  present,  "  and  he  mer- 
ited our  ill-will;  but  the  child  himself  is  innocent,  and  his 
youth  demands  our  friendship  and  protection."  Those 
Lords  felt  tenderly  towards  the  little  boy,  remembering 
their  own  young  children;  and  they  bowed  their  heads, 
and  said,  "  Long  live  King  Henry  the  Third !  " 

Next,  a  great  council  met  at  Bristol,  revised  Magna 
Charta,  and  made  Lord  Pembroke  Regent  or  Protector  of 
England,  as  the  King  was  too  young  to  reign  alone.  The 
next  thing  to  be  done,  was  to  get  rid  of  Prince  Louis  of 
France,  and  to  win  over  those  English  Barons  who  were 
still  ranged  under  his  banner.  He  was  strong  in  many 
parts  of  England,  and  in  London  itself;  and  he  held,  among 
other  places,  a  certain  Castle  called  the  Castle  of  Mount 
Sorel,  in  Leicestershire.  To  this  fortress,  after  some  skir- 
mishing and  truce-making.  Lord  Pembroke  laid  siege. 
Louis  despatched  an  army  of  six  hundred  knights  and 
twenty  thousand  soldiers  to  relieve  it.  Lord  Pembroke, 
who  was  not  strong  enough  for  such  a  force,  retired  with 
all  his  men.  The  army  of  the  French  Prince,  which  had 
marched  there  with  fire  and  plunder,  marched  away  with 
fire  and  plunder,  and  came,  in  a  boastful  swaggering  man- 
ner, to  Lincoln.  The  town  submitted;  but  the  Castle  in  the 
the  town,  held  by  a  brave  widow  lady,  named  Nichola  db 
Camville  (whose  property  it  was),  made  such  a  sturdy 
resistance,  that  the  French  Count  in  command  of  the  army 
of  the  French  Prince  found  it  necessary  to  besiege  this  Cas- 
tle. While  he  was  thiis  engaged,  word  was  brought  to  him 
that  Lord  Pembroke,  with  four  hundred  knights,  two 
hundred  and  fifty  men  with  cross-bows,  and  a  stout  force 
both  of  horse  and  foot,  was  marching  towards  him. 
"  What  care  I?  "  said  the  French  Count.  "  The  English- 
man is  not  so  mad  as  to  attack  me  and  my  great  army  in  a 
walled  town ! "  But  the  Englishman  did  it  for  all  that, 
and  did  it — not  so  madly  but  so  wisely,  that  he  decoyed 
the  great  army  into  the  narrow,  ill-paved  lanes  and  bye- 
ways  of  Lincoln,  where  its  horse-soldiers  could  not  ride  in 
any  strong  body ;  and  there  he  made  such  havoc  with  them, 


112  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

that  the  whole  force  surrendered  themselves  prisoners,  ex- 
cept the  Count;  who  said  that  he  would  never  yield  to  any- 
English  traitor  alive,  and  accordingly  got  killed.  The  end 
of  this  victory,  which  the  English  called,  for  a  joke,  the 
Fair  of  Lincoln,  was  the  usual  one  in  those  times — the 
common  men  were  slain  without  any  mercy,  and  the  knights 
and  gentlemen  paid  ransom  and  went  home. 

The  wife  of  Louis,  the  fair  Blanche  of  Castile,  duti- 
fully equipped  a  fleet  of  eighty  good  ships,  and  sent  it  over 
from  France  to  her  husband's  aid.  An  English  fleet  of  forty 
ships,  some  good  and  some  bad,  gallantly  met  them  near 
the  mouth  of  the  Thames,  and  took  or  sunk  sixty-five  in 
one  tight.  This  great  loss  put  an  end  to  the  French 
Prince's  hopes.  A  treaty  was  made  at  Lambeth,  in  virtue 
of  which  the  English  Barons  who  had  remained  attached  to 
his  cause  returned  to  their  allegiance,  and  it  was  engaged 
on  both  sides  that  the  Prince  and  all  his  troops  should 
retire  peacefully  to  France.  It  was  time  to  go;  for 
war  had  made  him  so  poor  that  he  was  obliged  to  borrow 
money  from  the  citizens  of  London  to  pay  his  expenses 
home. 

Lord  Pembroke  afterwards  applied  himself  to  governing 
the  country  justly,  and  to  healing  the  quarrels  and  disturb- 
ances that  had  arisen  among  men  in  the  days  of  the  bad 
King  John.  He  caused  Magna  Charta  to  be  still  more  im- 
proved, and  so  amended  the  Forest  Laws  that  a  Peasant 
was  no  longer  put  to  death  for  killing  a  stag  in  a  Royal 
Forest,  but  was  only  imprisoned.  It  would  have  been  well 
for  England  if  it  could  have  had  so  good  a  Protector  many 
years  longer,  but  that  was  not  to  be.  Within  three  years 
after  the  young  King's  Coronation,  Lord  Pembroke  died; 
and  you  may  see  his  tomb,  at  this  day,  in  the  old  Temple 
Church  in  London. 

The  Protectorship  was  now  divided.  Peter  de  Eoches, 
whom  King  John  had  made  Bishop  of  Winchester,  was  en- 
trusted with  the  care  of  the  person  of  the  young  sovereign; 
and  the  exercise  of  the  Royal  authority  was  confided  to 
Earl  Hubert  db  Burgh.  These  two  personages  had  from 
the  first  no  liking  for  each  other,  and  soon  became  enemies. 
When  the  young  King  was  declared  of  age,  Peter  de 
Roches,  finding  that  Hubert  increased  in  power  and  favour, 
retired  discontentedly,  and  went  abroad.  For  nearly  ten 
years  afterwards  Hubert  had  full  sway  alone. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND.  113 

But  ten  yeajs  is  a  long  time  to  hold  the  favour  of  a 
King.  This  King,  too,  as  he  grew  up,  showed  a  strong 
resemblance  to  his  father,  in  feebleness,  inconsistency,  and 
irresolution.  The  best  that  can  be  said  of  him  is  that  he 
was  not  cruel.  De  Roches  coming  home  again,  after  ten 
years,  and  being  a  novelty,  the  King  began  to  favour  him 
and  to  look  coldly  on  Hubert.  Wanting  money  besides, 
and  having  made  Hubert  rich,  he  began  to  dislike  Hubert. 
At  last  he  was  made  to  believe,  or  pretended  to  believe, 
that  Hubert  had  misappropriated  some  of  the  Royal  treas- 
ure ;  and  ordered  him  to  furnish  an  account  of  all  he  had 
done  in  his  administration.  Besides  which,  the  foolish 
charge  was  brought  against  Hubert  that  he  had  made  him- 
self the  King's  favourite  by  magic.  Hubert  very  well 
knowing  that  he  could  never  defend  himself  against  such 
nonsense,  and  that  his  old  enemy  must  be  determined  on 
his  ruin,  instead  of  answering  the  charges  jBed  to  Merton 
Abbey.  Then  the  King,  in  a  violent  passion,  sent  for  the 
Mayor  of  London,  and  said  to  the  Mayor,  "  Take  twenty 
thousand  citizens,  and  drag  me  Hubert  de  Burgh  out  of  that 
abbey,  and  bring  him  here."  The  Mayor  posted  off  to  do 
it,  but  the  Archbishop  of  Dublin  (who  was  a  friend  of 
Hubert's)  warning  the  King  that  an  abbey  was  a  sacred 
place,  and  that  if  he  committed  any  violence  there,  he  must 
answer  for  it  to  the  Church,  the  King  changed  his  mind 
and  called  the  Mayor  back,  and  declared  that  Hubert 
should  have  four  months  to  prepare  his  defence,  and  should 
be  safe  and  free  during  that  time. 

Hubert,  who  relied  upon  the  King's  word,  though  I 
think  he  was  old  enough  to  have  known  better,  came  out  of 
Merton  Abbey  upon  these  conditions,  and  journeyed  away 
to  see  his  wife :  a  Scottish  Princess  who  was  then  at  Saint 
Edmund'  s-Bury . 

Almost  as  soon  as  he  had  departed  from  the  Sanctuary, 
his  enemies  persuaded  the  weak  King  to  send  out  one  Sir 
Godfrey  de  Crancumb,  who  commanded  three  hundred 
vagabonds  called  the  Black  Band,  with  orders  to  seize  him. 
They  came  up  with  him  at  a  little  town  in  Essex,  called 
Brentwood,  when  he  was  in  bed.  He  leaped  out  of  bed, 
got  out  of  the  house,  fled  to  the  church,  ran  up  to  the  altar, 
and  laid  his  hand  upon  the  cross.  Sir  Godfrey  and  the 
Black  Band,  caring  neither  for  church,  altar,  nor  cross, 
dragged  him  forth  to  the  church  door,  with  their  drawn 
S 


114  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY   OF  ENGL'aND. 

swords  flashing  round  his  head,  and  sent  for  a  Smith  to 
rivet  a  set  of  chains  upon  him.  When  the  Smith  (I  wish 
I  knew  his  name !)  was  brought,  all  dark  and  swarthy  with 
the  smoke  of  his  forge,  and  panting  with  the  speed  he  had 
made;  and  the  Black  Band,  falling  aside  to  show  him  the 
Prisoner,  cried  with  a  loud  uproar,  "  Make  the  fetters 
heavy !  make  them  strong !  "  the  Smith  dropped  upon  his 
knee — but  not  to  the  Black  Band — and  said,  "  This  is  the 
brave  Earl  Hubert  de  Burgh,  who  fought  at  Dover  Castle, 
and  destroyed  the  French  fleet,  and  has  done  his  country 
much  good  service.  You  may  kill  me,  if  you  like,  but  I 
will  never  make  a  chain  for  Earl  Hubert  de  Burgh !  " 

The  Black  Band  never  blushed,  or  they  might  have 
blushed  at  this.  They  knocked  the  Smith  about  from  one 
to  another,  and  swore  at  him,  and  tied  the  Earl  on  horse- 
back, undressed  as  he  was,  and  carried  him  off  to  the 
Tower  of  London.  The  Bishops,  however,  were  so  indig- 
nant at  the  violation  of  the  Sanctuary  of  the  Church,  that 
the  frightened  King  soon  ordered  the  Black  Band  to  take 
him  back  again;  at  the  same  time  commanding  the  Sheriff 
of  Essex  to  prevent  his  escaping  out  of  Brentwood  Church. 
Well !  the  Sheriff  dug  a  deep  trench  all  round  the  church, 
and  erected  a  high  fence,  and  watched  the  church  night 
and  day;  the  Black  Band  and  their  Captain  watched  it  too, 
like  three  hundred  and  one  black  wolves.  For  thirty-nine 
days,  Hubert  de  Burgh  remained  within.  At  length,  upon 
the  fortieth  day,  cold  and  hunger  were  too  much  for  him, 
and  he  gave  himself  up  to  the  Black  Band,  who  carried 
him  off,  for  the  second  time,  to  the  Tower.  When  his  trial 
came  on,  he  refused  to  plead;  but  at  last  it  was  arranged 
that  he  should  give  up  all  the  royal  lands  which  had  been 
bestowed  upon  him,  and  should  be  kept  at  the  Castle  of 
Devizes,  in  what  was  called  "  free  prison,"  in  charge  of  four 
knights  appointed  by  four  lords.  There,  he  remained 
almost  a  year,  until,  learning  that  a  follower  of  his  old 
enemy  the  Bishop  was  made  Keeper  of  the  Castle,  and  fear- 
ing that  he  might  be  killed  by  treachery,  he  climbed  the 
ramparts  one  dark  night,  dropped  from  the  top  of  the  high 
Castle  wall  into  the  moat,  and  coming  safely  to  the  ground, 
took  refuge  in  another  church.  From  this  place  he  was 
delivered  by  a  party  of  horse  despatched  to  his  help  by 
some  nobles,  who  were  by  this  time  in  revolt  against  the 
King,  and  assembled  in  Wales.     He  was  finally  pardoned 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  116 

and  restored  to  his  estates,  but  lie  lived  privately,  and  never 
more  aspired  to  a  high  post  in  the  realm,  or  to  a  high  place 
in  the  King's  favour.  And  thus  end — more  happily  than 
the  stories  of  many  favourites  of  Kings — the  adventures 
of  Earl  Hubert  de  Burgh. 

The  nobles,  who  had  risen  in  revolt,  were  stirred  up  to 
rebellion  by  the  overbearmg  conduct  of  the  Bishop  of  Win- 
chester, who,  finding  that  the  King  secretly  hated  the 
Great  Charter  which  had  been  forced  from  his  father,  did 
his  utmost  to  confirm  him  in  that  dislike,  and  in  the  pref- 
erence he  showed  to  foreigners- over  the  English.  Of  this, 
and  of  his  even  publicly  declaring  that  the  Barons  of  Eng- 
land were  inferior  to  those  of  France,  the  English  Lords 
complained  with  such  bitterness,  that  the  King,  finding 
them  well  supported  by  the  clergy,  became  frightened  for 
his  throne,  and  sent  away  the  Bishop  and  all  his  foreign 
associates.  On  his  marriage,  however,  with  Eleanor,  a 
French  lady,  the  daughter  of  the  Count  of  Provence,  he 
openly  favoured  the  foreigners  again;  and  so  many  of  his 
wife's  relations  came  over,  and  made  such  an  immense 
family-party  at  court,  and  got  so  many  good  things,  and 
pocketed  so  much  money,  and  were  so  high  with  the  Eng- 
lish whose  money  they  pocketed,  that  the  bolder  English 
Barons  murmured  openly  about  a  clause  there  was  in  the 
Great  Charter,  which  provided  for  the  banishment  of  un- 
reasonable favourites.  But,  the  foreigners  only  laughed 
disdainfully,  and  said,  "What  are  your  English  laws  to 
us?  " 

King  Philip  of  France  had  died,  and  had  been  succeeded 
by  Prince  Louis,  who  had  also  died  after  a  short  reign  of 
three  years,  and  had  been  succeeded  by  his  son  of  the  same 
name — so  moderate  and  just  a  man  that  he  was  not  the 
least  in  the  world  like  a  King,  as  Kings  went.  Isabella, 
King  Henry's  mother,  wished  very  much  (for  a  certain 
spite  she  had)  that  England  should  make  war  against  this 
King;  and,  as  King  Henry  was  a  mere  puppet  in  anybody's 
hands  who  knew  how  to  manage  his  feebleness,  she  easily 
carried  her  point  with  him.  But,  the  Parliament  were  de- 
termined to  give  him  no  money  for  such  a  war.  So,  to 
defy  the  Parliament,  he  packed  up  thirty  large  casks  of 
silver — I  don't  know  how  he  got  so  much;  I  dare  say  he 
screwed  it  out  of  the  miserable  Jews — and  put  them  aboard 
ship,  and  went  away  himself  to  carry  war  into  France :  ac 


116  A  CHILD'S  HTSTORT  OP  ENGLAND. 

companied  by  his  mother  and  his  brother  Richard,  Earl  of 
Cornwall,  who  was  rich  and  clever.  But  he  only  got  well 
beaten,  and  came  home. 

The  good  humour  of  the  Parliament  was  not  restored  by 
this.  They  reproached  the  King  with  wasting  the  public 
money  to  make  greedy  foreigners  rich,  and  were  so  stern 
with  him,  and  so  determined  not  to  let  him  have  more  of 
it  to  waste  if  they  could  help  it,  that  he  was  at  his  wit's 
end  for  some,  and  tried  so  shamelessly  to  get  all  he  could 
from  his  subjects,  by  excuses  or  by  force,  that  the  people 
used  to  say  the  King  was  the  sturdiest  beggar  in  England. 
He  took  the  Cross,  thinking  to  get  some  money  by  that 
means;  but,  as  it  was  very  well  known  that  he  never  meant 
to  go  on  a  crusade,  he  got  none.  In  all  this  contention, 
the  Londoners  were  particularly  keen  against  the  King, 
and  the  King  hated  them  warmly  in  return.  Hating  or 
loving,  however,  made  no  difference;  he  continued  in  the 
same  condition  for  nine  or  ten  years,  when  at  last  the  Bar- 
ons said  that  if  he  would  solemnly  confirm  their  liberties 
afresh,  the  Parliament  would  vote  him  a  large  sum. 

As  he  readily  consented,  there  was  a  great  meeting  held 
in  Westminster  Hall,  one  pleasant  day  in  May,  when  all 
the  clergy,  dressed  in  their  robes  and  holding  every  one  of 
them  a  burning  candle  in  his  hand,  stood  up  (the  Barons 
being  also  there)  while  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  read 
the  sentence  of  excommunication  against  any  man,  and  all 
men,  who  should  henceforth,  in  any  way,  infringe  the 
Great  Charter  of  the  Kingdom.  When  he  had  done,  they 
all  put  out  their  burning  candles  with  a  curse  upon  the 
soul  of  any  one,  and  every  one,  who  should  merit  that  sen- 
tence. The  King  concluded  with  an  oath  to  keep  the 
Charter,  "  As  I  am  a  man,  as  I  am  a  Christian,  as  I  am  a 
Blnight,  as  I  am  a  King ! " 

It  was  easy  to  make  oaths,  and  easy  to  break  them;  and 
the  King  did  both,  as  his  father  had  done  before  him.  He 
took  to  his  old  courses  again  when  he  was  supplied  with 
money,  and  soon  cured  of  their  weakness  the  few  who  had 
ever  really  trusted  him.  When  his  money  was  gone,  and 
he  was  once  more  borrowing  and  begging  everywhere  with 
a  meanness  worthy  of  his  nature,  he  got  into  a  difficulty 
with  the  Pope  respecting  the  Crown  of  Sicily,  which  the 
Pope  said  he  had  a  right  to  give  away,  and  which  he 
ofiEered  to  King  Henry  for  his  second  son,  Pkince  Ed- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  117 

MUND.  But,  if  you  or  I  give  away  what  we  have  not  got, 
and  what  belongs  to  somebody  else,  it  is  likely  that  the 
person  to  whom  we  give  it,  will  have  some  trouble  in  tak- 
ing it.  It  was  exactly  so  in  this  case.  It  was  necessary 
to  conquer  the  Sicilian  Crown  before  it  could  be  put  upon 
young  Edmund's  head.  It  could  not  be  conquered  without 
money.  The  Pope  ordered  the  clergy  to  raise  money. 
The  clergy,  however,  were  not  so  obedient  to  him  as  usual; 
they  had  been  disputing  with  him  for  some  time  about  his 
unjust  preference  of  Italian  Priests  in  England;  and  tliey 
had  begun  to  doubt  whether  the  King's  chaplain,  whom  he 
allowed  to  be  paid  for  preaching  in  seven  hundred  churches, 
could  possibly  be,  even  by  the  Pope's  favour,  in  seven  hun- 
dred places  at  once.  "  The  Pope  and  the  King  together, " 
said  the  Bishop  of  London,  "may  take  the  mitre  off  my 
head;  but,  if  they  do,  they  will  find  that  I  shall  put  on  a 
soldier's  helmet.  I  pay  nothing."  The  Bishop  of  Worces- 
ter was  as  bold  as  the  Bishop  of  London,  and  would  pay 
nothing  either.  Such  sums  as  the  more  timid  or  more 
helpless  of  the  clergy  did  raise  were  squandered  away, 
without  doing  any  good  to  tlie  King,  or  bringing  the  Sicil- 
ian Crown  an  inch  nearer  to  Prince  Edmund's  head.  The 
end  of  the  business  was,  that  the  Pope  gave  the  Crown  to 
the  brother  of  tlie  King  of  France  (who  conquered  it  for 
himself),  and  sent  the  King  of  England  in  a  bill  of  one 
hundred  thousand  pounds  for  the  expenses  of  not  having 
won  it. 

The  King  was  now  so  much  distressed  that  we  might 
almost  pity  him,  if  it  were  possible  to  pity  a  King  so 
shabby  and  ridiculous.  His  clever  brother,  Richard,  had 
bought  the  title  of  King  of  the  Komans  from  the  German 
people,  and  was  no  longer  near  him,  to  help  him  with  ad- 
vice. The  clergy,  resisting  the  very  Pope,  were  in  alliance 
with  the  Barons.  The  Barons  were  headed  by  Simon  dk 
MoNTFORT,  Earl  of  Leicester,  married  to  King  Henry's  sis- 
ter, and,  though  a  foreigner  himself,  the  most  popular  man 
in  England  against  the  foreign  favourites.  When  the 
King  next  met  his  Parliament,  the  Barons,  led  by  this 
Earl,  came  before  him,  armed  from  head  to  foot,  and  cased 
in  armour.  When  the  Parliament  again  assembled,  in  a 
month's  time,  at  Oxford,  this  Earl  was  at  their  head,  and 
the  King  was  obliged  to  consent,  on  oath,  to  what  was 
called  a  Committee  of  Government :  consisting  of  twenty 


118  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND. 

four  members :  twelve  chosen  by  the  Barons,  and  twelve 
chosen  by  himself. 

But,  at  a  good  time  for  him,  his  brother  Richard  came 
back.  Richard's  first  act  (the  Barons  would  not  admit 
him  into  England  on  other  terms)  was  to  swear  to  be  faith- 
ful to  the  Committee  of  Government — which  he  immedi- 
ately began  to  oppose  with  all  his  might.  Then,  the  Bar- 
ons began  to  quarrel  among  themselves;  especially  the 
proud  Earl  of  Gloucester  with  the  Earl  of  Leicester,  who 
went  abroad  in  disgust.  Then,  the  people  began  to  be  dis- 
satisfied with  the  Barons,  because  they  did  not  do  enough 
for  them.  The  King's  chances  seemed  so  good  again  at 
length,  that  he  took  heart  enough — or  caught  it  from  his 
brother — to  tell  the  Committee  of  Government  that  he  abol- 
ished them — as  to  his  oath,  never  mind  that,  the  Pope 
said ! — and  to  seize  all  the  money  in  the  Mint,  and  to  shut 
himself  up  in  the  Tower  of  London.  Here  he  was  joined 
by  his  eldest  son.  Prince  Edward;  and,  from  the  Tower, 
he  made  public  a  letter  of  the  Pope's  to  the  world  in  gen- 
eral, informing  all  men  that  he  had  been  an  excellent  and 
just  King  for  five-and-forty  years. 

As  everybody  knew  he  had  been  nothing  of  the  sort,  no- 
body cared  much  for  this  document.  It  so  chanced  that 
the  proud  Earl  of  Gloucester  dying,  was  succeeded  by  his 
son;  and  that  his  son,  instead  of  being  the  enemy  of  the 
Earl  of  Leicester,  was  (for  the  time)  his  friend.  It  fell 
out,  therefore,  that  these  two  Earls  joined  their  forces,  took 
several  of  the  Royal  Castles  in  the  country,  and  advanced 
as  hard  as  they  could  on  London,  The  London  people, 
always  opposed  to  the  King,  declared  for  them  with  great 
joy.  The  King  himself  remained  shut  up,  not  at  all  glori- 
ously, in  the  Tower.  Prince  Edward  made  the  best  of  his 
way  to  Windsor  Castle.  His  mother,  the  Queen,  attempted 
to  follow  him  by  water;  but,  the  people  seeing  her  barge 
rowing  up  the  river,  and  hating  her  with  all  their  hearts, 
ran  to  London  Bridge,  got  together  a  quantity  of  stones 
and  mud,  and  pelted  the  barge  as  it  came  through,  crying 
furiously,  ''Drown  the  Witch!  Drown  her!"  They  were 
so  near  doing  it,  that  the  Mayor  took  the  old  lady  under 
his  protection,  and  shut  her  up  in  Saint  Paul's  until  the 
danger  was  past. 

It  would  require  a  great  deal  of  writing  on  my  part,  and 
a  great  deal  of  reading  on    yours,  to  follow  the   King 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  119 

through  his  disputes  with  the  Barons,  and  to  follow  the 
Barons  through  their  disputes  with  one  another — so  I  will 
make  short  work  of  it  for  both  of  us,  and  only  relate  the 
chief  events  that  arose  out  of  these  quarrels.  The  good 
King  of  France  was  asked  to  decide  between  them.  He 
gave  it  as  his  opinion  that  the  King  must  maintain  the 
Great  Charter,  and  that  the  Barons  must  give  up  the  Com- 
mittee of  Government,  and  all  the  rest  that  had  been  done 
by  the  Parliament  at  Oxford :  which  the  Royalists,  or 
King's  party,  scornfully  called  the  Mad  Parliament.  The 
Barons  declared  that  these  were  not  fair  terms,  and  they 
would  not  accept  them.  Then  they  caused  the  great  bell 
of  Saint  Paul's  to  be  tolled,  for  tlie  purpose  of  rousing  up 
the  London  people,  who  armed  themselves  at  the  dismal 
sound  and  formed  quite  an  army  in  the  streets.  I  am  sorry 
to  say,  however,  that  instead  of  falling  upon  the  King's 
party  with  whom  their  quarrel  was,  they  fell  upon  the 
miserable  Jews,  and  killed  at  least  five  hundred  of  them. 
They  pretended  that  some  of  these  Jews  were  on  the 
King's  side,  and  that  they  kept  hidden  in  their  houses, 
for  the  destruction  of  the  people,  a  certain  terrible  compo- 
sition called  Greek  Fire,  which  could  not  be  put  out  with 
water,  but  only  burnt  the  fiercer  for  it.  What  they  really 
did  keep  in  their  houses  was  money;  and  this  their  cruel 
enemies  wanted,  and  this  their  cruel  enemies  took,  like 
robbers  and  murderers. 

The  Earl  of  Leicester  put  himself  at  the  head  of  these 
Londoners  and  other  forces,  and  followed  the  King  to 
Lewes  in  Sussex,  where  he  lay  encamped  with  his  army. 
Before  giving  the  King's  forces  battle  here,  the  Earl  ad- 
dressed his  soldiers,  and  said  that  King  Henry  the  Third 
had  broken  so  many  oaths,  that  he  had  become  the  enemy 
of  God,  and  therefore  they  would  wear  white  crosses  on 
their  breasts,  as  if  they  were  arrayed,  not  against  a  fellow- 
Christian,  but  against  a  Turk.  White-crossed  accordingly, 
they  rushed  into  the  fight.  They  would  have  lost  the  day 
— the  King  having  on  his  side  all  the  foreigners  in  Eng- 
land :  and,  from  Scotland,  John  Comyn,  John  Baliol,  and 
Robert  Bruce,  with  all  their  men — but  for  the  impatience 
of  Prince  Edward,  who,  in  his  hot  desire  to  have  ven- 
geance on  the  people  of  London,  threw  the  whole  of  his 
father's  army  into  confusion.  He  was  taken  Prisoner;  so 
was  the  King;  so  was  the  King's  brother  the  King  of  the 


120  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

Romans;  and  five  thousand  Englishmen  were  left  dead 
upon  the  bloody  grass. 

For  this  success,  the  Pope  excommunicated  the  Earl  of 
Leicester :  which  neither  the  Earl  nor  the  people  cared  at 
all  about.  The  people  loved  him  and  supported  him,  and 
he  became  the  real  King;  having  all  the  power  of  the  gov- 
ernment in  his  own  hands,  though  he  was  outwardly  re- 
spectful to  King  Henry  the  Third,  whom  he  took  with  him 
wherever  he  went,  like  a  poor  old  limp  court-card.  He 
summoned  a  Parliament  (in  the  year  one  thousand  two 
hundred  and  sixty-live)  which  was  the  first  Parliament  in 
England  that  the  people  had  any  real  share  in  electing; 
and  he  grew  more  and  more  in  favour  with  the  people  every 
day,  and  they  stood  by  him  in  whatever  he  did. 

Many  of  the  other  Barons,  and  particularly  the  Earl  of 
Gloucester,  who  had  become  by  this  time  as  proud  as  his 
father,  grew  jealous  of  this  powerful  and  popular  Earl, 
who  was  proud  too,  and  began  to  conspire  against  him. 
Since  the  battle  of  Lewes,  Prince  Edward  had  been  kept  as 
a  hostage,  and,  though  he  was  otherwise  treated  like  a 
Prince,  had  never  been  allowed  to  go  out  without  attendants 
appointed  by  the  Earl  of  Leicester,  who  watched  him.  The 
conspiring  Lords  found  m?ans  to  propose  to  him,  in  secret, 
that  they  should  assist  him  to  escape,  and  should  make 
him  their  leader;  to  which  he  very  heartily  consented. 

So,  on  a  day  that  was  agreed  upon,  he  said  to  his  attend- 
ants after  dinner  (being  then  at  Hereford),  "I  should 
like  to  ride  on  horseback,  this  fine  afternoon,  a  little  way 
into  the  country."  As  they,  too,  thought  it  would  be  very 
pleasant  to  have  a  canter  in  the  sunshine,  they  all  rode  out 
of  the  town  together  in  a  gay  little  troop.  When  they 
came  to  a  fine  level  piece  of  turf,  the  Prince  fell  to  com- 
paring their  horses  one  with  another,  and  offering  bets  that 
one  was  faster  than  another;  and  the  attendants,  suspect- 
ing no  harm,  rode  galloping  matches  until  their  horses 
were  quite  tired.  The  Prince  rode  no  matches  himself, 
but  looked  on  from  his  saddle,  and  staked  his  money. 
Thus  they  passed  the  whole  merry  afternoon.  Now,  the 
sun  was  setting,  and  they  were  all  going  slowly  up  a  hill, 
the  Prince's  horse  very  fresh  and  all  the  other  horses  very 
weary,  when  a  strange  rider  mounted  on  a  grey  steed  ap- 
peared at  the  top  of  the  hill,  and  waved  his  hat.  "  What 
does  the  fellow  mean?  "  said  the  attendants  one  to  another 


A  CHILD'S   HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  121 

The  Prince  answered  on  the  instant  by  setting  spurs  to  his 
horse,  dashing  away  at  his  utmost  speed,  joining  the  man, 
riding  into  the  midst  of  a  little  crowd  of  horsemen  who 
were  then  seen  waiting  under  some  trees,  and  who  closed 
around  him;  and  so  he  departed  in  a  cloud  of  dust,  leaving 
the  road  empty  of  all  but  the  baffled  attendants,  who  sat 
looking  at  one  another,  while  their  horses  drooped  their 
ears  and  panted. 

The  Prince  joined  the  Earl  of  Gloucester  at  Ludlow. 
The  Earl  of  Leicester,  with  a  part  of  the  army  and  the 
stupid  old  King,  was  at  Hereford.  One  of  the  Earl  of 
Leicester's  sons,  Simon  de  Montfort,  with  another  part  of 
the  army,  was  in  Sussex.  To  prevent  these  two  parts 
from  uniting  was  the  Prince's  first  object.  He  attacked 
Simon  de  Montfort  by  night,  defeated  him,  seized  his  ban- 
ners and  treasure,  and  forced  him  into  Kenilworth  Castle 
in  Warwickshire,  which  belonged  to  his  family. 

His  father,  the  Earl  of  Leicester,  in  the  meanwhile,  not 
knowing  what  had  happened,  marched  out  of  Hereford, 
with  his  part  of  the  army  and  the  King,  to  meet  him.  He 
came,  on  a  bright  morning  in  August,  to  Evesham,  which 
is  watered  by  the  pleasant  river  Avon.  Looking  rather 
anxiously  across  the  prospect  towards  Kenilworth,  he  saw 
his  own  banners  advancing;  and  his  face  brightened  with 
joy.  But,  it  clouded  darkly  when  he  presently  perceived 
that  the  banners  were  captured,  and  in  the  enemy's  hands; 
and  he  said,  "  It  is  over.  The  Lord  have  mercy  on  our 
souls,  for  our  bodies  are  Prince  Edward's!  " 

He  fought  like  a  true  Knight,  nevertheless.  When  his 
horse  was  killed  under  him,  he  fought  on  foot.  It  was  a 
fierce  battle,  and  the  dead  lay  in  heaps  everywhere.  The 
old  King,  stuck  up  in  a  suit  of  armour  ou  a  big  war-horse, 
which  didn't  mind  him  at  all,  and  which  carried  him  into 
all  sorts  of  places  where  he  didn't  want  to  go,  got  into 
everybody's  way,  and  very  nearly  got  knocked  on  the  head 
by  one  of  his  son's  men.  But  he  managed  to  pipe  out,  "I 
am  Harry  of  Winchester !  "  and  the  Prince,  who  heard  him, 
seized  his  bridle,  and  took  him  out  of  peril.  The  Earl  of 
Leicester  still  fought  bravely,  until  his  best  son  Henry  was 
killed,  and  the  bodies  of  his  best  friends  choked  his  path; 
and  then  he  fell,  still  fighting,  sword  in  hand.  They  man- 
gled his  body,  and  sent  it  as  a  present  to  a  noble  lady — but 
a  very  unpleasant  lady,  I  should  think — who  was  the  wife 


J  22  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

of  his  worst  enemy.  They  could  not  mangle  his  memory 
in  the  minds  of  the  faithful  people,  though.  Many  years 
afterwards,  they  loved  him  more  than  ever,  and  regarded 
him  as  a  Saint,  and  always  spoke  of  him  as  "  Sir  Simon  the 
Righteous." 

And  even  though  he  was  dead,  the  cause  for  which  he 
had  fought  still  lived,  and  was  strong,  and  forced  itself 
upon  the  King  in  the  very  hour  of  victory.  Henry  found 
himself  obliged  to  respect  the  Great  Charter,  however  much 
he  hated  it,  and  to  make  laws  similar  to  the  laws  of  the 
Great  Earl  of  Leicester,  and  to  be  moderate  and  forgiving 
towards  the  people  at  last — even  towards  the  people  of 
London,  who  had  so  long  opposed  him.  There  were  more 
risings  before  all  this  was  done,  but  they  were  set  at  rest 
by  these  means,  and  Prince  Edward  did  his  best  in  all 
things  to  restore  peace.  One  Sir  Adam  de  Gourdon  was 
the  last  dissatisfied  knight  in  arms;  but,  the  Prince  van- 
quished him  in  single  combat,  in  a  wood,  and  nobly  gave 
him  his  life,  and  became  his  friend,  instead  of  slaying  him. 
Sir  Adam  was  not  ungrateful.  He  ever  afterwards  re- 
mained devoted  to  his  generous  conqueror. 

When  the  troubles  of  the  Kingdom  were  thus  calmed. 
Prince  Edward  and  his  cousin  Henry  took  the  Cross,  and 
went  away  to  the  Holy  Land,  with  many  English  Lords 
and  Knights.  Four  years  afterwards  the  King  of  the  Ro- 
mans died,  and,  next  year  (one  thousand  two  hundred  and 
seventy-two),  his  brother  the  weak  King  of  England  died. 
He  was  sixty-eight  years  old  then,  and  had  reigned  fifty- 
six  years.  He  was  as  much  of  a  King  in  death,  as  he  had 
ever  been  in  life.  He  was  the  mere  pale  shadow  of  a  King 
at  all  times. 


CHAPTER    XVI. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  EDWARD  THE  FIRST,   CALLED 
LONGSHANKS. 

It  was  now  the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  two  hun- 
dred and  seventy-two;  and  Prince  Edward,  the  heir  to  the 
throne,  being  away  in  the  Holy  Land,  knew  nothing  of  his 
father's  death.  The  Barons,  however,  proclaimed  him 
King,  immediately  after  the  Royal  funeral;  and  the  people 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  123 

very  willingly  consented,  since  most  men  knew  too  well  by 
this  time  what  the  horrors  of  a  contest  for  the  crown  were. 
So  King  Edward  the  First,  called,  in  a  not  very  compli- 
mentary manner,  Longshanks,  because  of  the  slendemess 
of  his  legs,  was  peacefully  accepted  by  the  English  Nation. 

His  legs  had  need  to  be  strong,  however  long  and  thin 
they  were;  for  they  had  to  support  him  through  many 
difficulties  on  the  fiery  sands  of  Asia,  where  his  small  force 
of  soldiers  fainted,  died,  deserted,  and  seemed  to  melt 
away.  But  his  prowess  made  light  of  it,  and  he  said,  "  I 
will  go  on,  if  I  go  on  with  no  other  follower  than  my 
groom ! " 

A  Prince  of  this  spirit  gave  the  Turks  a  deal  of  trouble. 
He  stormed  Nazareth,  at  which  place,  of  all  places  on 
earth,  I  am  sorry  to  relate,  he  made  a  frightful  slaughter 
of  innocent  people;  and  then  he  went  to  Acre,  where  he 
got  a  truce  of  ten  years  from  the  Sultan.  He  had  very 
nearly  lost  his  life  in  Acre,  through  the  treachery  of  a  Sar- 
acen Noble,  called  the  Emir  of  Jaffa,  who,  making  the 
pretence  that  he  had  some  idea  of  turning  Christian  and 
wanted  to  know  all  about  that  religion,  sent  a  trusty  mes- 
senger to  Edward  very  often — with  a  dagger  in  his  sleeve. 
At  last,  one  Friday  in  Whitsun  week,  when  it  was  very 
hot,  and  all  the  sandy  prospect  lay  beneath  the  blazing  sun, 
burnt  up  like  a  great  overdone  biscuit,  and  Edward  was  ly- 
ing on  a  couch,  dressed  for  coolness  in  only  a  loose  robe, 
the  messenger,  with  his  chocolate-coloured  face  and  his 
bright  dark  eyes  and  white  teeth,  came  creeping  in  with  a 
letter,  and  kneeled  down  like  a  tame  tiger.  But,  the  mo- 
ment Edward  stretched  out  his  hand  to  take  the  letter,  the 
tiger  made  a  spring  at  his  heart.  He  was  quick,  but  Ed- 
ward was  quick  too.  He  seized  the  traitor  by  his  choco- 
late throat,  threw  him  to  the  ground,  and  slew  him  with 
the  very  dagger  he  had  drawn.  The  weapon  had  struck 
Edward  in  the  arm,  and  although  the  wound  itself  was 
slight,  it  threatened  to  be  mortal,  for  the  blade  of  the  dag- 
ger had  been  smeared  with  poison.  Thanks,  however,  to 
a  better  surgeon  than  was  often  to  be  found  in  those  times, 
and  to  some  wholesome  herbs,  and  above  all,  to  his  faith- 
ful wife,  Eleanor,  who  devotedly  nursed  him,  and  is  said 
by  some  to  have  sucked  the  poison  from  the  wound  with 
her  own  red  lips  (which  I  am  very  willing  to  believe),  Ed- 
ward soon  recovered  and  was  sound  again. 


124  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

As  the  King  his  father  had  sent  entreaties  to  him  to  re- 
turn home,  he  now  began  the  journey.  He  had  got  as  far 
as  Italy,  when  he  met  messengers  who  brought  him  intelli- 
gence of  the  King's  death.  Hearing  that  all  was  quiet  at 
home,  he  made  no  haste  to  return  to  his  own  dominions, 
but  paid  a  visit  to  the  Pope,  and  went  in  state  through 
various  Italian  Towns,  where  he  was  welcomed  with  accla- 
mations as  a  mighty  champion  of  the  Cross  from  the  Holy 
Land,  and  where  he  received  presents  of  purple  mantles 
and  prancing  horses,  and  went  along  in  great  triumph. 
The  shouting  people  little  knew  that  he  was  the  last  Eng- 
lish monarch  who  would  ever  embark  in  a  crusade,  or  that 
within  twenty  years  every  conquest  which  the  Christians 
had  made  in  the  Holy  Land  at  the  cost  of  so  much  blood, 
would  be  won  back  by  the  Turks.  But  all  this  came  to 
pass. 

There  was,  and  there  is,  an  old  town  standing  in  a  plain 
in  France,  called  Chalons.  When  the  King  was  coming 
towards  this  place  on  his  way  to  England,  a  wily  French 
Lord,  called  the  Count  of  Chilons,  sent  him  a  polite  chal- 
lenge to  come  with  his  knights  and  hold  a  fair  tournament 
with  the  Count  and  his  knights,  and  make  a  day  of  it  with 
sword  and  lance.  It  was  represented  to  the  King  that  the 
Count  of  Ch&lons  was  not  to  be  trusted,  and  that,  instead 
of  a  holiday  fight  for  mere  show  and  in  good  humour,  he 
secretly  meant  a  real  battle,  in  which  the  English  should 
be  defeated  by  superior  force. 

The  King,  however,  nothing  afraid,  went  to  the  appoint- 
ed place  on  the  appointed  day  with  a  thousand  followers. 
When  the  Coumt  came  with  two  thousand  and  attacked  the 
English  in  earnest,  the  English  rushed  at  them  with  such 
valour  that  the  Count's  men  and  the  Count's  horses  soon 
began  to  be  tumbled  down  all  over  the  field.  The  Count 
himself  seized  the  King  round  the  neck,  but  the  King  tum- 
bled him  out  of  his  saddle  in  return  for  the  compliment, 
and,  jumping  from  his  own  horse,  and  standing  over  him, 
beat  away  at  his  iron  armour  like  a  blacksmith  hammering 
on  his  anvil.  Even  when  the  Count  owned  himself  defeated 
and  offered  his  sword,  the  King  would  not  do  him  the  hon- 
our to  take  it,  but  made  him  yield  it  up  to  a  common  sol- 
dier. There  had  been  such  fury  shown  in  this  fight,  that 
it  was  afterwards  called  the  little  Battle  of  Ch§,lons. 

The  English  were  very  well  disposed  to  be  proud  of  theii 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  126 

King  after  these  adventures;  so,  when  he  landed  at  Dover 
in  the  year  one  thousand  two  hundred  and  seventy-four 
(being  then  thirty  .six  years  old),  and  went  on  to  Westmin- 
ster where  he  and  his  good  queen  were  crowned  with  great 
magnificence,  splendid  rejoicings  took  place.  For  the  coro- 
nation-feast there  were  provided,  among  other  eatables, 
four  hundred  oxen,  four  hundred  sheep,  four  hundred  and 
fifty  pigs,  eighteen  wild  boars,  three  hundred  flitches  of 
bacon,  and  twenty  thousand  fowls.  The  fountains  and 
conduits  in  the  street  flowed  with  red  and  whitt  wine  in- 
stead of  water;  the  rich  citizens  hung  silks  and  cloths  of 
the  brightest  colours  out  of  their  windows  to  increase  the 
beauty  of  the  show,  and  threw  out  gold  and  silver  by  whole 
handfuls  to  make  scrambles  for  the  crowd.  In  short, 
there  was  such  eating  and  drinking,  such  music  and  caper- 
ing, such  a  ringing  of  bells  and  tossing  of  caps,  such  a 
shouting,  and  singing,  and  revelling,  as  the  narrow  over- 
hanging streets  of  old  London  City  had  not  witnessed  for 
many  a  long  day.  All  the  people  were  merry — except  the 
poor  Jews,  who,  trembling  within  their  houses,  and  scarcely 
daring  to  peep  out,  began  to  foresee  that  they  would  have 
to  find  the  money  for  this  joviality  sooner  or  later. 

To  dismiss  this  sad  subject  of  the  Jews  for  the  present, 
I  am  sorry  to  add  that  in  this  reign  they  were  most  unmer- 
cifully pillaged.  They  were  hanged,  in  great  numbers,  on 
accusations  of  having  clipped  the  King's  coin — which  all 
kinds  of  people  had  done.  They  were  heavily  taxed;  they 
were  disgracefully  badged;  they  were,  on  one  day,  thirteen 
years  after  the  coronation,  taken  up  with  their  wives  and 
children  and  thrown  into  beastly  prisons,  until  they  pur- 
chased their  release  by  paying  to  the  King  twelve  thousand 
pounds.  Finally,  every  kind  of  property  belonging  to 
them  was  seized  by  the  King,  except  so  little  as  would  de- 
fray the  charge  of  their  taking  themselves  away  into  for- 
eign countries.  Many  years  elapsed  before  the  hope  of 
gain  induced  any  of  their  race  to  return  to  England,  where 
they  had  been  treated  so  heartlessly  and  had  suffered  so 
much. 

If  King  Edward  the  First  had  been  as  bad  a  King  to 
Christians  as  he  was  to  Jews,  he  would  have  been  bad  in- 
deed. But  he  was,  in  general,  a  wise  and  great  monarch, 
under  whom  the  country  much  improved.  He  had  no  love 
for  the  Great  Charter — few   Kings  had,   through  many 


126  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

many  years — but  he  had  high  qualities.  The  first  bold 
object  which  he  conceived  when  he  came  home,  was  to  unite, 
under  one  Sovereign,  England,  Scotland,  and  Wales;  the 
two  last  of  which  countries  had  each  a  little  king  of  its 
own,  about  whom  the  people  were  always  quarrelling  and 
fighting,  and  making  a  prodigious  disturbance — a  great  deal 
more  than  he  was  worth.  In  the  course  of  King  Edward's 
reign  he  was  engaged,  besides,  in  a  war  with  France.  To 
make  these  quarrels  clearer,  we  will  separate  their  histories 
and  take  them  thus.  Wales,  first.  France,  second.  Scot- 
land, third. 

Llewellyn  was  the  Prince  of  Wales.  He  had  been  on 
the  side  of  the  Barons  in  the  reign  of  the  stupid  old  King, 
but  had  afterwards  sworn  allegiance  to  him.  When  King 
Edward  came  to  the  throne,  Llewellyn  was  required  to 
swear  allegiance  to  him  also;  which  he  refused  to  do.  The 
King,  being  crowned  and  in  his  own  dominions,  three  times 
more  required  Llewellyn  to  come  and  do  homage;  and 
three  times  more  Llewellyn  said  he  would  rather  not.  He 
was  going  to  be  married  to  Eleanor  de  Montfort,  a 
young  lady  of  the  family  mentioned  in  the  last  reign;  and 
it  chanced  that  this  young  lady,  coming  from  France  with 
her  youngest  brother,  Emeric,  was  taken  by  an  English 
ship,  and  was  ordered  by  the  English  King  to  be  detained. 
Upon  this,  the  quarrel  came  to  a  head.  The  King  went, 
with  his  fleet,  to  the  coast  of  Wales,  where,  so  encompass- 
ing Llewellyn,  that  he  could  only  take  refuge  in  the  bleak 
mountain  region  of  Snowdon  in  whicli  no  provisions  could 
reach  him,  he  was  soon  starved  into  an  apology,  and  into  a 
treaty  of  peace,  and  into  paying  the  expenses  of  the  war. 
The  King,  however,  forgave  him  some  of  the  hardest  con- 
ditions of  the  treaty,  and  consented  to  his  marriage.  And 
he  now  thought  he  had  reduced  Wales  to  obedience. 

But,  the  Welsh,  although  they  were  naturally  a  gentle, 
quiet,  pleasant  people,  who  liked  to  receive  strangers  in 
their  cottages  among  the  mountains,  and  to  set  before  them 
with  free  hospitality  whatever  they  had  to  eat  and  drink, 
and  to  play  to  them  on  their  harps,  and  sing  their  native 
ballads  to  them,  were  a  people  of  great  spirit  when  their 
blood  was  up.  Englishmen,  after  this  affair,  began  to  be 
insolent  in  Wales,  and  to  assume  the  air  of  masters;  and  the 
Welsh  pride  could  not  bear  it.     Moreover,  they  believed  iu 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  127 

that  unlucky  old  Merlin,  some  of  whose  unlucky  old  proph- 
ecies somebody  always  seemed  doomed  to  remember  when 
there  was  a  chance  of  its  doing  harm ;  and  just  at  this  time 
some  blind  old  gentleman  with  a  harp  and  a  long  white 
beard,  who  was  an  excellent  person,  but  had  become  of  an 
unknown  age  and  tedious,  burst  out  with  a  declaration  that 
Merlin  had  predicted  that  when  English  money  had  become 
round,  a  Prince  of  Wales  would  be  crowned  in  London. 
Now,  King  Edward  had  recently  forbidden  the  English 
penny  to  be  cut  into  halves  and  quarters  for  halfpence  and 
farthings,  and  had  actually  introduced  a  round  coin; 
therefore,  the  Welsh  people  said  this  was  the  time  Merlin 
meant,  and  rose  accordingly. 

King  Edward  had  bought  over  Prince  David,  Llewel- 
lyn's brother,  by  heaping  favours  upon  him;  but  he  was 
the  first  to  revolt,  being  perhaps  troubled  in  his  conscience. 
One  stormy  night,  he  surprised  the  Castle  of  Hawarden,  in 
possession  of  which  an  English  nobleman  had  been  left; 
killed  the  whole  garrison,  and  carried  off  the  nobleman  a 
prisoner  to  Snowdon.  Upon  this,  the  Welsh  people  rose 
like  one  man.  King  Edward,  with  his  army,  marching 
from  Worcester  to  the  Menai  Strait,  crossed  it — near  to 
where  the  wonderful  tubular  iron  bridge  now,  in  days  so 
different,  makes  a  passage  for  railway  trains — by  a  bridge 
of  boats  that  enabled  forty  men  to  march  abreast.  He 
subdued  the  Island  of  Anglesea,  and  sent  his  men  forward 
to  observe  the  enemy.  The  sudden  appearance  of  the 
Welsh  created  a  panic  among  them,  and  they  fell  back  to 
the  bridge.  The  tide  had  in  the  meantime  risen  and  sepa- 
rated the  boats;  the  Welsh  pursuing  them,  they  were 
driven  into  the  sea,  and  there  they  sunk,  in  their  heavy 
iron  armour,  by  thousands.  After  this  victory  Llewellyn, 
helped  by  the  severe  winter-weather  of  Wales,  gained  an- 
other battle;  but  the  King  ordering  a  portion  of  his  Eng- 
lish army  to  advance  through  South  Wales,  and  catch  him 
between  two  foes,  and  Llewellyn  bravely  turning  to  meet 
this  new  enemy,  he  was  surprised  and  killed — very  meanly, 
for  he  was  unarmed  and  defenceless.  His  head  was  struck 
off  and  sent  to  London,  where  it  was  fixed  upon  the  Tower, 
encircled  with  a  wreath,  some  say  of  ivy,  some  say  of  wil- 
low, some  say  of  silver,  to  make  it  look  like  a  ghastly  coin 
in  ridicule  of  the  prediction. 

David,  however,  still  held  out  for  six  months,  though 


128  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

eagerly  sought  after  by  the  King,  and  hunted  by  his  own 
countrymen.  One  of  them  finally  betrayed  him  with  his 
wife  and  children.  He  was  sentenced  to  be  hanged,  drawn, 
and  quartered;  and  from  that  time  this  became  the  estab- 
lished punishment  of  Traitors  in  England — a  punishment 
wholly  without  excuse,  as  being  revolting,  vile,  and  cruel, 
after  its  object  is  dead;  and  which  has  no  sense  in  it,  as 
its  only  real  degradation  (and  that  nothing  can  blot  out) 
is  to  the  country  that  permits  on  any  consideration  such 
abominable  barbarity. 

Wales  was  now  subdued.  The  Queen  giving  birth  to  a 
young  prince  in  the  Castle  of  Carnarvon,  the  King  showed 
him  to  the  Welsh  people  as  their  countryman,  and  called 
him  Prince  of  Wales;  a  title  that  has  ever  since  been  borne 
by  the  heir-apparent  to  the  English  Throne — which  that  lit- 
tle Prince  soon  became,  by  the  death  of  his  elder  brother. 
The  King  did  better  things  for  the  Welsh  than  that,  by  im- 
proving their  laws  and  encouraging  their  trade.  Disturb- 
ances still  took  place,  chiefly  occasioned  by  the  avarice  and 
pride  of  the  English  Lords,  on  whom  Welsh  lands  and  cas- 
tles had  been  bestowed;  but  they  were  subdued,  and  the 
country  never  rose  again.  There  is  a  legend  that  to  pre- 
vent the  people  from  being  incited  to  rebellion  by  the  songs 
of  their  bards  and  harpers,  Edward  had  them  all  put  to 
death.  Some  of  them  may  have  fallen  among  other  men 
who  held  out  against  the  King;  but  this  general  slaughter 
is,  I  think,  a  fancy  of  the  harpers  themselves,  who,  I  dare 
say,  made  a  song  about  it  many  years  afterwards,  and 
sang  it  by  the  Welsh  firesides  until  it  came  to  be  believed. 

The  foreign  war  of  the  reign  of  Edward  the  First  arose  in 
this  way.  The  crews  of  two  vessels,  one  a  Norman  ship, 
and  the  other  an  English  ship,  happened  to  go  to  the  same 
place  in  their  boats  to  fill  their  casks  with  fresh  water. 
Being  rough  angry  fellows,  they  began  to  quarrel,  and  then 
to  fight — the  English  with  their  fists;  the  Normans  with 
their  knives — and,  in  the  fight,  a  Norman  was  killed.  The 
Norman  crew,  instead  of  revenging  themselves  upon  those 
English  sailors  with  whom  they  had  quarrelled  (who  were 
too  strong  for  them,  I  suspect),  took  to  their  ship  again  in 
a  great  rage,  attacked  the  first  English  ship  they  met,  laid 
hold  of  an  unoffending  merchant  who  happened  to  be  on 
board,  and  brutally  hanged  him  in  the  rigging  of  their  own 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENQLAITO.  129 

vessel  with  a  dog  at  his  feet.  This  so  enraged  the  English 
sailors  that  there  was  no  restraining  them;  and  whenever, 
and  wherever,  English  sailors  met  Norman  sailors,  they 
fell  upon  each  other  tooth  and  nail.  The  Irish  and  Dutch 
sailors  took  part  with  the  English;  the  French  and  Geno- 
ese sailors  helped  the  Normans;  and  thus  the  greater  part 
of  the  mariners  sailing  over  the  sea  became,  in  their  way, 
as  violent  and  raging  as  the  sea  itself  when  it  is  disturbed. 

King  Edward's  fame  had  been  so  high  abroad  that  he 
had  been  chosen  to  decide  a  difference  between  France  and 
another  foreign  power,  and  had  lived  upon  the  Continent 
three  years.  At  first,  neither  he  nor  the  French  King 
Philip  (the  good  Louis  had  been  dead  some  time)  inter- 
fered in  these  quarrels;  but  when  a  fleet  of  eighty  English 
ships  engaged  and  utterly  defeated  a  Norman  fleet  of  two 
hundred,  in  a  pitched  battle  fought  round  a  ship  at  anchor, 
in  which  no  quarter  was  given,  the  matter  became  too  seri- 
ous to  be  passed  over.  King  Edward,  as  Duke  of  Guienne, 
was  summoned  to  present  himself  before  the  King  of  France, 
at  Paris,  and  answer  for  the  damage  done  by  his  sailor  sub- 
jects At  first,  he  sent  the  Bishop  of  London  as  his  rep- 
resentative, and  then  his  brother  Edmund  who  was  married 
to  the  French  Queen's  mother.  I  am  afraid  Edmund  was 
an  easy  man,  and  allowed  himself  to  be  talked  over  by  his 
charming  relations,  the  French  court  ladies;  at  all  events, 
he  was  induced  to  give  up  his  brother's  dukedom  for  forty 
days — as  a  mere  form,  the  French  King  said,  to  satisfy  his 
honour — and  he  was  so  very  much  astonished,  when  the 
time  was  out,  to  find  that  the  French  King  had  no  idea  of 
giving  it  up  again,  that  I  should  not  wonder  if  it  hastened 
his  death :  which  soon  took  place. 

King  Edward  was  a  King  to  win  his  foreign  dukedom 
back  again,  if  it  could  be  won  by  energy  and  valour.  He 
raised  a  large  army,  renounced  his  allegiance  as  Duke  of 
Guienne,  and  crossed  the  sea  to  carry  war  into  France. 
Before  any  important  battle  was  fought,  however,  a  truce 
was  agreed  upon  for  two  years;  and  in  the  course  of  that 
time,  the  Pope  effected  a  reconciliation.  King  Edward, 
who  was  now  a  widower,  having  lost  his  affectionate  and 
good  wife,  Eleanor,  married  the  French  King's  sister, 
Margaret;  and  the  Prince  of  Wales  was  contracted  to  the 
French  King's  daughter  Isabella. 

Out  of  bad  things,  good  things  sometimes  arise.  Out  of 
9 


130  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

this  hanging  of  the  innocent  merchant,  and  the  bloodshed 
and  strife  it  caused,  there  came  to  be  established  one  of  the 
greatest  powers  that  the  English  people  now  possess.  The 
preparations  for  the  war  being  very  expensive,  and  King 
Edward  greatly  wanting  money,  and  being  very  arbitrary 
in  his  ways  of  raising  it,  some  of  the  Barons  began  firmly 
to  oppose  him.  Two  of  them,  in  particular,  Humphrey 
Bohujst,  Earl  of  Hereford,  and  Eoger  Bigod,  Earl  of  Nor- 
folk, were  so  stout  against  him,  that  they  maintained  he 
had  no  right  to  command  them  to  head  his  forces  in  Gui- 
enne,  and  flatly  refused  to  go  there.  "By  Heaven,  Sir 
Earl,"  said  the  King  to  the  Earl  of  Hereford,  in  a  great 
passion, ''  you  shall  either  go  or  be  hanged !  "  "  By  Heaven, 
Sir  King,"  replied  the  Earl,  "  I  will  neither  go  nor  yet  will 
I  be  hanged!  "  and  both  he  and  the  other  Earl  sturdily  left 
the  court,  attended  by  many  Lords.  The  King  tried  every 
means  of  raising  money.  He  taxed  the  clergy,  in  spite  of 
all  the  Pope  said  to  the  contrary;  and  when  they  refused 
to  pay,  reduced  them  to  submission,  by  saying  Very  well, 
then  they  had  no  claim  upon  the  government  for  protection, 
and  any  man  might  plunder  them  wlio  would — which  a 
good  many  men  were  very  ready  to  do,  and  very  readily 
did,  and  which  the  clergy  found  too  losing  a  game  to  be 
played  at  long.  He  seized  all  the  wool  and  leather  in  the 
hands  of  the  merchants,  promising  to  pay  for  it  some  tine 
day;  and  he  set  a  tax  upon  the  exportation  of  wool,  which 
was  so  unpopular  among  the  traders  that  it  was  called  "  The 
evil  toll."  But  all  would  not  do.  The  Barons,  led  by 
those  two  great  Earls,  declared  any  taxes  imposed  without 
the  consent  of  Parliament,  unlawful;  and  the  Parliament 
refused  to  impose  taxes,  until  the  King  should  confirm 
afresh  the  two  Great  Charters,  and  should  solemnly  declare 
in  writing,  that  there  was  no  power  in  the  country  to  raise 
money  from  the  people,  evermore,  but  the  power  of  Parlia- 
ment representing  all  ranks  of  the  people.  The  King  was 
very  unwilling  to  diminish  his  own  power  by  allowing  this 
great  privilege  in  the  Parliament;  but  there  was  no  helpi 
for  it,  and  he  at  last  complied.  We  shall  come  to  another! 
King  by-and-bye,  who  might  have  saved  his  head  fromj 
rolling  off,  if  he  had  profited  by  this  example. 

The  people  gained  other  benefits  in  Parliament  from  the 
good  sense  and  wisdom  of  this  King.  Many  of  the  laws 
were  much  improved;  provision  was  made  for  the  greater 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  131 

safety  of  travellers,  and  the  apprehension  of  thieves  and 
murderers;  the  priests  were  prevented  from  holding  too 
much  land,  and  so  becoming  too  powerful;  and  Justices  of 
the  Peace  were  first  appointed  (though  not  at  first  under 
that  name)  in  various  parts  of  the  country. 

And  now  we  come  to  Scotland,  which  was  the  great  and 
lasting  trouble  of  the  reign  of  King  Edward  the  First. 

About  thirteen  years  after  King  Edward's  coronation, 
Alexander  the  Third,  the  King  of  Scotland,  died  of  a  fall 
from  his  horse.  He  had  been  married  to  Margaret,  King 
Edward's  sister.  All  their  children  being  dead,  the  Scot- 
tish crown  became  the  right  of  a  young  Princess  only  eight 
years  old,  the  daughter  of  Eric,  King  of  Norway,  who  had 
married  a  daughter  of  the  deceased  sovereign.  King  Ed- 
ward proposed,  that  the  Maiden  of  Norway,  as  this  Prin- 
cess was  called,  should  be  engaged  to  be  married  to  his 
eldest  son ;  but,  unfortunately,  as  she  was  coming  over  to 
England  she  fell  sick,  and  landing  on  one  of  the  Orkney 
Islands,  died  there.  A  great  commotion  immediately  began 
in  Scotland,  where  as  many  as  thirteen  noisy  claimants  to 
the  vacant  throne  started  up  and  made  a  general  con- 
fusion. 

King  Edward  being  much  renowned  for  his  sagacity  and 
justice,  it  seems  to  have  been  agreed  to  refer  the  dispute  to 
him.  He  accepted  the  trust,  and  went,  with  an  army,  to 
the  Border-land  where  England  and  Scotland  joined. 
There,  he  called  upon  the  Scottish  gentlemen  to  meet  him 
at  the  Castle  of  Norham,  on  the  English  side  of  the  river 
Tweed;  and  to  that  Castle  they  came.  But,  before  he 
would  take  any  step  in  the  business,  he  required  those 
Scottish  gentlemen,  one  and  all,  to  do  homage  to  him  as 
their  superior  Lord;  and  when  they  hesitated,  he  said,  "  By 
holy  Edward,  whose  crown  I  wear,  I  will  have  my  rights, 
or  I  will  die  in  maintaining  them !  "  The  Scottish  gentle- 
men, who  had  not  expected  this,  were  disconcerted,  and 
asked  for  three  weeks  to  think  about  it. 

At  the  end  of  the  three  weeks,  another  meeting  took 
place,  on  a  green  plain  on  the  Scottish  side  of  the  river. 
Of  all  the  competitors  for  the  Scottish  throne,  there  were 
only  two  who  had  any  real  claim,  in  right  of  their  near 
kindred  to  the  Koyal  family.  These  were  John^  Baliol 
and  RoBEKT  Bruce  :  and  the  right  was,  I  have  no  doubt, 


132  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAIH). 

on  the  side  of  John  Baliol.  At  this  particular  meeting 
John  Baliol  was  not  present,  but  Robert  Bruce  was;  and 
on  Robert  Bruce  being  formally  asked  whether  he  acknowl- 
edged the  King  of  England  for  his  superior  lord,  he  an' 
swered,  plainly  and  distinctly,  Yes,  he  did.  Next  day, 
John  Baliol  appeared,  and  said  the  same.  This  point  set- 
tled, some  arrangements  were  made  for  inquiring  into  their 
titles. 

The  inquiry  occupied  a  pretty  long  time — more  than  a 
year.  While  it  was  going  on,  King  Edward  took  the  op- 
portunity of  making  a  journey  through  Scotland,  and  call- 
ing upon  the  Scottish  people  of  all  degrees  to  acknow^ledge 
themselves  his  vassals,  or  be  imprisoned  until  they  did.  In 
the  meanwhile,  Commissioners  were  appointed  to  conduct 
the  inquiry,  a  Parliament  was  held  at  Berwick  about  it,  the 
two  claimants  were  heard  at  full  length,  and  there  was  a 
vast  amount  of  talking.  At  last,  in  the  great  hall  of  the 
Castle  of  Berwick,  the  King  gave  judgment  in  favour  of 
John  Baliol :  who,  consenting  to  receive  his  crown  by  the 
King  of  England's  favour  and  permission,  was  crowned  at 
Scone,  in  an  old  stone  chair  which  had  been  used  for  ages 
in  the  abbey  there,  at  the  coronations  of  Scottish  Kings. 
Then,  King  Edward  caused  the  great  seal  of  Scotland,  used 
since  the  late  King's  death,  to  be  broken  in  four  pieces, 
and  placed  in  the  English  Treasury;  and  considered  that  he 
now  had  Scotland  (according  to  the  common  saying)  under 
his  thumb. 

Scotland  had  a  strong  will  of  its  own  yet,  however. 
King  Edward,  determined  that  the  Scottish  King  should 
not  forget  he  was  his  vassal,  summoned  him  repeatedly  to 
come  and  defend  himself  and  his  Judges  before  the  Eng- 
lish Parliament  when  appeals  from  the  decisions  of  Scot- 
tish courts  of  justice  were  being  heard.  At  length,  John 
Baliol,  who  had  no  great  heart  of  his  own,  had  so  much 
heart  put  into  him  by  the  brave  spirit  of  the  Scottish  peo- 
ple, who  took  this  as  a  national  insult,  that  he  refused  to 
come  any  more.  Thereupon,  the  King  further  required  him 
to  help  him  in  his  war  abroad  (which  was  then  in  progress), 
and  to  give  up,  as  security  for  his  good  behaviour  in  future, 
the  three  strong  Scottish  Castles  of  Jedburgh,  Roxburgh, 
and  Berwick.  Nothing  of  this  being  done;  on  the  con- 
trary, the  Scottish  people  concealing  their  King  among 
their  mountains  in  the  Highlands  and  showing  a  determi- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  133 

nation  to  resist;  Edward  marched  to  Berwick  with  an  army 
of  thirty  thousand  foot,  and  four  thousand  horse;  took  the 
Castle,  and  slew  its  whole  garrison,  and  the  inhabitants 
of  the  town  as  well — men,  women,  and  children.  Lord 
Wakbenne,  Earl  of  Surrey,  then  went  on  to  the  Castle  of 
Dunbar,  before  which  a  battle  was  fought,  and  the  whole 
Scottish  army  defeated  with  great  slaughter.  The  victory 
being  complete,  the  Earl  of  Surrey  was  left  as  guardian  of 
Scotland;  the  principal  ofiices  in  that  kingdom  were  given 
to  Englishmen;  the  more  powerful  Scottish  Nobles  were 
obliged  to  come  and  live  in  England;  the  Scottish  crown 
and  sceptre  were  brought  away;  and  even  the  old  stone 
chair  was  carried  off  and  placed  in  Westminster  Abbey, 
where  you  may  see  it  now.  Baliol  had  the  Tower  of  Lon- 
don lent  him  for  a  residence,  with  permission  to  range 
about  within  a  circle  of  twenty  miles.  Three  years  after- 
wards he  was  allowed  to  go  to  Normandy,  where  he  had 
estates,  and  where  he  passed  the  remaining  six  years  of  his 
life :  far  more  happily,  I  dare  say,  than  he  had  lived  for  a 
long  while  in  angry  Scotland. 

Now,  there  was,  in  the  West  of  Scotland,  a  gentleman 
of  small  fortune,  named  William  Wallace,  the  second  son 
of  a  Scottish  knight.  He  was  a  man  of  great  size  and 
great  strength;  he  was  very  brave  and  daring;  when  he 
spoke  to  a  body  of  his  countrymen,  he  could  rouse  them  in 
a  wonderful  manner  by  the  power  of  his  burning  words;  he 
loved  Scotland  dearly,  and  he  hated  England  with  his  ut- 
most might.  The  domineering  conduct  of  the  English  who 
now  held  the  places  of  trust  in  Scotland  made  them  as  in- 
tolerable to  the  proud  Scottish  people  as  they  had  been, 
under  similar  circumstances,  to  the  Welsh;  and  no  man  in 
all  Scotland  regarded  them  with  so  much  smothered  rage  as 
William  Wallace.  One  day,  an  Englishman  in  office,  little 
knowing  what  he  was,  affronted  him.  Wallace  instantly 
struck  him  dead,  and  taking  refuge  among  the  rocks  and 
hills,  and  there  joining  with  his  countryman.  Sib  William 
Douglas,  who  was  also  in  arms  against  King  Edward, 
became  the  most  resolute  and  undaunted  champion  of  a  peo- 
ple struggling  for  their  independence  that  ever  lived  upon 
the  earth. 

The  English  Guardian  of  the  Kingdom  fled  before  him, 
and,  thus  encouraged,  the  Scottish  people  revolted  every- 
where, and  fell  upon  the  English  without  mercy.     The 


134  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

Earl  of  Surrey,  by  the  King's  ««-^!^f '^^^t  tmts 
Dower  of  the  Border-counties,  and  two  English  armies 
Toured  into  ScotW.  Only  one  Chief,  in  the  face  of  ^ose 
armies,  stood  by  Wallace,  who,  with  a  force  of  foity  thou 
sand  men,  awaited  the  invaders  at  a  place  on  the  iiver 
fTi'h  wXn  two  miles  of  Stirling.  Across  the  ri.er 
there  was  only  one  poor  wooden  bridge,  called  the  bridge 
of  KiMean-so  narrow,  that  but  two  men  cou  d  cross  it 
abrfast  With  his  eye's  upon  this  bridge,  Wallace  posted 
the  greater  part  of  his  men  among  some  rising  grounds, 
and  waSed  calmly.     When  the  English  army  came  up  on 

the  opposite  bank  of  the  river,  ^^^r^' X''' th  ".  dX- 
ward  to  offer  terms.  Wallace  sent  theni  back  w^^  ^  ^d^^ 
ance,  in  the  name  of  thefreedomof  Scotland  So^^^t  the 
^  \,  r.f  fi,a  TTflrl  of  Surrey  in  command  of  the  il^ngiisn, 
;Ttr;L''e>e:Ssoon%tbiJdge,ad^^^^^ 
^d  not  hasty.  He,  however,  urged  to  immediate  battle 
^  some  Xr  officers,  and  particularly  by  Cbessingham 
King  Edward's  treasuir,  and  a  rash  man  gave  the  word 
of  co^mlnd  to  advance.  One  thousand  English  crossed 
?he  bridge?  two  abreast;  the  Scottish  troops  were  as  mo- 
tne  uiiu^e,  i-ww  J     rr,„„  fUnimand  Enelish  crossed; 

tionless  as  stone  images      Two  thousana  ^ngu  ^ 

three  thousand,  four  thousand,  five.  ^,^«*  ^. P,^^^^^^^^ 
this  time,  had  been  seen  to  stir  among  the  Scottish  bonnets 
mw  Xy  all  fluttered.     "  Forward,  one  party,  to  the  foot 
of  Se  Bridge ! "    cried  Wallace,  "  and  let  no  more  English 
\TJ    The  rest   down  with  me  on  the  five  thousand  who 
Tvl^L'e^and  cut  them  all  to  Peees  ^^     It  w^^^ 
in  the  sieht  of  the  whole  remainder  of  the  English  army, 
who  Luld  give  no  help.     Cressingham  himself  was  killed, 
Tnd  the  Scotch  made  whips  for  their  horses  of  his  skm. 

Kine  Edward  was  abroad  at  this  time  and  dunng  the 
successes  onX  Scottish  side  which  followed,  and  which 
TaS  bold  Wallace  to  win  the  whole  country  ^ 
and  even  to  ravage  the  English  bordei-s      ^^\t' f  „*^[/ Jf,?^ 
winter  months,  the  King  returned,  and  took  the  field  wi^h 
more  than  his  usual  energy.     One  night,  when  a  kick  trom 
Ms  horse  as  they  both  lay  on  the  ground  together  broke 
two  of  his  ribs,  and  a  cry  arose  that  he  was  killed,  he 
eaped  into  his  'saddle,  regardless  of  the  pain  he  Buffered 
and  rode  through  the  camp.     Day  then  appearing,  he  gave 
ht  "ord  (stillfof  course,  in  that  ^-^ed  -d^a^hm^^^^^^^^^^ 
Forwai-d!  and  led  his  army  on  to  near  Falkirk,  where  cue 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  135 

Scottish  forces  were  seen  drawn  up  on  some  stony  ground, 
behind  a  morass.  Here,  he  defeated  Wallace,  and  killed 
fifteen  thousand  of  his  men.  With  the  shattered  remain- 
der, Wallace  drew  back  to  Stirling;  but,  being  pursued, 
set  fire  to  the  town  that  it  might  give  no  help  to  the  Eng- 
lish, and  escaped.  The  inhabitants  of  Perth  afterwards 
set  fire  to  their  houses  for  the  same  reason,  and  the  King, 
unable  to  find  provisions,  was  forced  to  withdraw  his 
army. 

Another  Kobebt  Bruce,  the  grandson  of  him  who  had 
disputed  the  Scottish  crown  with  Baliol,  was  now  in  arms 
against  the  King  (that  elder  Bruce  being  dead),  and  also 
John  Comyn,  Baliol's  nephew.  These  two  young  men 
might  agree  in  opposing  Edward,  but  could  agree  in  noth- 
ing else,  as  they  were  rivals  for  the  throne  of  Scotland. 
Probably  it  was  because  they  knew  tliis,  and  knew  what 
troubles  must  arise  even  if  they  could  hope  to  get  the  bet- 
ter of  the  great  English  King,  that  the  principal  Scottish 
people  applied  to  the  Pope  for  his  interference.  The  Pope, 
on  the  principle  of  losing  nothing  for  want  of  trying  to  get 
it,  very  coolly  claimed  that  Scotland  belonged  to  him;  but 
this  was  a  little  too  much,  and  the  Parliament  in  a  friendly 
manner  told  him  so. 

In  the  spring  time  of  the  year  one  thousand  three  hun- 
dred and  three,  the  King  sent  Sir  John  Segrave,  whom 
he  made  Governor  of  Scotland,  with  twenty  thousand  men, 
to  reduce  the  rebels.  Sir  John  was  not  as  careful  as  he 
should  have  been,  but  encamped  at  Rosslyn,  near  Edin- 
burgh, with  his  army  divided  into  three  parts.  The  Scot- 
tish forces  saw  their  advantage;  fell  on  each  part  sepa- 
rately; defeated  each;  and  killed  all  the  prisoners.  Then, 
came  the  King  himself  once  more,  as  soon  as  a  great  army 
could  be  raised;  he  passed  through  the  whole  north  of 
Scotland,  laying  waste  whatsoever  came  in  his  way;  and 
he  took  up  his  winter  quarters  at  Dunfermline.  The  Scot- 
tish cause  now  looked  so  hopeless,  that  Comyn  and  the 
other  nobles  made  submission  and  received  their  pardons. 
Wallace  alone  stood  out.  He  was  invited  to  surrender, 
though  on  no  distinct  pledge  that  his  life  should  be  spared; 
but  he  still  defied  the  ireful  King,  and  lived  among  the 
steep  crags  of  tlie  Highland  glens,  where  the  eagles  made 
their  nests,  and  where  the  mountain  torrents  roared,  and 
the  white  snow  was  deep,  and  the  bitter  winds  blew  round 


136  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

his  unsheltered  head,  as  he  lay  through  many  a  pitch-dark 
night  wrapped  up  in  his  plaid.  Nothing  could  break  his 
spirit;  nothing  could  lower  his  courage;  nothing  could  in- 
duce him  to  forget  or  to  forgive  his  country's  wrongs. 
Even  when  the  Castle  of  Stirling^  which  had  long  held  out, 
was  besieged  by  the  King  with  every  kind  of  military  en- 
gine then  in  use;  even  when  the  lead  upon  cathedral  roofs 
was  taken  down  to  help  to  make  them;  even  when  the 
King,  though  an  old  man,  commanded  in  the  siege  as  if  he 
were  a  youth,  being  so  resolved  to  conquer;  even  when  the 
brave  garrison  (then  found  with  amazement  to  be  not  two 
hundred  people,  including  several  ladies)  were  starved  and 
beaten  out  and  were  made  to  submit  on  their  knees,  and 
with  every  form  of  disgrace  that  could  aggravate  their  suf- 
ferings; even  then,  when  there  was  not  a  ray  of  hope  in 
Scotland,  William  Wallace  was  as  proud  and  firm  as  if  he 
had  beheld  the  powerful  and  relentless  Edward  lying  dead 
at  his  feet. 

Who  betrayed  William  Wallace  in  the  end,  is  not  quite 
certain.  That  he  was  betrayed — probably  by  an  attendant 
— is  too  true.  He  was  taken  to  the  Castle  of  Dumbarton, 
under  Sib  John  Menteith,  and  thence  to  London,  Avhere 
the  great  fame  of  his  bravery  and  resolution  attracted  im- 
mense concourses  of  people  to  behold  him.  He  was  tried 
in  Westminster  Hall,  with  a  crown  of  laurel  on  his  head — 
it  is  supposed  because  he  was  reported  to  have  said  that  he 
ought  to  wear,  or  that  he  would  wear,  a  crown  there — and 
was  found  guilty  as  a  robber,  a  murderer,  and  a  traitor. 
What  they  called  a  robber  (he  said  to  those  who  tried  him) 
he  was,  because  he  had  taken  spoil  from  the  King's  men. 
What  they  called  a  murderer,  he  was,  because  he  had  slain 
an  insolent  Englishman.  What  they  called  a  traitor,  he 
was  not,  for  he  had  never  sworn  allegiance  to  the  King, 
and  had  ever  scorned  to  do  it.  He  was  dragged  at  the 
tails  of  horses  to  West  Smithfield,  and  there  hanged  on  a 
high  gallows,  torn  open  before  he  was  dead,  beheaded,  and 
quartered.  His  head  was  set  upon  a  pole  on  London 
Bridge,  his  right  arm  was  sent  to  Newcastle,  his  left  arm 
to  Berwick,  his  legs  to  Perth  and  Aberdeen.  But,  if  King 
Edward  had  had  his  body  cut  into  inches,  and  had  sent 
every  separate  inch  into  a  separate  town,  he  could  not  have 
dispersed  it  half  so  far  and  wide  as  his  fame.  Wallace 
will  be  remembered  in  songs  and  stories,  while  there  are 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  137 

songs  and  stories  in  the  English  tongue,  and  Scotland  will 
hold  him  dear  while  her  lakes  and  mountains  last. 

Released  from  this  dreaded  enemy,  the  King  made  a 
fairer  plan  of  Government  for  Scotland,  divided  the  offices 
of  honour  among  Scottish  gentlemen  and  English  gentle- 
men, forgave  past  offences,  and  thought,  in  his  old  age^ 
that  his  work  was  done. 

But  he  deceived  himself.  Comyn  and  Bruce  conspired, 
and  made  an  appointment  to  meet  at  Dumfries,  in  the 
Church  of  the  Minorites.  There  is  a  story  that  Comyn  was 
false  to  Bruce,  and  had  informed  against  him  to  the  King; 
that  Bruce  was  warned  of  his  danger  and  the  necessity  of 
flight,  by  receiving,  one  night  as  he  sat  at  supper,  from  his 
friend  the  Earl  of  Gloucester,  twelve  pennies  and  a  pair  of 
spurs;  that  as  he  was  riding  angrily  to  keep  his  appointment 
(through  a  snow-storm,  with  his  horse's  shoes  reversed  that 
he  might  not  be  tracked),  he  met  an  evil-looking  serving 
man,  a  messenger  of  Comyn,  whom  he  killed,  and  concealed 
in  whose  dress  he  found  letters  that  proved  Comyn' s  treach- 
ery. However  this  may  be,  they  were  likely  enough  to 
quarrel  in  any  case,  being  hot-headed  rivals;  and,  whatever 
they  quarrelled  about,  they  certainly  did  quarrel  in  the 
church  where  they  met,  and  Bruce  drew  his  dagger  and 
stabbed  Comyn,  who  fell  upon  the  pavement.  When 
Bruce  came  out,  pale  and  disturbed,  the  friends  who  were 
waiting  for  him  asked  what  was  the  matter?  "  I  think  I 
have  killed  Comyn,"  said  he.  "You  only  think  so?"  re- 
turned one  of  them;  "  I  will  make  sure !  "  and  going  into  the 
church,  and  finding  him  alive,  stabbed  him  again  and 
again.  Knowing  that  the  King  would  never  forgive  this 
new  deed  of  violence,  the  party  then  declared  Bruce  King 
of  Scotland :  got  him  crowned  at  Scone — without  the  chair; 
and  set  up  the  rebellious  standard  once  again. 

When  the  King  heard  of  it  he  kindled  with  fiercer  anger 
than  he  had  ever  shown  yet.  He  caused  the  Prince  of 
Wales  and  two  hundred  and  seventy  of  the  young  nobility 
to  be  knighted — the  trees  in  the  Temple  Gardens  were  cut 
down  to  make  room  for  their  tents,  and  they  watched  their 
armour  all  night,  according  to  the  old  usage :  some  in  the 
Temple  Church :  some  in  Westminster  Abbey — and  at  the 
public  Feast  which  then  took  place,  he  swore,  by  Heaven, 
and  by  two  swans  covered  with  gold  network  which  his 
minstrels  placed  upon  the  table,  that  he  would  avenge  the 


138  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

death  of  Comyn,  and  would  puuish  the  false  Brvice.  And 
before  all  the  company,  he  charged  the  Prince  his  son,  in 
case  that  he  should  die  before  accomplishing  his  vow,  not 
to  bury  him  until  it  was  fullilled.  Next  morning  the 
Prince  and  the  rest  of  the  young  Knights  rode  away  to  the 
Border-country  to  join  the  English  army;  and  the  King, 
now  weak  and  sick,  followed  in  a  horse-litter. 

Bruce,  after  losing  a  battle  and  undergoing  many  dan- 
gers and  much  misery,  fled  to  Ireland,  where  he  lay  con- 
cealed through  the  winter.  That  winter,  Edward  passed 
in  hunting  down  and  executing  Bruce' s  relations  and  ad- 
herents, sparing  neither  youth  nor  age,  and  showing  no 
touch  of  pity  or  sign  of  mercy.  In  the  following  spring, 
Bruce  reappeared  and  gained  some  victories.  In  these 
frays,  both  sides  were  grievously  cruel.  For  instance — 
Bruce' s  two  brothers,  being  taken  captives  desperately 
wounded,  were  ordered  by  the  King  to  instant  execution. 
Bruce' s  friend  Sir  John  Douglas,  taking  his  own  Castle  of 
Douglas  out  of  the  hands  of  an  English  Lord,  roasted  the 
dead  bodies  of  the  slaughtered  garrison  in  a  great  fire  made 
of  every  movable  within  it;  which  dreadful  cookery  his 
men  called  the  Douglas  Larder.  Bruce,  still  successful, 
however,  drove  the  Earl  of  Pembroke  and  the  Earl  of 
Gloucester  into  the  Castle  of  Ayr  and  laid  siege  to  it. 

The  King,  who  had  been  laid  up  all  the  winter,  but  had 
directed  the  army  from  his  sick-bed,  now  advanced  to  Car- 
lisle, and  there,  causing  the  litter  in  which  he  had  travelled 
to  be  placed  in  the  Cathedral  as  an  offering  to  Heaven, 
mounted  his  horse  once  more,  and  for  the  last  time.  He 
was  now  sixty-nine  years  old,  and  had  reigned  thirty-five 
years.  He  was  so  ill,  that  in  four  days  he  could  go  no 
more  than  six  miles;  still,  even  at  that  pace,  he  went  on 
and  resolutely  kept  his  face  towards  the  Border.  At 
length,  he  lay  down  at  the  village  of  Burgh-upon-Sands; 
and  there,  telling  those  around  him  to  impress  upon  the 
Prince  that  he  was  to  remember  his  father's  vow,  and  was 
never  to  rest  until  he  had  thoroughly  subdued  Scotland,  he 
yielded  up  his  last  breath. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  139 

CHAPTER    XVII. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  EDWARD  THE  SECOND. 

King  Edward  the  Second,  the  first  Prince  of  Wales, 
was  twenty-three  years  old  when  his  father  died.  There 
was  a  certain  favourite  of  his,  a  young  man  from  Gascony, 
named  Piers  Gaveston,  of  whom  his  father  had  so  much 
disapproved  that  he  had  ordered  him  out  of  England,  and 
had  made  his  son  swear  by  the  side  of  his  sick-bed,  never 
to  bring  him  back.  But,  the  Prince  no  sooner  found  him- 
self King,  than  he  broke  his  oath,  as  so  many  other  Princes 
and  Kings  did  (they  were  far  too  ready  to  take  oaths), 
and  sent  for  his  dear  friend  immediately. 

Now,  this  same  Gaveston  was  handsome  enough,  but 
was  a  reckless,  insolent,  audacious  fellow.  He  was  detested 
by  the  proud  English  Lords :  not  only  because  he  had  such 
power  over  tlie  King,  and  made  the  Court  such  a  dissipated 
place,  but,  also,  because  he  could  ride  better  than  they  at 
tournaments,  and  was  used,  in  his  impudence,  to  cut  very 
bad  jokes  on  them;  calling  one,  the  old  hog;  another,  the 
stage-player;  another,  the  Jew;  another,  the  black  dog  of 
Ardenne.  Tliis  was  as  poor  wit  as  need  be,  but  it  made 
those  Lords  very  wroth;  and  the  surly  Earl  of  Warwick, 
who  was  the  black  dog,  swore  that  the  time  should  come 
when  Piers  Gaveston  should  feel  the  black  dog's  teeth. 

It  was  not  come  yet,  however,  nor  did  it  seem  to  be  com- 
ing. The  King  made  him  Earl  of  Cornwall,  and  gave  him 
vast  riches ;  and,  when  the  King  went  over  to  France  to 
marry  the  French  Princess,  Isabella,  daughter  of  Philip 
le  Bel  :  who  was  said  to  be  the  most  beautiful  woman  in 
the  world:  he  made  Gaveston,  Regent  of  the  Kingdom. 
His  splendid  marriage-ceremony  in  the  Church  of  Our  Lady 
at  Boulogne,  where  there  were  four  Kings  and  three  Queens 
present  (quite  a  pack  of  Court  Cards,  for  I  dare  say  the 
Knaves  were  not  wanting),  being  over,  he  seemed  to  care 
little  or  nothing  for  his  beautiful  wife ;  but  was  wild  with 
impatience  to  meet  Gaveston  again. 

When  he  landed  at  home,  he  paid  no  attention  to  any- 
body else,  but  ran  into  the  favourite's  arms  before  a  great 


140  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

concourse  of  people,  and  hugged  him,  and  kissed  him,  and 
called  him  his  brother.  At  the  coronation  which  soon  fol- 
lowed, Gaveston  was  the  richest  and  brightest  of  all  the 
glittering  company  there,  and  had  the  honour  of  carrying 
the  crown.  This  made  the  proud  Lords  fiercer  than  ever; 
the  people,  too,  despised  the  favourite,  and  would  never 
call  him  Earl  of  Cornwall,  however  much  he  complained  to 
the  King  and  asked  him  to  punish  them  for  not  doing  so, 
but  persisted  in  styling  him  plain  Piers  Gaveston. 

The  Barons  were  so  unceremonious  with  the  King  in  giv- 
ing him  to  understand  that  they  would  not  bear  this  favour- 
ite, that  the  King  was  obliged  to  send  him  out  of  the  coun- 
try. The  favourite  himself  was  made  to  take  an  oath 
(more  oaths!)  that  he  would  never  come  back,  and  the 
Barons  supposed  him  to  be  banished  in  disgrace,  until  they 
heard  that  he  was  appointed  Governor  of  Ireland.  Even 
this  was  not  enough  for  the  besotted  King,  who  brought 
him  home  again  in  a  year's  time,  and  not  only  disgusted 
the  Court  and  the  people  by  his  doting  folly,  but  offended 
his  beautiful  wife  too,  who  never  liked  him  afterwards. 

He  had  now  the  old  Royal  want — of  money — and  the 
Barons  had  the  new  power  of  positively  refusing  to  let  him 
raise  any.  He  summoned  a  Parliament  at  York ;  the  Bar- 
ons refused  to  make  one,  while  the  favourite  was  near  him. 
He  summoned  another  Parliament  at  Westminster,  and 
sent  Gaveston  away.  Then,  the  Barons  came,  completely 
armed,  and  appointed  a  committee  of  tiiem selves  to  correct 
abuses  in  the  state  and  in  the  King's  household.  He  got 
some  money  on  these  conditions,  and  directly  set  off  with 
Gaveston  to  the  Border-country,  where  they  spent  it  in 
idling  away  the  time,  and  feasting,  while  Bruce  made  ready 
to  drive  the  English  out  of  Scotland.  For,  though  the  old 
King  had  even  made  this  poor  weak  son  of  his  swear  (as 
some  say)  that  he  would  not  bury  his  bones,  but  would 
have  them  boiled  clean  in  a  caldron,  and  carried  before  the 
English  army  until  Scotland  was  entirely  subdued,  the 
second  Edward  was  so  unlike  the  first  that  Bruce  gained 
strength  and  power  every  day. 

The  committee  of  Nobles,  after  some  months  of  delibera- 
tion, ordained  that  the  King  should  henceforth  call  a  Par- 
liament together,  once  every  year,  and  even  twice  if  neces- 
sary, instead  of  summoning  it  only  when  he  chose. 
Further,  that  Gaveston  should  once  more  be  banished,  and, 


A  CHILD  S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  141 

this  time,  on  pain  of  death  if  he  ever  came  back.  The 
King's  tears  were  of  no  avail ;  he  was  obliged  to  send  his 
favourite  to  Flanders.  As  soon  as  he  had  done  so,  how- 
ever, he  dissolved  the  Parliament,  with  the  low  cunning  of 
a  mere  fool,  and  set  off  to  the  North  of  England,  thinking 
to  get  an  army  about  him  to  oppose  the  Nobles.  And  once 
again  he  brought  Gaveston  home,  and  heaped  upon  him  all 
the  riches  and  titles  of  which  the  Bai-ons  had  deprived  him. 

The  Lords  saw,  now,  that  there  was  nothing  for  it  but 
to  put  the  favourite  to  death.  They  could  have  done  so, 
legally,  accordmg  to  the  terms  of  his  banishment ;  but  they 
did  so,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  in  a  shabby  manner.  Led  by 
the  Earl  of  Lancaster,  the  King's  cousin,  they  first  of  all 
attacked  the  King  and  Gaveston  at  Newcastle.  They  had 
time  to  escape  by  sea,  and  the  mean  King,  having  his 
precious  Gaveston  with  him,  was  quite  content  to  leave  his 
lovely  wife  behind.  When  they  were  comparatively  safe, 
they  separated ;  the  King  went  to  York  to  collect  a  force 
of  soldiers ;  and  the  favourite  shut  himself  up,  in  the  mean- 
time, in  Scarborough  Castle  overlooking  the  sea.  This 
was  what  the  Barons  wanted.  They  knew  that  the  Castle 
could  not  hold  out ;  they  attacked  it,  and  made  Gaveston 
surrender.  He  delivered  himself  up  to  the  Earl  of  Pem- 
broke— that  Lord  whom  he  had  called  the  Jew — on  the 
Earl's  pledging  his  faith  and  knightly  word,  that  no  harm 
should  happen  to  him  and  no  violence  be  done  him. 

Now,  it  was  agreed  with  Gaveston  that  he  should  be 
taken  to  the  Castle  of  Wallingford,  and  there  kept  in  hon- 
ourable custody.  They  travelled  as  far  as  Dedington, 
near  Banbury,  where,  in  the  Castle  of  that  place,  they 
stopped  for  a  night  to  rest.  Whether  the  Earl  of  Pembroke 
left  his  prisoner  there,  knowing  what  would  happen,  or 
really  left  him  thinking  no  harm,  and  only  going  (as  he 
pretended)  to  visit  his  wife,  the  Countess,  who  was  in  the 
neighbourhood,  is  no  great  matter  now;  in  any  case,  he 
was  bound  as  an  honourable  gentleman  to  protect  his  pris- 
oner, and  he  did  not  do  it.  In  the  morning,  while  the  fa- 
vourite was  yet  in  bed,  he  was  required  to  dress  himself 
and  come  down  into  the  courtyard.  He  did  so  without  any 
mistrust,  but  started  and  turned  pale  when  he  found  it  full 
of  strange  armed  men.  "I  think  you  know  me?"  said 
their  leader,  also  armed  from  head  to  foot.  "  I  am  the  black 
dog  of  Ardenne ! " 


142  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND. 

The  time  was  come  when  Piers  Gaveston  was  to  feel  the 
black  dog's  teeth  indeed.  They  set  him  on  a  mule,  and 
carried  him,  in  mock  state  and  with  military  music,  to  the 
black  dog's  kennel — Warwick  Castle — where  a  hasty  coun- 
cil, composed  of  some  great  noblemen,  considered  what 
should  be  done  with  him.  Some  were  for  sparing  him,  but 
one  loud  voice — it  was  the  black  dog's  bark,  I  dare  say — 
sounded  through  the  Castle  Hall,  uttering  these  words: 
"  You  have  the  fox  in  your  power.  Let  him  go  now,  and 
you  must  hunt  him  again." 

They  sentenced  him  to  death.  He  threw  himself  at  the 
feet  of  the  Earl  of  Lancaster — the  old  hog — but  the  old 
hog  was  as  savage  as  the  dog.  He  was  taken  out  upon  the 
pleasant  road,  leading  from  Warwick  to  Coventry,  where 
the  beautiful  river  Avon,  by  which,  long  afterwards,  Will- 
iam Shakespeare  was  born  and  now  lies  buried,  sparkled 
in  the  bright  landscape  of  the  beautiful  May-day;  and 
there  they  struck  off  his  wretched  head,  and  stained  the 
dust  with  his  blood. 

When  the  King  heard  of  this  black  deed,  in  his  grief 
and  rage  he  denounced  relentless  war  against  his  Barons, 
and  both  sides  were  in  arms  for  half  a  year.  But,  it  then 
became  necessary  for  them  to  join  their  forces  against 
Bruce,  who  had  used  the  time  well  while  they  were  divided, 
and  had  now  a  great  power  in  Scotland. 

Intelligence  was  brought  that  Bruce  was  then  besieging 
Stirling  Castle,  and  that  the  Governor  had  been  obliged  to 
pledge  himself  to  surrender  it,  unless  he  should  be  relieved 
before  a  certain  day.  Hereupon,  the  King  ordered  the 
nobles  and  their  fighting-men  to  meet  him  at  Berwick ;  but, 
the  nobles  cared  so  little  for  the  King,  and  so  neglected  the 
summons,  and  lost  time,  that  only  on  the  day  before  that 
appointed  for  the  surrender,  did  the  King  find  himself  at 
Stirling,  and  even  then  with  a  smaller  force  than  he  had 
expected.  However,  he  had,  altogether,  a  hundred  thou- 
sand men,  and  Bruce  had  not  more  than  forty  thousand ; 
but,  Bruce' s  army  was  strongly  posted  in  three  square  col- 
umns, on  the  ground  lying  between  the  Burn  or  Brook  of 
Bannock  and  the  walls  of  Stirling  Castle. 

On  the  very  evening,  when  the  King  came  up,  Bruce  did 
a  brave  act  that  encouraged  his  men.  He  was  seen  by  a 
certain  Henry  de  Bohun,  an  English  Knight,  riding  about 
before  his  army  on  a  little  horse,  with  a  light  battle-axe  in 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  143 

his  hand,  and  a  crown  of  gold  on  his  head.  This  English 
Knight,  who  was  mounted  on  a  strong  war-horse,  cased  in 
steel,  strongly  armed,  and  able  (as  he  thought)  to  over- 
throw Bruce  by  crushing  him  with  his  mere  weight,  set 
spurs  to  his  great  charger,  rode  on  him,  and  made  a  thrust 
at  him  with  his  heavy  spear.  Bruce  parried  the  thrust, 
and  with  one  blow  of  his  battle-axe  split  his  skull. 

The  Scottish  men  did  not  forget  this,  next  day  when  the 
battle  raged.  Randolph,  Bruce' s  valiant  Nephew,  rode, 
with  the  small  body  of  men  he  commanded,  into  such  a 
host  of  the  English,  all  shining  in  polished  armour  in  the 
sunlight,  that  they  seemed  to  be  swallowed  up  and  lost,  as 
if  they  had  plunged  into  the  sea.  But,  they  fought  so 
well,  and  did  such  dreadful  execution,  that  the  English 
staggered.  Then  came  Bruce  himself  upon  them,  with  all 
the  rest  of  his  army.  While  they  were  thus  hard  pressed 
and  amazed,  there  appeared  upon  the  hills  what  they  sup- 
posed to  be  a  new  Scottish  army,  but  what  were  really  only 
tlie  camp  followers,  in  number  fifteen  thousand:  whom 
Bruce  had  taught  to  show  themselves  at  that  place  and 
time.  The  Earl  of  Gloucester,  commanding  the  English 
horse,  made  a  last  rush  to  change  the  fortune  of  the  day ; 
but  Bruce  (like  Jack  the  Giant-killer  in  the  story)  had 
had  pits  dug  m  the  ground,  and  covered  over  with  turfs 
and  stakes.  Into  these,  as  they  gave  way  beneath  the 
weight  of  the  horses,  riders  and  horses  rolled  by  hundreds. 
The  English  were  completely  routed;  all  their  treasure, 
stores,  and  engines  were  taken  by  the  Scottish  men ;  so 
many  waggons  and  other  wheeled  vehicles  were  seized,  that 
it  is  related  that  they  would  have  reached,  if  they  had  been 
drawn  out  in  a  line,  one  hundred  and  eighty  miles.  The 
fortunes  of  Scotland  were,  for  the  time,  completely  changed ; 
and  never  was  a  battle  won,  more  famous  upon  Scottish 
ground,  than  this  great  battle  of  Baxnockburn. 

Plague  and  famine  succeeded  in  England;  and  still  the 
powerless  King  and  his  disdainful  Lords  were  always  in 
contention.  Some  of  the  turbulent  chiefs  of  Ireland  made 
proposals  to  Bruce,  to  accept  the  rule  of  that  country.  He 
sent  his  brother  Edward  to  them,  who  was  crowned  King 
of  Ireland.  He  afterwards  went  himself  to  help  his  brother 
in  his  Irish  wars,  but  his  brother  was  defeated  in  the  end 
and  killed.  Robert  Bruce,  returning  to  Scotland,  still  in- 
creased his  strength  there. 


144  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND. 

As  the  King's  ruin  had  begun  in  a  favourite,  so  it  seemed 
likely  to  end  in  one.  He  was  too  poor  a  creature  to  rely 
at  all  upon  himself;  and  his  new  favourite  was  one  Hugh 
LE  Despenser,  the  son  of  a  gentleman  of  ancient  family. 
Hugh  was  handsome  and  brave,  but  he  was  the  favourite  of 
a  weak  King,  whom  no  man  cared  a  rush  for,  and  that  was 
a  dangerous  place  to  hold.  The  Nobles  leagued  against 
him,  because  the  King  liked  him ;  and  they  lay  in  wait, 
both  for  his  ruin  and  his  father's.  Now,  the  King  had 
married  him  to  the  daughter  of  the  late  Earl  of  Gloucester, 
and  had  given  both  him  and  his  father  great  possessions  in 
Wales.  In  their  endeavours  to  extend  these,  they  gave 
violent  offence  to  an  angry  Welsh  gentleman,  named  John 
DE  Mowbray,  and  to  divers  other  angry  Welsh  gentlemen, 
who  resorted  to  arms,  took  their  castles,  and  seized  their 
estates.  The  Earl  of  Lancaster  had  first  placed  the  favour- 
ite (who  was  a  poor  relation  of  his  own)  at  Court,  and  he 
considered  his  own  dignity  offended  by  the  preference  he 
received  and  the  honours  he  acquired ;  so  he,  and  the  Bar- 
ons who  were  his  friends,  joined  the  Welshmen,  marched 
on  London,  and  sent  a  message  to  the  King  demanding  to 
have  the  favourite  and  his  father  banished.  At  first,  the 
King  unaccountably  took  it  into  his  head  to  be  spirited, 
and  to  send  them  a  bold  reply ;  but  when  they  quartered 
themselves  ai^ound  Holborn  and  Clerkenwell,  and  went 
down,  armed,  to  the  Parliament  at  Westminster,  he  gave 
way,  and  complied  with  their  demands. 

His  turn  of  triumph  came  sooner  than  he  expected.  It 
arose  out  of  an  accidental  circumstance.  The  beautiful 
Queen  happening  to  be  travelling,  came  one  night  to  one  of 
the  royal  castles,  and  demanded  to  be  lodged  and  enter- 
tained there  until  morning.  The  governor  of  this  castle, 
who  was  one  of  the  enraged  lords,  was  away,  and  in  his 
absence,  his  wife  refused  admission  to  the  Queen ;  a  scuffle 
took  place  among  the  common  men  on  either  side,  and 
some  of  the  royal  attendants  were  killed.  The  people, 
who  cared  nothing  for  the  King,  were  very  angry  that  their 
beautiful  Queen  should  be  thus  rudely  treated  in  her  own 
dominions ;  and  the  King,  taking  advantage  of  this  feeling, 
besieged  the  castle,  took  it,  and  then  called  the  two  Des- 
pensers  home.  Upon  this,  the  confederate  lords  and  the 
Welshmen  went  over  to  Bruce.  The  King  encountered 
them   at  Boroughbridge,   gained  the  victory,  and  took  a 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  145 

number  of  distinguished  prisoners ;  among  them,  the  Earl 
of  Lancaster,  now  an  old  man,  upon  whose  destruction  he 
was  resolved.  This  Earl  was  taken  to  his  own  castle  of 
Pontefract,  and  there  tried  and  found  guilty  by  an  unfair 
court  appointed  for  the  purpose ;  he  was  not  even  allowed 
to  speak  in  his  own  defence.  He  was  insulted,  pelted, 
mounted  on  a  starved  pony  without  saddle  or  bridle,  car- 
ried out,  and  beheaded.  Eight-and-twenty  knights  were 
hanged,  drawn,  and  quartered.  When  the  King  had  de- 
spatched this  bloody  work,  and  had  made  a  fresh  and  a 
long  truce  with  Bruce,  he  took  the  Despensers  into  greater 
favour  than  ever,  and  made  the  father  Earl  of  Winchester. 

One  prisoner,  and  an  important  one,  who  was  taken  at 
Boroughbridge,  made  his  escape,  however,  and  turned  the 
tide  against  the  King.  This  was  Kogeb  Mortimer, 
always  resolutely  opposed  to  him,  who  was  sentenced  to 
death,  and  placed  for  safe  custody  in  the  Tower  of  London. 
He  treated  his  guards  to  a  quantity  of  wine  into  which  he 
had  put  a  sleeping  potion ;  and,  when  they  were  insensible, 
broke  out  of  his  dungeon,  got  into  a  kitchen,  climbed  up 
the  chimney,  let  himself  down  from  the  roof  of  the  build- 
ing with  a  rope-ladder,  passed  the  sentries,  got  down  to  the 
river,  and  made  away  in  a  boat  to  where  servants  and 
horses  were  waiting  for  him.  He  finally  escaped  to  France, 
where  Charles  le  Bel,  the  brother  of  the  beautiful 
Queen,  was  King.  Charles  sought  to  quarrel  with  the 
King  of  England,  on  pretence  of  his  not  having  come  to  do 
him  homage  at  his  coronation.  It  was  proposed  that  the 
beautiful  Queen  should  go  over  to  arrange  the  dispute ;  she 
went,  and  wrote  home  to  the  King,  that  as  he  was  sick 
and  could  not  come  to  France  himself,  perhaps  it  would  be 
better  to  send  over  the  young  Prince,  their  son,  who  was 
only  twelve  years  old,  who  could  do  homage  to  her  brother 
in  his  stead,  and  in  whose  company  she  would  immediately 
return.  The  King  sent  him :  but,  both  he  and  the  Queen 
remained  at  the  French  Court,  and  Roger  Mortimer  became 
the  Queen's  lover. 

When  the  King  wrote,  again  and  again,  to  the  Queen  to 
come  home,  she  did  not  reply  that  she  despised  him  too 
much  to  live  with  him  any  more  (which  was  the  truth), 
but  said  she  was  afraid  of  the  two  Despensers.  In  short, 
her  design  was  to  overthrow  the  favourites'  power,  and  the 
King's  power,  such  as  it  was,  and  invade  England.  Hav- 
10 


146  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

ing  obtained  a  French  force  of  two  thousand  men,  and  being 
joined  by  all  the  English  exiles  then  in  France,  she  landed, 
within  a  year,  at  Ore  well,  in  Suffolk,  where  she  was  im- 
mediately joined  by  the  Earls  of  Kent  and  Norfolk,  the 
King's  two  brothers;  by  other  powerful  noblemen;  and 
lastly,  by  the  first  English  general  who  was  despatched  to 
check  her :  who  went  over  to  her  with  all  his  men.  The 
people  of  London,  receiving  these  tidings,  would  do  nothing 
for  the  King,  but  broke  open  the  Tower,  let  out  all  his 
prisoners,  and  threw  up  their  caps  and  hurrahed  for  the 
beautiful  Queen. 

The  King,  with  his  two  favourites,  fled  to  Bristol,  where 
he  left  old  Despenser  in  charge  of  the  town  and  castle, 
Avhile  he  went  on  with  the  son  to  Wales.  The  Bristol  men 
being  opposed  to  the  King,  and  it  being  impossible  to  hold 
the  town  with  enemies  everywhere  within  the  walls,  Des- 
penser yielded  it  up  on  the  third  day,  and  was  instantly 
brought  to  trial  for  having  traitorously  influenced  what  was 
called  "the  King's  mind" — though  I  doubt  if  the  King 
ever  had  any.  He  was  a  venerable  old  man,  upwards  of 
ninety  years  of  age,  but  his  age  gained  no  respect  or  mercy. 
He  was  hanged,  torn  open  while  he  was  yet  alive,  cut  up 
into  pieces,  and  thrown  to  the  dogs.  His  son  was  soon 
taken,  tried  at  Hereford  before  the  same  judge  on  a  long 
series  of  foolish  charges,  found  guilty,  and  hanged  upon  a 
gallows  fifty  feet  high,  with  a  chaplet  of  nettles  round  his 
head.  His  poor  old  father  and  he  were  innocent  enough  of 
any.  worse  crimes  than  the  crime  of  having  been  friends  of 
a  King,  on  whom,  as  a  mere  man,  they  would  never  have 
deigned  to  cast  a  favourable  look.  It  is  a  bad  crime,  I 
know,  and  leads  to  worse ;  but,  many  lords  and  gentlemen 
— I  even  think  some  ladies,  too,  if  I  recollect  right — have 
committed  it  in  England,  who  have  neither  been  given  to 
the  dogs,  nor  hanged  up  fifty  feet  high. 

The  wretched  King  was  running  here  and  there,  all  this 
time,  and  never  getting  anywhere  in  particular,  until  he 
gave  himself  up,  and  was  taken  off  to  Kenilworth  Castle. 
When  he  was  safely  lodged  there,  the  Queen  went  to  Lon- 
don and  met  the  Parliament.  And  the  Bishop  of  Here- 
ford, who  was  the  most  skilful  of  her  friends,  said,  What 
was  to  be  done  now?  Here  was  an  imbecile,  indolent, 
miserable  King  upon  the  throne;  wouldn't  it  be  better  to 
take  him  off,  and  put  his  son  there  instead?     I  don't  know 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  14/ 

whether  the  Queen  really  jDitied  him  at  this  pass,  but  she 
began  to  cry ;  so,  the  Bishop  said.  Well,  my  Lords  and  Gen- 
tlemen, what  do  you  think,  upon  the  whole,  of  sending 
down  to  Kenilworth,  and  seeing  if  His  Majesty  (God  bless 
him,  and  forbid  we  should  depose  him!)  won't  resign? 

My  Lords  and  Gentlemen  thought  it  a  good  notion,  so  a 
deputation  of  them  went  down  to  Kenilworth ;  and  there 
the  King  came  into  the  great  hall  of  the  Castle,  commonly 
dressed  in  a  poor  black  gown ;  and  when  he  saw  a  certain 
bishop  among  them,  fell  down,  poor  feeble-headed  man, 
and  made  a  wretched  spectacle  of  himself.  Somebody 
lifted  him  up,  and  then  Sir  William  Trussel,  the  Speaker 
of  the  House  of  Commons,  almost  frightened  him  to  death 
by  making  him  a  tremendous  speech  to  the  eifect  that  he 
was  no  longer  a  King,  and  that  everybody  renounced  alle- 
giance to  him.  After  which.  Sir  Thomas  Blount,  the 
Steward  of  the  Household,  nearly  finished  him,  by  coming 
forward  and  breaking  his  white  wand — which  was  a  cere- 
mony only  performed  at  a  King's  death.  Being  asked  in 
this  pressing  manner  what  he  thought  of  resigning,  the 
King  said  he  thought  it  was  the  best  thing  he  could  do. 
So,  he  did  it,  and  they  proclauned  his  son  next  day. 

I  wish  I  could  close  his  history  by  saying  that  he  lived 
a  harmless  life  in  the  Castle  and  the  Castle  gardens  at  Ken- 
ilworth, many  years — that  he  had  a  favourite,  and  plenty 
to  eat  and  drink — and,  having  that,  wanted  nothing.  But 
he  was  shamefully  humiliated.  He  was  outraged,  and 
slighted,  and  had  dirty  water  from  ditches  given  him  to 
shave  with,  and  wept  and  said  he  would  have  clean  warm 
water,  and  was  altogether  very  miserable.  He  was  moved 
from  this  castle  to  that  castle,  and  from  that  castle  to  the 
other  castle,  because  this  lord  or  that  lord,  or  the  other 
lord,  was  too  kind  to  him :  until  at  last  he  came  to  Berke- 
ley Castle,  near  the  river  Severn,  where  (the  Lord  Berkeley 
being  then  ill  and  absent)  he  fell  into  the  hands  of  two 
black  ruffians,  called  Thomas  Gournay  and  William 
Ogle. 

One  night — it  was  the  night  of  September  the  twenty- 
first,  one  thousand  three  hundred  and  twenty-seven — dread- 
ful screams  were  heard,  by  the  startled  people  in  the  neigh- 
bouring town,  ringing  through  the  thick  walls  of  the  Castle, 
and  the  dark  deep  night;  and  they  said,  as  they  were  thus 
horribly  awakened  from  their  sleep,  "  May  Heaven  be  mei- 


148  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

ciful  to  the  King;  for  those  cries  forbode  that  no  good  is 
being  done  to  him  in  his  dismal  prison !  "  Next  morning 
he  was  dead — not  bruised,  or  stabbed,  or  marked  upon  the 
body,  but  much  distorted  in  the  face ;  and  it  was  whis- 
pered afterwards,  that  those  two  villains,  Gournay  and 
Ogle,  had  burnt  up  his  inside  with  a  red-hot  iron. 

If  you  ever  come  near  Gloucester,  and  see  the  centre 
tower  of  its  beautiful  Cathedral,  with  its  four  pinnacles, 
rising  lightly  in  the  air;  you  may  remember  that  the 
wretched  Edward  the  Second  was  buried  in  the  old  abbey 
of  that  ancient  city,  at  forty-three  years  old,  after  being 
for  nineteen  years  and  a  half  a  perfectly  incapable  King. 


CHAPTER     XVIII. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  EDWARD  THE  THIRD. 

Roger  Mortimer,  the  Queen's  lover  (who  escaped  to 
France  in  the  last  chapter),  was  far  from  profiting  by  the 
examples  he  had  had  of  the  fate  of  favourites.  Having, 
through  the  Queen's  influence,  come  into  possession  of  the 
estates  of  the  two  Despensers,  he  became  extremely  proud 
and  ambitious,  and  sought  to  be  the  real  ruler  of  England. 
The  young  King,  who  was  crowned  at  fourteen  years  of 
age  with  all  the  usual  solemnities,  resolved  not  to  bear  this, 
and  soon  pursued  Mortimer  to  his  ruin. 

The  people  themselves  were  not  fond  of  Mortimer — first, 
because  he  was  a  Royal  favourite;  secondly,  because  he 
was  supposed  to  have  helped  to  make  a  peace  with  Scotland 
which  now  took  place,  and  in  virtue  of  which  the  young 
King's  sister  Joan,  only  seven  years  old,  was  promised  in 
marriage  to  David,  the  son  and  heir  of  Robert  Bruce,  who 
was  only  five  years  old.  The  nobles  hated  Mortimer  be- 
cause of  his  pride,  riches,  and  power.  They  went  so  far  as 
to  take  up  arms  against  him ;  but  were  obliged  to  submit. 
The  Earl  of  Kent,  one  of  those  who  did  so,  but  who  after- 
wards went  over  to  Mortimer  and  the  Queen,  was  made  an 
example  of  in  the  following  cruel  manner : 

He  seems  to  have  been  anything  but  a  wise  old  earl ;  and 
he  was  persuaded  by  the  agents  of  the  favourite  and  the 


A  CHILD  S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  149 

Queen,  that  poor  King  Edward  the  Second  was  not  really 
dead ;  and  thus  was  betrayed  into  writing  letters  favouring 
his  rightful  claim  to  the  throne.  This  was  made  out  to  be 
high  treason,  and  he  was  tried,  found  guilty,  and  sentenced 
to  be  executed.  They  took  the  poor  old  lord  outside  the 
town  of  Winchester,  and  there  kept  him  waiting  some  three 
or  four  hours  until  they  could  find  somebody  to  cut  off  his 
head.  At  last,  a  convict  said  he  would  do  it,  if  the  gov- 
ernment would  pardon  him  in  return ;  and  they  gave  him 
the  pardon ;  and  at  one  blow  he  put  the  Earl  of  Kent  out 
of  his  last  suspense. 

While  the  Queen  was  in  France,  she  found  a  lovely  and 
good  young  lady,  named  Philippa,  who  she  thought  would 
make  an  excellent  wife  for  her  son.  The  young  King 
married  this  lady,  soon  after  he  came  to  the  throne ;  and 
her  first  child,  Edward,  Prince  of  Wales,  afterwards  be- 
came celebrated,  as  we  shall  presently  see,  under  the  fa- 
mous title  of  Edward  the  Black  Prince. 

The  young  King,  thinking  the  time  ripe  for  the  downfall 
of  Mortimer,  took  counsel  with  Lord  Montacute  how  he 
should  proceed.  A  Parliament  was  going  to  be  held  at 
Nottingham,  and  that  lord  recommended  that  the  favourite 
should  be  seized  by  night  in  Nottingham  Castle,  where  he 
was  sure  to  be.  Now,  this,  like  many  other  things,  was 
more  easily  said  than  done;  because,  to  guard  against 
treachery,  the  great  gates  of  the  Castle  were  locked  every 
night,  and  the  great  keys  were  carried  up-stairs  to  the 
Queen,  who  laid  them  under  her  own  pillow.  But  the  Castle 
had  a  governor,  and  the  governor  being  Lord  Montacute' s 
friend,  confided  to  him  how  he  knew  of  a  secret  passage 
under-ground,  hidden  from  observation  by  the  weeds  and 
brambles  with  which  it  was  overgrown ;  and  how,  through 
that  passage,  the  conspirators  might  enter  in  the  dead  of 
the  night,  and  go  straight  to  Mortimer's  room.  Accord- 
ingly, upon  a  certain  dark  night,  at  midnight,  they  made 
their  way  through  this  dismal  place :  startling  the  rats,  and 
frightening  the  owls  and  bats :  and  came  safely  to  the  bottom 
of  the  main  tower  of  the  Castle,  where  the  King  met  them, 
and  took  them  up  a  profoundly  dark  staircase  in  a  deep 
silence.  They  soon  heard  the  voice  of  Mortimer  in  council 
with  some  friends ;  and  bursting  int*  the  room  with  a  sud- 
den noise,  took  him  prisoner.  The  Queen  cried  out  from 
her  bed-chamber,  "  Oh,  my  sweet  son,  my  dear  son,  spare 


150  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

my  gentle  Mortimer ! "  They  carried  him  off,  however ; 
and,  before  the  next  Parliament,  accused  him  of  having 
made  differences  between  the  young  King  and  his  mother, 
and  of  having  brought  about  the  death  of  the  Earl  of  Kent, 
and  even  of  the  late  King ;  for,  as  you  know  by  this  time, 
when  they  wanted  to  get  rid  of  a  man  in  those  old  days, 
they  were  not  very  particular  of  what  they  accused  him. 
Mortimer  was  found  guilty  of  all  this,  and  was  sentenced 
to  be  hanged  at  Tyburn.  The  King  shut  his  mother  up  in 
genteel  confinement,  where  she  passed  the  rest  of  her  life ; 
and  now  he  became  King  in  earnest. 

The  first  effort  he  made  was  to  conquer  Scotland.  The 
English  lords  who  had  lands  in  Scotland,  finding  that  their 
rights  were  not  respected  under  the  late  peace,  made  war 
on  their  own  account :  choosing  for  their  general,  Edward, 
the  son  of  John  Baliol,  who  made  such  a  vigorous  fight, 
that  in  less  than  two  months  he  won  the  whole  Scottish 
Kingdom.  He  was  joined,  when  thus  triumphant,  by  the 
King  and  Parliament ;  and  he  and  the  King  in  person  be- 
sieged the  Scottish  forces  in  Berwick.  The  whole  Scottish 
army  coming  to  the  assistance  "of  their  countrymen,  such  a 
furious  battle  ensued,  that  thirty  thousand  men  are  said  to 
have  been  killed  in  it.  Baliol  was  then  crowned  King  of 
Scotland,  doing  homage  to  the  King  of  England ;  but  little 
came  of  his  successes  after  all,  for  the  Scottish  men  rose 
against  him,  within  no  very  long  time,  and  David  Bruce 
came  back  within  ten  years  and  took  his  kingdom. 

France  was  a  far  richer  country  than  Scotland,  and  the 
King  had  a  much  greater  mind  to  conquer  it.  So,  he  let 
Scotland  alone,  and  pretended  that  he  had  a  claim  to  the 
French  throne  in  right  of  his  mother.  He  had,  in  reality, 
no  claim  at  all;  but  that  mattered  little  in  those  times. 
He  brought  over  to  his  cause  many  little  princes  and  sover- 
eigns, and  even  courted  the  alliance  of  tlie  people  of  Flan- 
ders— a  busy,  working  community,  who  had  very  small 
respect  for  kings,  and  whose  head  man  was  a  brewer. 
With  such  forces  as  he  raised  by  these  means,  Edward  in- 
vaded France ;  but  he  did  little  by  that,  except  run  into 
debt  in  carrying  on  the  war  to  the  extent  of  three  hundred 
thousand  pounds.  The  next  year  he  did  better ;  gaining  a 
great  sea-fight  in  the  harbour  of  Sluys.  This  success,  how- 
ever, was  very  short-lived,  for  the  Flemings  took  fright  at 
the  siege  of  Saint  Omer  and  ran  away,  leaving  their  weap- 


A   CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  151 

ons  and  baggage  behind  them.     Philip,  the  French  King, 
coming  up  with  his  army,  and  Edward  being  very  anxious 
to  decide  the  war,  proposed  to  settle  the  difference  by  sin- 
gle combat  with  him,  or  by  a  fight  of  one  hundred  knights 
on  each  side.     The  French  King  said,  he  thanked  him; 
but  being  very  well  as  he  was,  he  would  rather  not.     So, 
after  some  skirmishing  and  talking,  a  short  peace  was  made. 
It  was   soon  broken  by  King  Edward's  favouring  the 
cause  of  John,  Earl  of  Montford;  a  French  nobleman,  who 
asserted  a  claim  of  his  own  against  the  French  King,  and 
offered  to  do  homage  to  England  for  the  Crown  of  France, 
if  he  could  obtain  it  through  England's  help.     This  French 
lord,  himself,  was  soon  defeated  by  the  French  King's  son, 
and  shut  up  in  a  tower  in  Paris ;  but  his  wife,  a  courageous 
and  beautiful  woman,  who  is  said  to  have  had  the  courage 
of  a  man,  and  the  heart  of  a  lion,  assembled  the  people  of 
Brittany,  where  she  then  was ;  and,  showing  them  her  in- 
fant son,  made  many  pathetic  entreaties  to  them  not  to  de- 
sert her  and  their  young  Lord.     They  took   fire  at  this 
appeal,  and  rallied  round  her  in  the  strong  castle  of  Henne- 
bon.     Here  she  was  not  only  besieged  without  by  the  French 
under  Charles  de  Blois,  but  was  endangered  within  by  a 
dreary  old  bishop,  who  was  always  representing  to  the 
people  what  horrors  they  must  undergo  if  they  were  faith- 
ful— first  from  famine,  and  afterwards  from  fire  and  sword. 
But  this  noble  lady,  whose  heart  never  failed  her,  encour- 
aged her  soldiers  by  her  own  example ;  went  from  post  to 
post  like  a  great  general;  even  mounted  on  horseback  fully 
armed,  and,  issuing  from  the  castle  by  a  by-path,  fell  upon 
the  French  camp,  set  fire  to  the  tents,  and  threw  the  whole 
force  into  disorder.     This  done,   she  got  safely  back  to 
Hennebon  again,  and  was  received  with  loud  shouts  of  joy 
by  the  defenders  of  the  castle,  who  had  given  her  up  for 
lost.     As  they  were  now  very  short  of  provisions,  however, 
«    and  as  they  could  not  dine  off  enthusiasm,  and  as  the  old 
I    bishop  was  always  saying,  "  I  told  you  what  it  would  come 
I   to !  "  they  began  to  lose  heart,  and  to  talk  of  yielding  the 
i   castle  up.     The  brave  Countess  retiring  to  an  upper  room 
i  and  looking  with  great  grief  out  to  sea,  where  she  expected 
i  relief  from  England,  saw,  at  this  very  time,  the  English 
'  ships  in  the  distance,  and  was  relieved  and  rescued  I     Sir 
Walter  Manning,  the  English  commander,  so  admired  her 
I  courage,  that,  being  come  into  the  castle  with  the  English 


152  A    CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

knights,  and  having  made  a  feast  there,  he  assaulted  the 
French  by  way  of  dessert,  and  beat  them  off  triumphantly. 
Then  he  and  the  knights  came  back  to  the  castle  with  great 
joy ;  and  the  Countess  who  had  watched  them  from  a  high 
tower,  thanked  them  with  all  her  heart,  and  kissed  them 
every  one. 

This  noble  lady  distinguished  herself  afterwards  in  a  sea- 
fight  with  the  French  off  Guernsey,  when  she  was  on  her 
way  to  England  to  ask  for  more  troops.  Her  great  spirit 
roused  another  lady,  the  wife  of  another  French  lord 
(whom  the  French  King  very  barbarously  murdered),  to 
distinguish  herself  scarcely  less.  The  time  was  fast  com- 
ing, however,  when  Edward,  Prince  of  Wales,  was  to  be 
the  great  star  of  this  French  and  English  war. 

It  was  in  the  month  of  July,  in  the  year  one  thousand 
three  hundred  and  forty-six,  when  the  King  embarked  at 
Southampton  for  France,  with  an  army  of  about  thirty 
thousand  men  in  all,  attended  by  the  Prince  of  Wales  and 
by  several  of  the  chief  nobles.  He  landed  at  La  Hogue  in 
Normandy;  and,  burning  and  destroying  as  he  went,  ac- 
cording to  custom,  advanced  up  the  left  bank  of  the  river 
Seine,  and  fired  the  small  towns  even  close  to  Paris;  but, 
being  watched  from  the  right  bank  of  the  river  by  the 
French  King  and  all  his  army,  it  came  to  this  at  last,  that 
Edward  found  himself,  on  Saturday  the  twenty-sixth  of 
August,  one  thousand  three  hundred  and  forty-six,  on  a 
rising  ground  behind  the  little  French  village  of  Crecy, 
face  to  face  with  the  French  King's  force.  And,  although 
the  French  King  had  an  enormous  army — in  number  more 
than  eight  times  his — he  there  resolved  to  beat  him  or  be 
beaten. 

The  young  Prince,  assisted  by  the  Earl  of  Oxford  and 
the  Earl  of  Warwick,  led  the  first  division  of  the  English 
army ;  two  other  great  Earls  led  the  second ;  and  the  King, 
the  third.  When  the  morning  dawned,  the  King  received 
the  sacrament,  and  heard  prayers,  and  then,  mounted  on 
horseback  with  a  white  wand  in  his  hand,  rode  from  com- 
pany to  company,  and  rank  to  rank,  cheering  and  encour- 
aging both  officers  and  men.  Then  the  whole  army  break- 
fasted, each  man  sitting  on  the  ground  where  he  had  stood; 
and  then  they  remained  quietly  on  the  ground  with  their 
weapons  ready. 

Up  came  the  French  King  with  all  ''^is  great  force.     It 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  153 

was  dark  and  angry  weather ;  there  was  an  eclipse  of  the 
sun;  there  was  a  thunder-storm,  accompanied  with  tre- 
mendous rain ;  the  frightened  birds  flew  screaming  above 
the  soldiers'  heads.  A  certain  captain  in  the  French  army 
advised  the  French  King,  who  was  by  no  means  cheerful, 
not  to  begin  the  battle  until  the  morroWc  The  King,  tak- 
ing this  advice,  gave  the  word  to  halt.  But,  those  behind 
not  understanding  it,  or  desiring  to  be  foremost  with  the 
rest,  came  pressing  on.  The  roads  for  a  great  distance 
were  covered  with  this  immense  army,  and  with  the  com- 
mon people  from  the  villages,  who  were  flourishing  their 
rude  weapons,  and  making  a  great  noise.  Owing  to  these 
circumstances,  the  French  army  advanced  in  the  greatest 
confusion ;  every  French  lord  doing  what  he  liked  with  his 
own  men,  and  putting  out  the  men  of  every  other  French 
lord. 

Now,  their  King  relied  strongly  upon  a  great  body  of 
cross-bowmen  from  Genoa;  and  these  he  ordered  to  the 
front  to  begin  the  battle,  on  finding  that  he  could  not  stop 
it.  They  shouted  once,  they  shouted  twice,  they  shouted 
three  times,  to  alarm  the  English  archers ;  but,  the  English 
would  have  heard  them  shout  three  thousand  times  and 
would  have  never  moved.  At  last  the  cross-bowmen  went 
forward  a  little,  and  began  to  discharge  their  bolts ;  upon 
which,  the  English  let  fly  such  a  hail  of  arrows,  that  the 
Genoese  speedily  made  off — for  their  cross-bows,  besides 
being  heavy  to  carry,  required  to  be  wound  up  with  a  han- 
dle, and  consequently  took  time  to  re-load ;  the  English, 
on  the  other  hand,  could  discharge  their  arrows  almost  as 
fast  as  the  arrows  could  fly. 

When  the  French  King  saw  the  Genoese  turning,  he 
cried  out  to  his  men  to  kill  those  scoundrels,  who  were  do- 
ing harm  instead  of  service.  This  increased  the  confusion. 
Meanwhile  the  English  archers,  continuing  to  shoot  as  fast 
as  ever,  shot  down  great  numbers  of  the  French  solcji^rs 
and  knights ;  whom  certain  sly  Cornishmen  and  Welshmen, 
from  the  English  army,  creeping  along  the  ground,  de- 
spatched with  great  knives. 

The  Prince  and  his  division  were  at  this  time  so  hard- 
pressed,  that  the  Earl  of  Warwick  sent  a  message  to  the 
King,  who  was  overlooking  the  battle  from  a  windmill, 
beseeching  him  to  send  more  aid. 

"  Is  my  son  killed?  "  said  the  King. 


154  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND. 

"No,  sire,  please  God,"  returned  the  messenger. 

"  Is  he  wounded?  "  said  the  King. 

"No,  sire." 

"  Is  he  thrown  to  the  ground?  "  said  the  King, 

"No,  sire,  not  so;  but,  he  is  very  hard-pressed." 

"Then,"  said  the  King,  "  go  back  to  those  who  sent  you, 
and  tell  them  I  shall  send  no  aid;  because  I  set  my  heart 
upon  my  son  proving  himself  this  day  a  brave  knight,  and 
because  I  am  resolved,  please  God,  that  the  honour  of  a 
great  victory  shall  be  his ! " 

These  bold  words,  being  reported  to  the  Prince  and  his 
division,  so  raised  their  spirits,  that  they  fought  better  than 
ever.  The  King  of  France  charged  gallantly  with  his  men 
many  times;  but  it  was  of  no  use.  Night  closing  in,  his 
horse  was  killed  under  him  by  an  English  arrow,  and  the 
knights  and  nobles  wlio  had  clustered  thick  about  him  ear- 
ly in  the  day,  were  now  completely  scattered.  At  last, 
some  of  his  few  remaining  followers  led  him  off  the  field 
by  force,  since  he  would  not  retire  of  himsdlf,  and  they 
journeyed  away  to  Amiens.  The  victorious  English,  light- 
ing their  watch-tires,  made  merry  on  the  field,  and  the 
King,  riding  to  meet  his  gallant  son,  took  him  in  his  arms, 
kissed  him,  and  told  him  that. he  had  acted  nobly,  and 
proved  himself  worthy  of  the  day  and  of  the  crown. 
While  it  was  yet  night.  King  Edward  was  hardly  aware  of 
the  great  victory  he  had  gained ;  but,  next  day,  it  was  dis- 
covered that  eleven  princes,  twelve  hundred  knights,  and 
thirty  thousand  common  men  lay  dead  upon  the  French 
side.  Among  these  was  the  King  of  Bohemia,  an  old 
blind  man ;  who,  having  been  told  that  his  son  was  wound- 
ed in  the  battle,  and  that  no  force  could  stand  against  the 
Black  Prince,  called  to  him  two  knights,  put  himself  on 
horseback  between  them,  fastened  the  three  bridles  to- 
gether, and  dashed  in  among  the  English,  where  he  was 
presently  slain.  He  bore  as  his  crest  three  white  ostrich 
feathers,  with  the  motto  Ich  dien,  signifying  in  English  "  I 
serve."  This  crest  and  motto  were  taken  by  the  Prince  of 
Wales  in  remembrance  of  that  famous  day,  and  have  been 
borne  by  the  Prince  of  Wales  ever  since. 

Five  days  after  this  great  battle,  the  King  laid  siege  to 
Calais.  This  siege — ever  afterwards  memorable — lasted 
nearly  a  year.  In  order  to  starve  the  inhabitants  out,  King 
Edward  built  so  many  wooden  houses  for  the  lodgings  of 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  156 

Ms  troops,  that  it  is  said  their  quarters  looked  like  a  sec- 
ond Calais  suddenly  sprung  up  around  the  first.  Early  in 
the  siege,  the  governor  of  the  town  drove  out  what  he  called 
the  useless  mouths,  to  the  number  of  seventeen  hundred 
persons,  men  and  women,  young  and  old.  King  Edward 
allowed  them  to  pass  through  his  lines,  and  even  fed  them, 
and  dismissed  them  with  money ;  but,  later  in  the  siege,  he 
was  not  so  merciful — five  hundred  more,  who  were  after- 
wards driven  out,  dying  of  starvation  and  misery.  The 
garrison  were  so  hard-pressed  at  last,  that  they  sent  a  let- 
ter to  King  Philip,  telling  him  that  they  had  eaten  all  the 
horses,  all  the  dogs,  and  all  the  rats  and  mice  that  could 
be  found  in  the  place ;  and,  that  if  he  did  not  relieve  them, 
they  must  either  surrender  to  the  English,  or  eat  one  an- 
other. Philip  made  one  effort  to  give  them  relief;  but 
they  were  so  hemmed  in  by  the  English  power,  that  he 
could  not  succeed,  and  was  fain  to  leave  the  place.  Upon 
this  they  hoisted  the  English  flag,  and  surrendered  to  King 
Edward.  "  Tell  your  general,"  said  he  to  the  humble  mes- 
sengers who  came  out  of  the  town,  "  that  I  require  to  have 
sent  here,  six  of  the  most  distinguished  citizens,  bare- 
legged, and  in  their  shirts,  with  ropes  about  their  necks ; 
and  let  those  six  men  bring  with  them  the  keys  of  the  cas- 
tle and  the  town." 

When  the  Governor  of  Calais  related  this  to  the  people 
in  the  Market-place,  there  was  great  weeping  and  distress ; 
in  the  midst  of  which,  one  worthy  citizen,  named  Eustace 
de  Saint  Pierre,  rose  up  and  said,  that  if  the  six  men  re- 
quired were  not  sacrificed,  the  whole  population  would  be ; 
therefore,  he  offered  himself  as  the  first.  Encouraged  by 
this  bright  example,  five  other  worthy  citizens  rose  up  one 
after  another,  and  offered  themselves  to  save  the  rest.  The 
Governor,  who  was  too  badly  wounded  to  be  able  to  walk, 
mounted  a  poor  old  horse  that  had  not  been  eaten,  and  con- 
ducted these  good  men  to  the  gate,  while  all  the  people 
cried  and  mourned. 

Edward  received  them  wrathf ully,  and  ordered  the  heads 
of  the  whole  six  to  be  struck  off.  However,  the  good 
Queen  fell  upon  her  knees,  and  besought  the  King  to  give 
them  up  to  her.  The  King  replied,  "  I  wish  you  had  been 
somewhere  else ;  but  I  cannot  refuse  you."  So  she  had 
them  properly  dressed,  made  a  feast  for  them,  and  sent 
them  back  with  a  handsome  present,  to  the  great  rejoicing 


156  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

of  the  whole  camp.  I  hope  the  people  of  Calais  loved  the 
daughter  to  whom  she  gave  birth  soon  afterwards,  for  her 
gentle  mother's  sake. 

Now  came  that  terrible  disease,  the  Plague,  into  Europe, 
hurrying  from  the  heart  of  China;  and  killed  the  wretched 
people — especially  the  poor — in  such  enormous  numbers, 
that  one-half  of  the  inhabitants  of  England  are  related  to 
have  died  of  it.  It  killed  the  cattle,  in  great  numbers, 
too ;  and  so  few  working  men  remained  alive,  that  there 
were  not  enough  left  to  till  the  ground. 

After  eight  years  of  differing  and  quarrelling,  the  Prince 
of  Wales  again  invaded  France  with  an  army  of  sixty 
thousand  men.  He  went  through  the  south  of  the  country, 
burning  and  plundering  wheresoever  he  went;  while  his 
father,  who  had  still  the  Scottish  war  upon  his  hands,  did 
the  like  in  Scotland,  but  was  harassed  and  worried  in  his 
retreat  from  that  country  by  the  Scottish  men,  who  repaid 
his  cruelties  with  interest. 

The  French  King,  Philip,  was  now  dead,  and  was  suc- 
ceeded by  his  son  John.  The  Black  Prince,  called  by  that 
name  from  the  colour  of  the  armour  he  wore  to  set  off  his 
fair  complexion,  continuing  to  burn  and  destroy  in  France, 
roused  John  into  determined  opposition ;  and  so  cruel  had 
the  Black  Prince  been  in  his  campaign,  and  so  severely  had 
the  French  peasants  suffered,  that  he  could  not  find  one 
who,  for  love,  or  money,  or  the  fear  of  death,  would  tell 
him  what  the  French  King  was  doing,  or  where  he  was. 
Thus  it  happened  that  he  came  upon  the  French  King's 
forces,  all  of  a  sudden,  near  the  town  of  Poitiers,  and 
found  that  the  whole  neighbouring  country  was  occupied 
by  a  vast  French  army.  "  God  help  us !  "  said  the  Black 
Prince,  "we  must  make  the  best  of  it." 

So,  on  a  Sunday  morning,  the  eighteenth  of  September, 
the  Prince — whose  army  was  now  reduced  to  ten  thousand 
men  in  all — prepared  to  give  battle  to  the  French  King, 
who  had  sixty  thousand  horse  alone.  While  he  was  so 
engaged,  there  came  riding  from  the  French  camp,  a 
Cardinal,  who  had  persuaded  John  to  let  him  offer  terms, 
and  try  to  save  the  shedding  of  Christian  blood.  "  Save 
ray  honour,"  said  the  Prince  to  this  good  priest,  "and 
save  the  honour  of  my  army,  and  I  will  make  any  reason- 
able terms."  He  offered  to  give  up  all  the  towns,  castles, 
and  prisoners,  he  had  taken,  and  to  swear  to  make  no  war 


A  CHILD'S  fflSTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  157 

in  France  for  seven  years;  but,  as  John  would  hear  of 
nothing  but  his  surrender,  with  a  hundred  of  his  chief 
knights,  the  treaty  was  broken  off,  and  the  Prince  said 
quietly — "  God  defend  the  right ;  we  shall  fight  to-morrow." 

Therefore,  on  the  Monday  morning,  at  break  of  day,  the 
two  armies  prepared  for  battle.  The  English  were  posted 
in  a  strong  place,  which  could  only  be  approached  by  one 
narrow  lane,  skirted  by  hedges  on  both  sides.  The  French 
attacked  them  by  this  lane ;  but  were  so  galled  and  slain 
by  English  arrows  from  behind  the  hedges,  that  they  were 
forced  to  retreat.  Then  went  six  hundred  English  bow- 
men round  about,  and,  coming  upon  the  rear  of  the  French 
army,  rained  arrows  on  them  thick  and  fast.  The  French 
knights,  thrown  into  confusion,  quitted  their  banners  and 
dispersed  in  all  directions.  Said  Sir  John  Chandos  to  the 
Prince,  "  Eide  forward,  noble  Prince,  and  the  day  is  yours. 
The  King  of  France  is  so  valiant  a  gentleman,  that  I  know 
he  will  never  fly,  and  may  be  taken  prisoner."  Said  the 
Prince  to  this,  "Advance,  English  banners,  in  the  name 
of  God  and  Saint  George !  "  and  on  they  pressed  until  they 
came  up  with  the  French  King,  fighting  fiercely  with  his 
battle-axe,  and,  when  all  his  nobles  had  forsaken  him,  at- 
tended faithfully  to  the  last  by  his  youngest  son  Philip, 
only  sixteen  years  of  age.  Father  and  son  fought  well, 
and  the  King  had  already  two  wounds  in  his  face,  and  had 
been  beaten  down,  when  he  at  last  delivered  himself  to  a 
banished  French  knight,  and  gave  him  his  right-hand  glove 
in  token  that  he  had  done  so. 

The  Black  Prince  was  generous  as  well  as  brave,  and  he 
invited  his  royal  prisoner  to  supper  in  his  tent,  and  waited 
upon  him  at  table,  and,  when  they  afterwards  rode  into 
London  in  a  gorgeous  procession,  mounted  the  French  King 
on  a  fine  cream-coloured  horse,  and  rode  at  his  side  on  a 
little  pony.  This  was  all  very  kind,  but  I  think  it  was, 
perhaps,  a  little  theatrical  too,  and  has  been  made  more 
meritorious  than  it  deserved  to  be ;  especially  as  I  am  in- 
clined to  think  that  the  greatest  kindness  to  the  King  of 
France  would  have  been  not  to  have  shown  him  to  the  peo- 
ple at  all.  However,  it  must  be  said,  for  these  acts  of 
politeness,  that,  in  course  of  time,  they  did  much  to  soften 
the  horrors  of  war  and  the  passions  of  conquerors.  It  was 
a  long,  long  time  before  the  common  soldiers  began  to  have 
the  benefit  of  such  courtly  deeds ;  but  they  did  at  last ;  and 


158  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

thus  it  is  possible  that  a  poor  soldier  who  asked  for  quarter 
at  the  battle  of  Waterloo,  or  any  other  such  great  fight,  may 
have  owed  his  life  indirectly  to  Edward  the  Black  Prince. 

At  this  time  there  stood  in  the  Strand,  in  London,  a  pal- 
ace called  the  Savoy,  which  was  given  up  to  the  captive 
King  of  France  and  his  son  for  their  residence.  As  the 
King  of  Scotland  had  now  been  King  Edward's  captive  for 
eleven  years  too,  his  success  was,  at  this  time,  tolerably 
complete.  The  Scottish  business  was  settled  by  the  pris- 
oner being  released  under  the  title  of  Sir  David,  King  of 
Scotland,  and  by  his  engaging  to  pay  a  large  ransom.  The 
state  of  France  encouraged  England  to  propose  harder 
terms  to  that  country,  where  the  people  rose  against  the 
unspeakable  cruelty  and  barbarity  of  its  nobles ;  where  the 
nobles  rose  in  turn  against  the  people;  where  the  most 
frightful  outrages  were  committed  on  all  sides ;  and  where 
the  insurrection  of  the  peasants,  called  the  insurrection  of 
the  Jacquerie,  from  Jacques,  a  common  Christian  name 
among  the  country  people  of  France,  awakened  terrors  and 
hatreds  that  have  scarcely  yet  passed  away.  A  treaty 
called  the  Great  Peace,  was  at  last  signed,  under  which 
King  Edward  agreed  to  give  up  the  greater  part  of  his  con- 
quests, and  King  John  to  pay,  within  six  years,  a  ransom 
of  three  million  crowns  of  gold.  He  was  so  beset  by  his 
own  nobles  and  courtiers  for  having  yielded  to  these  con- 
ditions— though  they  could  help  him  to  no  better — that  he 
came  back  of  his  own  will  to  his  old  palace-prison  of  the 
Savoy,  and  there  died. 

There  was  a  Sovereign  of  Castile  at  that  time,  called 
Pedro  the  Cruel,  who  deserved  the  name  remarkably 
well:  having  committed,  among  other  cruelties,  a  variety 
of  murders.  This  amiable  monarch,  being  driven  from  his 
throne  for  his  crimes,  went  to  the  province  of  Bordeaux, 
where  the  Black  Prince — now  married  to  his  cousin  Joan, 
a  pretty  widow — was  residing,  and  besought  his  help. 
The  Prince,  who  took  to  him  much  more  kindly  than  a 
prince  of  such  fame  ought  to  have  taken  to  such  a  ruffian, 
readily  listened  to  his  fair  promises,  and  agreeing  to  help 
him,  sent  secret  orders  to  some  troublesome  disbanded  sol- 
diers of  his  and  his  father's,  who  called  themselves  the 
Free  Companions,  and  who  had  been  a  pest  to  the  French 
people,  for  some  time,  to  aid  this  Pedro.  The  Prince, 
himself,  going  into  Spain  to  head  the  army  of  relief,  soon 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  159 

set  Pedro  on  his  throne  again — where  he  no  sooner  found 
himself,  than,  of  course,  he  behaved  like  the  villain  he 
was,  broke  his  word  without  the  least  shame,  and  aban- 
doned all  the  promises  he  had  made  to  the  Black  Prince. 

Now,  it  had  cost  the  Prince  a  good  deal  of  money  to  pay 
soldiers  to  support  this  murderous  King;  and  finding 
himself,  when  he  came  back  disgusted  to  Bordeaux,  not 
only  in  bad  health,  but  deeply  in  debt,  he  began  to  tax  his 
French  subjects  to  pay  his  creditors.  They  appealed  to 
the  French  King,  Charles  ;  war  again  broke  out ;  and  the 
French  town  of  Limoges,  which  the  Prince  had  greatly 
benefited,  went  over  to  the  French  King.  Upon  this  he 
ravaged  the  province  of  which  it  was  the  capital ;  burnt, 
and  plundered,  and  killed  in  the  old  sickening  way ;  and 
refused  mercy  to  the  prisoners,  men,  women,  and  children 
taken  in  the  offending  town,  though  he  was  so  ill  and  so 
much  in  need  of  pity  himself  from  Heaven,  that  he  was 
carried  in  a  litter.  He  lived  to  come  home  and  make  him- 
self popular  with  the  people  and  Parliament,  and  he  died 
on  Trinity  Sunday,  the  eighth  of  June,  one  thousand  three 
hundred  and  seventy-six,  at  forty-six  years  old. 

The  whole  nation  mourned  for  him  as  one  of  the  most 
renowned  and  beloved  princes  it  had  ever  had;  and  he  was 
buried  with  great  lamentations  in  Canterbury  Cathedral. 
Near  to  the  tomb  of  Edward  the  Confessor,  his  monument, 
with  his  figure,  carved  in  stone,  and  represented  in  the  old 
black  armour,  lying  on  its  back,  may  be  seen  at  this  day, 
with  an  ancient  coat  of  mail,  a  helmet,  and  a  pair  of  gaunt- 
lets hanging  from  a  beam  above  it,  which  most  people  like 
to  believe  were  once  worn  by  the  Black  Prince. 

King  Edward  did  not  outlive  his  renowned  son,  long. 
He  was  old,  and  one  Alice  Perrers,  a  beautiful  lady,  had 
contrived  to  make  him  so  fond  of  her  in  his  old  age,  that 
he  could  refuse  her  nothing,  and  made  himself  ridiculous. 
She  little  deserved  his  love,  or — what  I  dare  say  she  valued 
a  great  deal  more — the  jewels  of  the  late  Queen,  which  he 
gave  her  among  other  rich  presents.  She  took  the  very 
ring  from  his  finger  on  the  morning  of  the  day  when  he 
died,  and  left  him  to  be  pillaged  by  his  faithless  servants. 
Only  one  good  priest  was  true  to  him,  and  attended  him  to 
the  last. 

Besides  being  famous  for  the  great  victories  I  have  re- 
lated, the  reign  of  King  Edward  the  Third  was  rendered 


160  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

memorable  in  better  ways,  by  the  growth  of  architecture 
and  the  erection  of  Windsor  Castle.  In  better  ways  still, 
by  the  rising  up  of  Wickliffe,  originally  a  poor  parish 
priest :  who  devoted  himself  to  exposing,  with  wonderful 
power  and  success,  the  ambition  and  corruption  of  the  Pope, 
and  of  the  whole  church  of  which  he  was  the  head. 

Some  of  those  Flemings  were  induced  to  come  to  Eng- 
land in  this  reign  too,  and  to  settle  in  Norfolk,  where  they 
made  better  woollen  cloths  than  the  English  had  ever  had 
before.  The  Order  of  the  Garter  (a  very  fine  thing  in  its 
way,  but  hardly  so  important  as  good  clothes  for  the  na- 
tion) also  dates  from  this  period.  The  King  is  said  to 
have  picked  up  a  lady's  garter  at  a  ball,  and  to  have  said, 
Honi  soit  qui  mal  y pense — in  English,  "Evil  be  to  him 
who  evil  thinks  of  it."  The  courtiers  were  usually  glad  to 
imitate  what  the  King  said  or  did,  and  hence  from  a  slight 
incident  the  Order  of  the  Garter  was  instituted,  and  became 
a  great  dignity.     So  the  story  goes. 


CHAPTER    XIX. 

ENGLAND   UNDER  RICHARD  THE  SECOND. 

Richard,  son  of  the  Black  Prince,  a  boy  eleven  years  of 
age,  succeeded  to  the  Crown  under  the  title  of  King  Rich- 
ard the  Second.  The  whole  English  nation  were  ready  to 
admire  him  for  the  sake  of  his  brave  father.  As  to  the 
lords  and  ladies  about  the  Court,  they  declared  him  to  be 
the  most  beautiful,  the  wisest,  and  the  best — even  of 
princes — whom  the  lords  and  ladies  about  the  Court  gener- 
ally declare  to  be  the  most  beautiful,  the  wisest,  and  the 
best  of  mankind.  To  flatter  a  poor  boy  in  this  base  man- 
ner was  not  a  very  likely  way  to  develop  whatever  good  was 
in  him;  and  it  brought  him  to  anything  but  a  good  or 
happy  end. 

The  Duke  of  Lancaster,  the  young  King's  uncle — com- 
monly called  John  of  Gaunt,  from  having  been  born  at 
Ghent,  which  the  common  people  so  pronounced — was  sup- 
posed to  have  some  thoughts  of  the  throne  himself ;  but,  as 
he  was  not  popular,  and  the  memory  of  the  Black  Prince 
was,  he  submitted  to  his  nephew. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  161 

The  war  with  France  being  still  unsettled,  the  Govern- 
ment of  England  wanted  money  to  provide  for  the  expenses 
that  might  arise  out  of  it ;  accordingly  a  certain  tax,  called 
the  Poll-tax,  which  had  originated  in  the  last  reign,  was 
ordered  to  be  levied  on  the  people.  This  was  a  tax  on 
every  person  in  the  kingdom,  male  and  female,  above  the 
age  of  fourteen,  of  three  groats  (or  three  fourpenny  pieces) 
a  year ;  clergymen  were  charged  more,  and  only  beggars 
were  exempt. 

I  have  no  need  to  repeat  that  the  common  people  of  Eng- 
land had  long  been  suffering  under  great  oppression.  They 
were  still  the  mere  slaves  of  the  lords  of  the  land  on  which 
they  lived,  and  were  on  most  occasions  harshly  and  unjustly 
treated.  But,  they  had  begun  by  this  time  to  think  very 
seriously  of  not  bearing  quite  so  much;  and,  probably, 
were  emboldened  by  that  French  insurrection  I  mentioned 
in  the  last  chapter. 

The  people  of  Essex  rose  against  the  Poll-tax,  and  being 
severely  handled  by  the  government  officers,  killed  some  of 
them.  At  this  very  time  one  of  the  tax-collectors,  going 
his  rounds  from  house  to  house,  at  Dartford  in  Kent  came 
to  the  cottage  of  one  Wat,  a  tiler  by  trade,  and  claimed  the 
tax  upon  his  daughter.  Her  mother,  who  was  at  home, 
declared  that  she  was  under  the  age  of  fourteen ;  upon  that, 
the  collector  (as  other  collectors  had  already  done  in  dif- 
ferent parts  of  England)  behaved  in  a  savage  way,  and 
brutally  insulted  Wat  Tyler's  daughter.  The  daughter 
screamed,  the  mother  screamed.  Wat  the  Tiler,  who  was 
at  work  not  far  off,  ran  to  the  spot,  and  did  what  any  hon- 
est father  under  such  provocation  might  have  done — struck 
the  collector  dead  at  a  blow. 

Instantly  the  people  of  that  town  uprose  as  one  man. 
They  made  Wat  Tyler  their  leader;  they  joined  with  the 
people  of  Essex,  who  were  in  arms  under  a  priest  called 
Jack  Straw  ;  they  took  out  of  prison  another  priest  named 
John  Ball  ;  and  gathering  in  numbers  as  they  went  along, 
advanced,  in  a  great  confused  army  of  poor  men,  to  Black- 
heath.  It  is  said  that  they  wanted  to  abolish  all  property, 
and  to  declare  all  men  equal.  I  do  not  think  this  very 
likely ;  because  they  stopped  the  travellers  on  the  roads 
and  made  them  swear  to  be  true  to  King  Richard  and  the 
people.  Nor  were  they  at  all  disposed  to  injure  those 
who  had  done  them  no  harm,  merely  because  they  were 


162  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

of  high  station ;  for,  the  King's  mother,  who  had  to  pass 
through  their  camp  at  Blackheath,  on  her  way  to  her  young 
son,  lying  for  safety  in  the  Tower  of  London,  had  merely 
to  kiss  a  few  dirty-faced  rough-bearded  men  who  were 
noisily  fond  of  royalty,  and  so  got  away  in  perfect  safety. 
Next  day  the  whole  mass  marched  on  to  London  Bridge. 

There  was  a  drawbridge  in  the  middle,  which  William 
Walworth  the  Mayor  caused  to  be  raised  to  prevent  their 
coming  into  the  city ;  but  they  soon  terrified  the  citizens 
into  lowering  it  again,  and  spread  themselves,  with  great 
uproar,  over  the  streets.  They  broke  open  the  prisons; 
they  burned  the  papers  in  Lambeth  Palace ;  they  destroyed 
the  Duke  of  Lancaster's  Palace,  the  Savoy,  in  the 
Strand,  said  to  be  the  most  beautiful  and  splendid  in  Eng- 
land ;  they  set  fire  to  the  books  and  documents  in  the  Tem- 
ple ;  and  made  a  great  riot.  Many  of.  these  outrages  were 
committed  in  drunkenness;  since  those  citizens,  who  had 
well-filled  cellars,  were  only  too  glad  to  throw  them  open 
to  save  the  rest  of  their  property ;  but  even  the  drunken 
rioters  were  very  careful  to  steal  nothing.  They  were  so 
angry  with  one  man,  who  was  seen  to  take  a  silver  cup  at 
the  Savoy  Palace,  and  put  it  in  his  breast,  that  they 
drowned  him  in  the  river,  cup  and  all. 

The  young  King  had  been  taken  out  to  treat  with  them 
before  they  committed  these  excesses ;  but,  he  and  the  peo- 
ple about  him  were  so  frightened  by  the  riotous  shouts, 
that  they  got  back  to  the  Tower  in  the  best  way  they  could. 
This  made  the  insurgents  bolder ;  so  they  went  on  rioting 
away,  striking  off  the  heads  of  those  who  did  not,  at  a  mo- 
ment's notice,  declare  for  King  Richard  and  the  people; 
and  killing  as  many  of  the  unpopular  persons  whom  they 
supposed  to  be  their  enemies  as  they  could  by  any  means 
lay  hold  of.  In  this  manner  they  passed  one  very  violent 
day,  and  then  proclamation  was  made  that  the  King  would 
meet  them  at  Mile-end,  and  grant  their  requests. 

The  rioters  went  to  Mile-end  to  the  number  of  sixty 
thousand,  and  the  King  met  them  there,  and  to  the  King 
the  rioters  peaceably  proposed  four  conditions.  First,  that 
neither  they,  nor  their  children,  nor  any  coming  after  them, 
should  be  made  slaves  any  more.  Secondly,  that  the  rent 
of  land  should  be  fixed  at  a  certain  price  in  money,  instead 
of  being  paid  in  service.  Thirdly,  that  they  should  have 
liberty  to  buy  and  sell  in  all  markets  and  public  places, 


•a  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  163 

like  other  free  men.  Fourthly,  that  they  should  be  par- 
doned for  past  offences.  Heaven  knows,  there  was  nothing 
very  unreasonable  in  these  proposals!  The  young  King 
deceitfully  pretended  to  think  so,  and  kept  thirty  clerks 
up,  all  night,  writing  out  a  charter  accordingly. 

Now,  Wat  Tyler  himself  wanted  more  than  this.  He 
wanted  the  entire  abolition  of  the  forest  laws.  He  was 
not  at  Mile-end  with  the  rest,  but,  while  that  meeting  was 
being  held,  broke  into  the  Tower  of  London  and  slew  the 
archbishop  and  the  treasurer,  for  whose  heads  the  people 
had  cried  out  loudly  the  day  before.  He  and  his  men  even 
thrust  their  swords  into  the  bed  of  the  Princess  of  Wales 
while  the  Princess  was  in  it,  to  make  certain  that  none  of 
their  enemies  were  concealed  there. 

So,  Wat  and  his  men  still  continued  armed,  and  rode 
about  the  city.  Next  morning,  the  King  with  a  small  train 
of  some  sixty  gentlemen — among  whom  was  Walworth 
the  Mayor — rode  into  Smithfield,  and  saw  Wat  and  his 
people  at  a  little  distance.  Says  Wat  to  his  men,  "  There 
is  the  King.  I  will  go  speak  with  him,  and  tell  him  what 
we  want." 

Straightway  Wat  rode  up  to  him,  and  began  to  talk. 
"King,"  says  Wat,  "  dost  thou  see  all  my  men  there?  " 

"  Ah,"  says  the  King.     "  Why?  " 

"Because,"  says  Wat,  "they  are  all  at  my  command, 
and  have  sworn  to  do  whatever  I  bid  them. " 

Some  declared  afterwards  that  as  Wat  said  this,  he  laid 
his  hand  on  the  King's  bridle.  Others  declared  that  he 
was  seen  to  play  with  his  own  dagger.  I  think,  myself, 
that  he  just  spoke  to  the  King  like  a  rough,  angry  man  as 
he  was,  and  did  nothing  more.  At  any  rate  he  was  ex- 
pecting no  attack,  and  preparing  for  no  resistance,  when 
Walworth  the  Mayor  did  the  not  very  valiant  deed  of 
drawing  a  short  sword  and  stabbing  him  in  the  throat.  He 
dropped  from  his  horse,  and  one  of  the  King's  people 
speedily  finished  him.  So  fell  Wat  Tyler.  Fawners  and 
flatterers  made  a  mighty  triumph  of  it,  and  set  up  a  cry 
which  will  occasionally  find  an  echo  to  this  day.  But  Wat 
was  a  hard-working  man,  who  had  suffered  much,  and  had 
been  foully  outraged ;  and  it  is  probable  that  he  was  a  man 
of  a  much  higher  nature  and  a  much  braver  spirit  than  any 
of  the  parasites  who  exulted  then,  or  have  exulted  since, 
over  his  defeat. 


164  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.' 

Seeing  Wat  down,  his  men  immediately  bent  their  bows 
to  avenge  his  fall.  If  the  young  King  had  not  had  pres- 
ence of  mind  at  that  dangerous  moment,  both  he  and  the 
Mayor  to  boot  might  have  followed  Tyler  pretty  fast.  But 
the  King  riding  up  to  the  crowd,  cried  out  that  Tyler  was 
a  traitor,  and  that  he  would  be  their  leader.  They  were 
so  taken  by  surprise,  that  they  set  up  a  great  shouting,  and 
followed  the  boy  until  he  was  met  at  Islington  by  a  large 
body  of  soldiers. 

The  end  of  this  rising  was  the  then  usual  end.  As  soon 
as  the  King  found  himself  safe,  he  unsaid  all  he  had  said, 
and  undid  all  he  had  done ;  some  fifteen  hundred  of  the 
rioters  were  tried  (mostly  in  Essex)  with  great  rigour,  and 
executed  with  great  cruelty.  Many  of  them  were  hanged 
on  gibbets,  and  left  there  as  a  terror  to  the  country  people ; 
and,  because  their  miserable  friends  took  some  of  the  bod- 
ies down  to  bury,  the  King  ordered  the  rest  to  be  chained 
up — which  was  the  beginning  of  the  barbarous  custom  of 
hanging  in  chains.  The  King's  falsehood  in  this  business 
makes  such  a  pitiful  figure,  that  I  think  Wat  Tyler  appears 
in  history  as  beyond  comparison  the  truer  and  more  respect- 
able man  of  the  two. 

Richard  was  now  sixteen  years  of  age,  and  married  Anne 
of  Bohemia,  an  excellent  princess,  who  was  called  "  the  good 
Queen  Anne."  She  deserved  a  better  husband;  for  the 
King  had  been  fawned  and  flattered  into  a  treacherous, 
wasteful,  dissolute,  bad  young  man. 

There  were  two  Popes  at  this  time  (as  if  one  were  not 
enough!),  and  their  quarrels  involved  Europe  in  a  great 
deal  of  trouble.  Scotland  was  still  troublesome  too ;  and 
at  home  there  was  much  jealousy  and  distrust,  and  plotting 
and  counter-plotting,  because  the  King  feared  the  ambition 
of  his  relations,  and  particularly  of  his  uncle,  the  Duke  of 
Lancaster,  and  the  duke  had  his  party  against  the  King, 
and  the  King  liad  his  party  against  the  duke.  Nor  were 
these  home  troubles  lessened  when  the  duke  went  to  Cas- 
tile to  urge  his  claim  to  the  crown  of  that  kingdom ;  for 
then  the  Duke  of  Gloucester,  another  of  Richard's  uncles, 
opposed  him,  and  influenced  the  Parliament  to  demand  the 
dismissal  of  the  King's  favourite  ministers.  The  King 
said  in  reply,  that  he  would  not  for  such  men  dismiss  the 
meanest  servant  in  his  kitchen.  But,  it  had  begun  to  sig- 
nify little  what  a  King  said  when  a  Parliament  was  deter- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  165 

mined ;  so  Richard  was  at  last  obliged  to  give  way,  and  to 
agree  to  another  Government  of  the  kingdom,  under  a 
commission  of  fourteen  nobles,  for  a  year.  His  uncle  of 
Gloucester  was  at  the  head  of  this  commission,  and,  i;;  fact, 
appointed  everybody  composing  it. 

Having  done  all  this,  the  King  declared  as  soon  as  he 
saw  an  opportunity  that  he  had  never  meant  to  do  it,  and 
that  it  was  all  illegal ;  and  he  got  the  judges  secretly  to 
sign  a  declaration  to  that  effect.  The  secret  oozed  out 
directly,  and  was  carried  to  the  Duke  of  Gloucester.  The 
Duke  of  Gloucester,  at  the  head  of  forty  thousand  men, 
met  the  King  on  his  entering  into  London  to  enforce  his 
authority ;  the  King  was  helpless  against  him ;  his  favour- 
ites and  ministers  were  impeached  and  were  mercilessly 
executed.  Among  them  were  two  men  whom  the  people 
regarded  with  very  different  feelings ;  one,  Robert  Tresilian, 
Chief  Justice,  who  was  hated  for  having  made  what  was 
called  "  the  bloody  circuit "  to  try  the  rioters ;  the  other. 
Sir  Simon  Burley,  an  honourable  knight,  who  had  been  the 
dear  friend  of  the  Black  Prince,  and  the  governor  and 
guardian  of  the  King.  For  this  gentleman's  life  the  good 
Queen  even  begged  of  Gloucester  on  her  knees ;  but  Glouces- 
ter (with  or  without  reason)  feared  and  hated  him,  and 
replied,  that  if  she  valued  her  husband's  crown,  she  had 
better  beg  no  more.  All  this  was  done  under  what  was 
called  by  some  the  wonderful — and  by  others,  with  better 
reason,  the  merciless — Parliament. 

But  Gloucester's  power  was  not  to  last  for  ever.  He 
held  it  for  only  a  year  longer ;  in  which  year  the  famous 
battle  of  Otterbourne,  sung  in  the  old  ballad  of  Chevy 
Chase,  was  fought.  When  the  year  was  out,  the  King, 
turning  suddenly  to  Gloucester,  in  the  midst  of  a  great 
council  said,  "  Uncle,  how  old  am  I?  "  "  Your  highness," 
returned  the  duke,  "  is  in  your  twenty-second  year."  "  Am 
I  so  much?  "  said  the  King,  "then  I  will  manage  my  own 
affairs !  I  am  much  obliged  to  you,  my  good  lords,  for  your 
past  services,  but  I  need  them  no  more."  He  followed 
this  up,  by  appointing  a  new  Chancellor  and  a  new  Treas- 
urer, and  announced  to  the  people  that  he  had  resumed  the 
Government.  He  held  it  for  eight  years  without  opposi- 
tion. Through  all  that  time,  he  kept  his  determination 
to  revenge  himself  some  day  upon  his  uncle  Gloucester,  in 
his  own  breast. 


166  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

At  last  the  good  Queen  died,  and  then  the  King,  desir- 
ing to  take  a  second  wife,  proposed  to  his  council  that  he 
should  marry  Isabella,  of  France,  the  daughter  of  Charles 
the  Sixth :  who,  the  French  courtiers  said  (as  the  English 
courtiers  had  said  of  Richard),  was  a  marvel  of  beauty  and 
wit,  and  quite  a  phenomenon— of  seven  years  old.  The 
council  were  divided  about  this  marriage,  but  it  took  place. 
It  secured  peace  between  England  and  France  for  a  quarter 
of  a  century ;  but  it  was  strongly  opposed  to  the  prejudices 
of  the  English  people.  The  Duke  of  Gloucester,  who  was 
anxious  to  take  the  occasion  of  making  himself  popular, 
declaimed  against  it  loudly,  and  this  at  length  decided  the  . 
King  to  execute  the  vengeance  he  had  been  nursing  so 
long. 

He  went  with  a  gay  company  to  the  Duke  of  Glouces- 
ter's house,  Pleshey  Castle,  in  Essex,  where  the  duke,  sus- 
pecting nothing,  came  out  into  the  courtyard  to  receive  his 
royal  visitor.  While  the  King  conversed  in  a  friendly 
manner  with  the  duchess,  the  duke  was  quietly  seized, 
hurried  away,  shipped  for  Calais,  and  lodged  in  the  castle 
there.  His  friends,  the  Earls  of  Arundel  and  Warwick, 
were  taken  in  the  same  treacherous  manner,  and  confined 
to  their  castles.  A  few  days  after,  at  Nottingham,  they 
were  impeached  of  high  treason.  The  Earl  of  Arundel  was 
condemned  and  beheaded,  and  the  Earl  of  Warwick  was 
banished.  Then,  a  writ  was  sent  by  a  messenger  to  the 
Governor  of  Calais,  requiring  him  to  send  the  Duke  of 
Gloucester  over  to  be  tried.  In  three  days  he  returned  an 
answer  that  he  could  not  do  that,  because  the  Duke  of 
Gloucester  had  died  in  prison.  The  duke  was  declared  a 
traitor,  his  property  was  confiscated  to  the  King,  a  real  or 
pretended  confession  he  had  made  in  prison  to  ■  one  of  the 
Justices  of  the  Common  Pleas  was  produced  against  him, 
and  there  was  an  end  of  the  matter.  How  the  unfortunate 
duke  died,  very  few  cared  to  know.  W^hether  he  really 
died  naturally ;  whether  he  killed  himself ;  whether,  by  the 
King's  order,  he  was  strangled,  or  smothered  between  two 
beds  (as  a  serving-man  of  the  Governor's  named  Hall,  did 
afterwards  declare),  cannot  be  discovered.  There  is  not 
much  doubt  that  he  was  killed,  somehow  or  other,  by  his 
nephew's  orders.  Among  the  most  active  nobles  in  these 
proceedings  were  the  King's  cousin,  Henry  Bolingbroke, 
whom  the  King  had  made  Duke  of  Hereford  to  smooth 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  167 

down  the  old  family  quarrels,  and  some  others :  who  had 
in  the  family-plotting  times  done  just  such  acts  themselves 
as  they  now  condemned  in  the  duke.  They  seem  to  have 
been  a  corrupt  set  of  men ;  but  such  men  were  easily  found 
about  the  court  in  such  days. 

The  people  murmured  at  all  this,  and  were  still  very 
sore  about  the  French  marriage.  The  nobles  saw  how  little 
the  King  cared  for  law,  and  how  crafty  he  was,  and  began 
to  be  somewhat  afraid  of  themselves.  The  King's  life  was 
a  life  of  continued  feasting  and  excess ;  his  retinue,  down 
to  the  meanest  servants,  were  dressed  in  the  most  costly 
manner,  and  caroused  at  his  tables,  it  is  related,  to  the 
number  of  ten  thousand  persons  every  day.  He  himself, 
surrounded  by  a  body  of  ten  thousand  archers,  and  enriched 
by  a  duty  on  wool  which  the  Commons  had  granted  him  for 
life,  saw  no  danger  of  ever  being  otherwise  than  powerful 
and  absolute,  and  was  as  fierce  and  haughty  as  a  King 
could  be. 

He  had  two  of  his  old  enemies  left,  in  the  persons  of  the 
Dukes  of  Hereford  and  Norfolk,  Sparing  these  no  more 
than  the  others,  he  tampered  with  the  Duke  of  Hereford 
until  he  got  him  to  declare  before  the  Council  that  the  Duke 
of  Norfolk  had  lately  held  some  treasonable  talk  with  him, 
as  he  was  riding  near  Brentford ;  and  that  he  had  told  him, 
among  other  things,  that  he  could  not  believe  the  King's 
oath — which  nobody  could,  I  should  think.  For  this 
treachery  he  obtained  a  pardon,  and  the  Duke  of  Norfolk 
was  summoned  to  appear  and  defend  himself.  As  he  de- 
nied the  charge  and  said  his  accuser  was  a  liar  and  a  traitor, 
both  noblemen,  according  to  the  manner  of  those  times, 
were  held  in  custody,  and  the  truth  was  ordered  to  be  de- 
cided by  wager  of  battle  at  Coventry.  This  wager  of  bat- 
tle meant  that  whosoever  won  the  combat  was  to  be  con- 
sidered in  the  right ;  which  nonsense  meant  in  effect,  that 
no  strong  man  could  ever  be  wrong.  A  great  holiday  was 
made;  a  great  crowd  assembled,  with  much  parade  and 
show ;  and  the  two  combatants  were  about  to  rush  at  each 
other  with  their  lances,  when  the  King,  sitting  in  a  pavil- 
ion to  see  fair,  threw  down  the  truncheon  he  carried  in  his 
hand,  and  forbade  the  battle.  The  Duke  of  Hereford  was 
to  be  banished  for  ten  years,  and  the  Duke  of  Norfolk  was 
to  be  banished  for  life.  So  said  the  King.  The  Duke  of 
Hereford  went  to  France,  and  went  no  farther.     The  Duke 


168  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

of  Norfolk  made  a  pilgrimage  to  the  Holy  Land,  and  after- 
wards died  at  Venice  of  a  broken  heart. 

Faster  and  fiercer,  after  this,  the  King  went  on  in  his 
career.  The  Duke  of  Lancaster,  who  was  the  father  of  the 
Duke  of  Hereford,  died  soon  after  the  departure  of  his 
son ;  and,  the  King,  although  he  had  solemnly  gfanted  to 
that  son  leave  to  inherit  his  father's  property,  if  it  should 
come  to  him  during  his  banishment,  immediately  seized  it 
all,  like  a  robber.  The  judges  were  so  afraid  of  him,  that 
they  disgraced  themselves  by  declaring  this  theft  to  be  just 
and  lawful.  His  avarice  knew  no  bounds.  He  outlawed 
seventeen  counties  at  once,  on  a  frivolous  pretence,  merely 
to  raise  money  by  way  of  fines  for  misconduct.  In  short, 
he  did  as  many  dishonest  things  as  he  could ;  and  cared  so 
little  for  the  discontent  of  his  subjects — though  even  the 
spaniel  favourites  began  to  whisper  to  him  that  there  was 
such  a  thing  as  discontent  afloat— that  he  took  that  time, 
of  all  others,  for  leaving  England  and  making  an  expedi- 
tion against  the  Irish. 

He  was  scarcely  gone,  leaving  the  Duke  of  York  Re- 
gent in  his  absence,  when  his  cousin,  Henry  of  Hereford, 
came  over  from  France  to  claim  the  riglits  of  which  he  had 
been  so  monstrously  deprived.  He  was  immediately  joined 
by  the  two  great  Earls  of  Northumberland  and  Westmore- 
land; and  his  uncle,  the  Regent,  finding  the  King's  cause 
unpopular,  and  the  disinclination  of  the  aruiy  to  act  against 
Henry,  very  strong,  withdrew  with  the  royal  forces  towards 
Bristol.  Henry,  at  the  head  of  an  army,  came  from  York- 
shire (where  he  had  landed)  to  London  and  followed  him. 
They  joined  their  forces — how  they  brought  that  about,  is 
not  distinctly  understood — and  proceeded  to  Bristol  Castle, 
whither  three  noblemen  had  taken  the  young  Queen.  The 
castle  surrendering,  they  presently  put  those  three  noble- 
men to  death.  The  Regent  then  remained  there,  and 
Henry  went  on  to  Chester. 

All  this  time,  the  boisterous  weather  had  prevented  the 
King  from  receiving  intelligence  of  what  had  occurred. 
At  length  it  was  conveyed  to  him  in  Ireland,  and  he  sent 
over  the  Earl  of  Salisbury,  who,  landing  at  Conway, 
rallied  the  Welshmen,  and  waited  for  the  King  a  whole 
fortnight;  at  the  end  of  that  time  the  Welshmen,  who  were 
perhaps  not  very  warm  for  him  in  the  beginning,  quite 
cooled  down  and  went  home.     When  the  King  did  land 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  169 

on  the  coast  at  last,  he  came  with  a  pretty  good  power,  but 
his  men  cared  nothing  for  him,  and  quickly  deserted. 
Supposing  the  Welshmen  to  be  still  at  Conway,  he  disguised 
himself  as  a  priest,  and  made  for  that  place  in  company  with 
his  two  brothers  and  some  few  of  their  adherents.  But, 
there  were  no  Welshmen  left — only  Salisbury  and  a  hun- 
dred soldiers.  In  this  distress,  the  King's  two  brothers, 
Exeter  and  Surrey,  offered  to  go  to  Henry  to  learn  what 
his  intentions  were.  Surrey,  who  was  true  to  Richard,  was 
put  into  prison.  Exeter,  who  was  false,  took  the  royal 
badge,  which  was  a  hart,  off  his  shield,  and  assumed  the 
rose,  the  badge  of  Henry.  After  this,  it  was  pretty  plain 
to  the  King  what  Henry's  intentions  were,  without  send- 
ing any  more  messengers  to  ask. 

The  fallen  King,  thus  deserted — hemmed  in  on  all  sides, 
and  pressed  with  hunger — rode  here  and  rode  there,  and 
went  to  this  castle,  and  went  to  that  castle,  endeavouring 
to  obtain  some  provisions,  but  could  find  none.  He  rode 
wretchedly  back  to  Conway,  and  there  surrendered  himself 
to  the  Earl  of  Northumberland,  who  came  from  Henry,  in 
reality  to  take  him  prisoner,  but  in  appearance  to  offer 
terms ;  and  whose  men  were  hidden  not  far  off.  By  this 
earl  he  was  conducted  to  the  castle  of  Flint,  where  his 
cousin  Henry  met  him,  and  dropped  on  his  knee  as  if  he 
were  still  respectful  to  his  sovereign. 

"Fair  cousin  of  Lancaster,"  said  the  King,  "you  are 
very  welcome"  (very  welcome,  no  doubt;  but  he  would 
liave  been  more  so,  in  chains  or  without  a  head). 

"  My  lord,"  replied  Henry,  "  1  am  come  a  little  before 
my  time ;  but,  with  your  good  pleasure,  I  will  show  you 
the  reason.  Your  people  complain  with  some  bitterness, 
that  you  have  ruled  them  rigorously  for  two-and-twenty 
years.  Noav,  if  it  please  God,  I  will  help  you  to  govern 
them  better  in  future." 

"  Fair  cousin,"  replied  the  abject  King,  "  since  it  pleas- 
eth  you,  it  pleaseth  me  mightily." 

After  this,  the  trumpets  sounded,  and  the  King  was 
stuck  on  a  wretched  horse,  and  carried  prisoner  to  Chester, 
where  he  was  made  to  issue  a  proclamation,  calling  a  Par- 
liament. From  Chester  he  was  taken  on  towards  London. 
At  Lichfield  he  tried  to  escape  by  getting  out  of  a 
window  and  letting  himself  down  into  a  garden;  it  was 
all  in  vain,  however,  and  he  was  carried  on  and  shut  up 


170  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

in  the  Tower,  where  no  one  pitied  him,  and  where  the 
whole  people,  whose  patience  he  had  quite  tired  out,  re- 
proached him  without  mercy.  Before  he  got  there,  it  is 
related,  that  his  very  dog  left  him  and  departed  from  his 
side  to  lick  the  hand  of  Henry. 

The  day  before  the  Parliament  met,  a  deputation  went  to 
this  wrecked  King,  and  told  him  that  he  had  promised  the 
Earl  of  Northumberland  at  Conway  Castle  to  resign  the 
crown.  He  said  he  was  quite  ready  to  do  it,  and  signed  a 
paper  in  which  he  renounced  his  authority  and  absolved  his 
people  from  their  allegiance  to  him.  He  had  so  little 
spirit  left  that  he  gave  his  royal  ring  to  his  triumphant 
cousin  Henry  with  his  own  hand,  and  said,  that  if  he  could 
have  had  leave  to  appoint  a  successor,  that  same  Henry 
was  the  man  of  all  others  whom  he  would  have  named. 
Next  day,  the  Parliament  assembled  in  Westminster  Hall, 
where  Henry  sat  at  the  side  of  the  throne,  which  was  empty 
and  covered  with  a  cloth  of  gold.  The  paper  just  signed 
by  the  King  was  read  to  the  multitude  amid  shouts  of  joy, 
which  were  echoed  through  all  the  streets ;  when  some  of 
the  noise  had  died  away,  the  King  was  formally  deposed. 
Then  Henry  arose,  and,  making  the  sign  of  the  cross  on 
his  forehead  and  breast,  challenged  the  realm  of  England 
as  his  right;  the  archbishops  of  Canterbury  and  York 
seated  him  on  the  throne. 

The  multitude  shouted  again,  and  the  shouts  re-echoed 
throughout  all  the  streets.  No  one  remembered,  now,  that 
Richard  the  Second  had  ever  been  the  most  beautiful,  the 
wisest,  and  the  best  of  princes;  and  he  now  made  living 
(to  my_ thinking)  a  far  more  sorry  spectacle  in  the  Tower 
of  London,  than  Wat  Tyler  had  made,  lying  dead,  among 
the  hoofs  of  the  royal  horses  in  Smithfield. 

The  Poll-tax  died  with  Wat.  The  Smiths  to  the  King 
and  Royal  Family,  could  make  no  chains  in  which  the 
King  could  hang  the  people's  recollection  of  him;  so  the 
Poll-tax  was  never  collected. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  171 


CHAPTER   XX 

ENGLAND  UNDER  HENRY  THE  FOURTH,  CALLED 
BOLINGBROKE. 

DuBiNO  the  last  reign,  the  preaching  of  Wickliffe  against 
the  pride  and  cunning  of  the  Pope  and  all  his  men,  had 
made  a  great  noise  in  England.  Whether  the  new  King 
wished  to  be  in  favour  with  the  priests,  or  whether  he 
hoped,  by  pretending  to  be  very  religious,  to  cheat  Heaven 
itself  into  the  belief  that  he  was  not  an  usurper,  I  don't 
know.  Both  suppositions  are  likely  enough.  It  is  certain 
that  he  began  his  reign  by  making  a  strong  show  against 
the  followers  of  Wickliffe,  who  were  called  Lollards,  or 
heretics — although  his  father,  John  of  Gaunt,  had  been  of 
that  way  of  thinking,  as  he  himself  had  been  more  than 
suspected  of  being.  It  is  no  less  certain  that  he  first  estab- 
lished in  England  the  detestable  and  atrocious  custom, 
brought  from  abroad,  of  burning  those  people  as  a  punish- 
ment for  their  opinions.  It  was  the  importation  into  Eng- 
land of  one  of  the  practices  of  what  was  called  the  Holy 
Inquisition :  which  was  the  most  unholy  and  the  most  in- 
famous tribunal  that  ever  disgraced  mankind,  and  made  men 
more  like  demons  than  followers  of  Our  Saviour. 

No  real  right  to  the  crown,  as  you  know,  was  in  this 
King.  Edward  Mortimer,  the  young  Earl  of  March — who 
was  only  eight  or  nine  years  old,  and  who  was  descended 
from  the  Duke  of  Clarence,  the  elder  brother  of  Henry's 
father — was,  by  succession,  the  real  heir  to  the  throne. 
However,  the  King  got  his  son  declared  Prince  of  Wales; 
and,  obtaining  possession  of  the  young  Earl  of  March  and 
his  little  brother,  kept  them  in  confinement  (but  not  se- 
verely) in  Windsor  Castle.  He  then  required  the  Parlia- 
ment to  decide  what  was  to  be  done  with  the  deposed  King, 
who  was  quiet  enough,  and  who  only  said  that  he  hoped 
his  cousin  Henry  would  be  "  a  good  lord "  to  him.  The 
Parliament  replied  that  they  would  recommend  his  being 
kept  in  some  secret  place  where  the  people  could  not  resort, 
and  where  his  friends  could  not  be  admitted  to  see  him. 
Henry  accordingly  passed  this  sentence  upon  him,  and.  it 


172  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

now  began  to  be  pretty  clear  to  the  nation  that  Richard 
the  Second  would  not  live  very  long. 

It  was  a  noisy  Parliament,  as  it  was  an  unprincipled  one, 
and  the  Lords  quarrelled  so  violently  among  themselves  as 
to  which  of  them  had  been  loyal  and  which  disloyal,  and 
which  consistent  and  which  inconsistent,  that  forty  gaunt- 
lets are  said  to  have  been  thrown  upon  the  floor  at  one  time 
as  challenges  to  as  many  battles :  the  truth  being  that  they 
were  all  false  and  base  together,  and  had  been,  at  one 
time  with  the  old  King,  and  at  another  time  with  the  new 
one,  and  seldom  true  for  any  length  of  time  to  any  one. 
They  soon  began  to  plot  again.  A  conspiracy  was  formed 
to  invite  the  King  to  a  tournament  at  Oxford,  and  then  to 
take  him  by  surprise  and  kill  him.  This  murderous  enter- 
prise, which  was  agreed  upon  at  secret  meetings  in  the 
house  of  the  Abbot  of  Westminster,  was  betrayed  by  the 
Earl  of  Rutland — one  of  the  conspirators.  The  King,  in- 
stead of  going  to  the  tournament  or  staying  at  Windsor 
(where  the  conspirators  suddenly  went,  on  finding  them- 
selves discovered,  with  the  hope  of  seizing  him),  retired  to 
London,  proclaimed  them  all  traitors,  and  advanced  upon 
them  with  a  great  force.  They  retired  into  the  west  of 
England,  proclaiming  Richard  King;  but,  the  people  rose 
against  them,  and  they  were  all  slain.  Their  treason  hast- 
ened the  death  of  the  deposed  monarch.  Whether  he 
was  killed  by  hired  assassins,  or  whether  he  was  starved 
to  death,  or  whether  he  refused  food  on  hearing  of  his 
brothers  being  killed  (who  were  in  that  plot),  is  very 
doubtful.  He  met  his  death  somehow ;  and  his  body  was 
publicly  shown  at  Saint  Paul's  Cathedral  with  only  the 
lower  part  of  the  face  uncovered.  I  can  scarcely  doubt 
that  he  was  killed  by  the  King's  orders. 

The  French  wife  of  the  miserable  Richard  was  now  only 
ten  years  old;  and,  when  her  father,  Charles  of  France, 
heard  of  her  misfortunes  and  of  her  lonely  condition  in 
England,  he  went  mad :  as  he  had  several  times  done  be- 
fore, during  the  last  five  or  six  years.  The  French  Dukes 
of  Burgundy  and  Bourbon  took  up  the  poor  girl's  cause, 
without  caring  much  about  it,  but  on  the  chance  of  getting 
something  out  of  England.  The  people  of  Bordeaux,  who 
had  a  sort  of  superstitious  attachment  to  the  memory  of 
Richard,  because  he  was  born  there,  swore  by  the  Lord  that 
he  had  been  the  best  man  in  all  his  kingdom — which  was 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  173 

going  rather  far — and  promised  to  do  great  things  against 
the  English.  Nevertheless,  when  they  came  to  consider 
that  they,  and  the  whole  people  of  France,  were  ruined  by 
their  own  nobles,  and  that  the  English  rule  was  much  the 
better  of  the  two,  they  cooled  down  again;  and  the  two 
dukes,  although  they  were  very  great  men,  could  do  noth- 
ing without  them.  Then,  began  negotiations  between 
France  and  England  for  the  sending  home  to  Paris  of  the 
poor  little  Queen  with  all  her  jewels  and  her  fortune  of  two 
hundred  thousand  francs  in  gold.  The  King  was  quite 
willing  to  restore  the  young  lady,  and  even  the  jewels ;  but 
he  said  he  really  could  not  part  with  the  money.  So,  at 
last  she  was  safely  deposited  at  Paris  without  her  fortune, 
and  then  the  Duke  of  Burgundy  (who  was  cousin  to  the 
French  King)  began  to  quarrel  with  the  Duke  of  Orleans 
(who  was  brother  to  the  French  King)  about  the  whole 
matter;  and  those  two  dukes  made  France  even  more 
wretched  than  ever. 

As  the  idea  of  conquering  Scotland  was  still  popular  at 
home,  the  King  marched  to  the  river  Tyne  and  demanded 
homage  of  the  King  of  that  country.  This  being  refused, 
he  advanced  to  Edinburgh,  but  did  little  there;  for,  his 
army  being  in  want  of  provisions,  and  the  Scotch  being 
very  careful  to  hold  him  in  check  without  giving  battle,  he 
was  obliged  to  retire.  It  is  to  his  immortal  honour  that  in 
this  sally  he  burnt  no  villages  and  slaughtered  no  people, 
but  was  particularly  careful  that  his  army  should  be  merciful 
and  harmless.  It  was  a  great  example  in  those  ruthless  times. 

A.  war  among  the  border  people  of  England  and  Scot- 
laud  went  on  for  twelve  months,  and  then  the  Earl  of 
Northumberland,  the  nobleman  who  had  helped  Henry  to 
the  crown,  began  to  rebel  against  him — probably  because 
nothing  that  Henry  could  do  for  him  would  satisfy  his 
extravagant  expectations.  There  was  a  certain  Welsh  gen- 
tleman, named  Owen  Glendower,  who  had  been  a  stu- 
dent in  one  of  the  Inns  of  Court,  and  had  afterwards  been 
in  the  service  of  the  late  King,  whose  Welsh  property  was 
taken  from  him  by  a  powerful  lord  related  to  the  present 
King,  who  was  his  neighbour.  Appealing  for  redress,  and 
getting  none,  he  took  up  arms,  was  made  an  outlaw,  and 
declared  himself  sovereign  of  Wales.  He  pretended  to  be 
a  magician ;  and  not  only  were  the  Welsh  people  stupid 
enough  to  believe  him,  but,  even  Henry  believed  him  too; 


174  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAITD. 

for,  making  three  expeditions  into  Wales,  and  being  three 
times  driven  back  by  the  wildness  of  the  country,  the  bad 
weather,  and  the  skill  of  Glendower,  he  thought  he  was 
defeated  by  the  Welshman's  magic  arts.  However,  he 
took  Lord  Grey  and  Sir  Edmund  Mortimer,  prisoners,  and 
allowed  the  relatives  of  Lord  Grey  to  ransom  him,  but 
would  not  extend  such  favour  to  Sir  Edmund  Mortimer. 
Now,  Henry  Percy,  called  Hotspur,  son  of  the  Earl  of 
Northumberland,  who  was  married  to  Mortimer's  sister,  is 
supposed  to  have  taken  offence  at  this ;  and,  therefore,  in 
conjunction  with  his  father  and  some  others,  to  have 
joined  Owen  Glendower,  and  risen  against  Henry.  It  is 
by  no  means  clear  that  this  was  the  real  cause  of  the  con- 
spiracy; but  perhaps  it  was  made  the  pretext.  It  was 
formed,  and  was  very  powerful ;  including  Scroop,  Arch- 
bishop of  York,  and  the  Earl  of  Douglas,  a  powerful  and 
brave  Scottish  nobleman.  The  King  was  prompt  and  ac- 
tive, and  the  two  armies  met  at  Shrewsbury, 

There  were  about  fourteen  thousand  men  in  each.  The 
old  Earl  of  Northumberland  being  sick,  the  rebel  forces 
were  led  by  his  son.  The  King  wore  plain  armour  to  de- 
ceive the  enemy ;  and  four  noblemen,  with  the  same  object, 
wore  the  royal  arms.  The  rebel  charge  was  so  furious, 
that  every  one  of  those  gentlemen  was  killed,  the  royal 
standard  was  beaten  down,  and  the  young  Prince  of  Wales 
was  severely  wounded  in  the  face.  But  he  was  one  of  the 
bravest  and  best  soldiers  that  ever  lived,  and  he  fought  so 
well,  and  the  King's  troops  were  so  encouraged  by  his  bold 
example,  that  they  rallied  immediately,  and  cut  the  ene- 
my' s  forces  all  to  pieces.  Hotspur  was  killed  by  an  arrow  in 
the  brain,  and  the  rout  was  so  complete  that  the  whole  rebel- 
lion was  struck  down  by  this  one  blow.  The  Earl  of  North- 
umberland surrendered  himself  soon  after  hearing  of  the 
death  of  his  son,  and  received  a  pardon  for  all  his  offences. 

There  were  some  lingerings  of  rebellion  yet :  Owen  Glen- 
dower being  retired  to  Wales,  and  a  preposterous  story  be- 
ing spread  among  the  ignorant  people  that  King  Richard 
was  still  alive.  How  they  could  have  believed  such  non- 
sense it  is  difficult  to  imagine ;  but  they  certainly  did  sup- 
pose that  the  Court  fool  of  the  late  King,  who  was  some- 
thing like  him,  was  he,  himself;  so  that  it  seemed  as  if, 
after  giving  so  much  trouble  to  the  country  in  his  life,  he 
was  still  to  trouble  it  after  his  death.     This  was  not  the 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  175 

worst.  The  young  Earl  of  March  and  his  brother  were 
stolen  out  of  Windsor  Castle.  Being  retaken,  and  being 
found  to  have  been  spirited  away  by  one  Lady  Spencer, 
she  accused  her  own  brother,  that  Earl  of  Rutland  who 
was  in  the  former  conspiracy  and  was  now  Duke  of  York, 
of  being  in  the  plot.  For  this  he  was  ruined  in  fortune, 
though  not  put  to  death;  and  then  another  plot  arose 
among  the  old  Earl  of  Northumberland,  some  other  lords, 
and  that  same  Scroop,  Archbishop  of  York,  who  was  with 
the  rebels  before.  These  conspirators  caused  a  writing  to 
be  posted  on  the  church  doors,  accusing  the  King  of  a  va- 
riety of  crimes;  but,  the  King  being  eager  and  vigilant  to 
oppose  them,  they  were  all  taken,  and  the  Archbishop  was 
executed.  This  was  the  first  time  that  a  great  churchman 
had  been  slain  by  the  law  in  England;  but  the  King  was 
resolved  that  it  should  be  done,  and  done  it  was. 

The  next  most  remarkable  event  of  this  time  was  the 
seizure,  by  Henry,  of  the  heir  to  the  Scottish  throne — 
James,  a  boy  of  nine  years  old.  He  had  been  put  aboard- 
ship  by  his  father,  the  Scottish  King  Robert,  to  save  him 
from  the  designs  of  his  uncle,  when,  on  his  way  to  France, 
he  was  accidentally  taken  by  some  English  cruisers.  He 
remained  a  prisoner  in  England  for  nineteen  years,  and  be- 
came in  his  prison  a  student  and  a  famous  poet. 

With  the  exception  of  occasional  troubles  with  the  Welsh 
and  with  the  French,  the  rest  of  the  King  Henry's  reign 
was  quiet  enough.  But,  the  King  was  far  from  happy,  and 
probably  was  troubled  in  his  conscience  by  knowing  that 
he  had  usurped  the  crown,  and  had  occasioned  the  death  of 
his  miserable  cousin.  The  Prince  of  Wales,  though  brave 
and  generous,  is  said  to  have  been  wild  and  dissipated,  and 
even  to  have  drawn  his  sword  on  Gascoigne,  the  Chief  Jus- 
tice of  the  King's  Bench,  because  he  was  firm  in  dealing 
impartially  with  one  of  his  dissolute  companions.  Upon 
this  the  Chief  Justice  is  said  to  have  ordered  him  immedi- 
ately to  prison ;  the  Prince  of  Wales  is  said  to  have  sub- 
mitted with  a  good  grace ;  and  the  King  is  said  to  have  ex- 
claimed, "Happy  is  the  monarch  who  has  so  just  a  judge, 
and  a  son  so  willing  to  obey  the  laws."  This  is  all  very 
doubtful,  and  so  is  another  story  (of  which  Shakespeare 
has  made  beautiful  use),  that  the  Prince  once  took  the 
crown  oat  of  his  father's  chamber  as  he  was  sleeping,  and 
tried  it  on  his  own  head. 


176  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

The  King's  health  sank  more  and  more,  and  he  became 
subject  to  violent  eruptions  on  the  face  and  to  bad  epileptic 
fits,  and  his  spirits  sank  every  day.  At  last,  as  he  was 
praying  before  the  shrine  of  Saint  Edward  at  Westminster 
Abbey,  he  was  seized  with  a  terrible  fit,  and  was  carried 
into  the  Abbot's  Chamber,  where  he  presently  died.  It 
had  been  foretold  that  he  would  die  at  Jerusalem,  which 
certainly  is  not,  and  never  was,  Westminster.  But,  as  the 
Abbot's  room  had  long  been  called  the  Jerusalem  chamber, 
people  said  it  was  all  the  same  thing,  and  were  quite  satis- 
fied with  the  prediction. 

The  King  died  on  the  20th  of  March,  1413,  in  the  forty- 
seventh  year  of  his  age,  and  the  fourteenth  of  his  reign. 
He  was  buried  in  Canterbury  Cathedral.  He  had  been 
twice  married,  and  had,  by  his  first  wife,  a  family  of  four 
sons  and  two  daughters.  Considering  his  duplicity  before 
he  came  to  the  throne,  his  unjust  seizure  of  it,  and  above 
all,  his  making  that  monstrous  law  for  the  burning  of 
what  the  priests  called  heretics,  he  was  a  reasonably  good 
king,  as  kings  went. 


CHAPTER    XXI. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  HENRY  THE  FIFTH. 

FIRST  PART. 

The  Prince  of  Wales  began  his  reign  like  a  generous  and 
honest  man.  He  set  the  young  Earl  of  March  free ;  he  re- 
stored their  estates  and  their  honours  to  the  Percy  family, 
who  had  lost  them  by  their  rebellion  against  his  father;  he 
ordered  the  imbecile  and  unfortunate  Richard  to  be  hon- 
ourably buried  among  the  Kings  of  England;  and  he  dis- 
missed all  his  wild  companions,  with  assurances  that  they 
should  not  want,  if  they  would  resolve  to  be  steady,  faith- 
ful, and  true. 

It  is  much  easier  to  burn  men  than  to  burn  their  opin- 
ions; and  those  of  the  Lollards  were  spreading  every  day. 
The  Lollards  were  represented  by  the  priests — probably 
falsely  for  the  most  part — to  entertain  treasonable  designs 
against  the  new  King;  and  Henry,  suffering  himself  to  be 


A  CHILD  S  HIiSTOKY   OF  ENGLAND.  177 

worked  upon  by  these  representations,  sacrificed  his  friend 
Sir  John  Oldcastle,  the  Lord  Cobham,  to  them,  after  try- 
ing in  vain  to  convert  him  by  arguments.  He  was  declared 
guilty,  as  the  head  of  the  sect,  and  sentenced  to  the 
flames ;  but  he  escaped  from  the  Tower  before  the  day  of 
execution  (postponed  for  fifty  days  by  the  King  himself), 
and  summoned  the  Lollards  to  meet  him  near  London  on  a 
certain  day.  So  the  priests  told  the  King,  at  least.  I 
doubt  whether  there  was  any  conspiracy  beyond  such  as 
was  got  up  by  their  agents.  On  the  day  appointed,  in- 
stead of  five-and-twenty  thousand  men,  under  the  command 
of  Sir  John  Oldcastle,  in  the  meadows  of  Saint  Giles,  the 
King  found  only  eighty  men,  and  no  Sir  John  at  all. 
There  was,  in  another  place,  an  addle-headed  brewer,  who 
had  gold  trappings  to  his  horses,  and  a  pair  of  gilt  spurs 
in  his  breast — expecting  to  be  made  a  knight  next  day  by 
Sir  John,  and  so  to  gain  the  right  to  wear  them — but  there 
was  no  Sir  John,  nor  did  anybody  give  information  respect- 
ing him,  though  the  King  offered  great  rewards  for  such 
intelligence.  Thirty  of  these  unfortunate  Lollards  were 
hanged  and  drawn  immediately,  and  were  then  burnt,  gal- 
lows and  all ;  and  the  various  prisons  in  and  around  Lon- 
don were  crammed  full  of  others.  Some  of  these  unfortu- 
nate men  made  various  confessions  of  treasonable  designs ; 
but,  such  confessions  were  easily  got,  under  torture  and  the 
fear  of  fire,  and  are  very  little  to  be  trusted.  To  finish  the 
sad  story  of  Sir  John  Oldcastle  at  once,  I  may  mention 
that  he  escaped  into  Wales,  and  remained  there  safely,  for 
four  years.  When  discovered  by  Lord  Powis,  it  is  very 
doubtful  if  he  would  have  been  taken  alive — so  great  was 
the  old  soldier's  bravery — if  a  miserable  old  woman  had 
not  come  behind  him  and  broken  his  legs  with  a  stool.  He 
was  carried  to  London  in  a  horse-litter,  was  fastened  by 
an  iron  chain  to  a  gibbet,  and  so  roasted  to  death. 

To  make  the  state  of  France  as  plain  as  I  can  in  a  few 
words,  I  should  tell  you  that  the  Duke  of  Orleans,  and  the 
Duke  of  Burgundy,  commonly  called  "John  without  fear," 
had  had  a  grand  reconciliation  of  their  quarrel  in  the  last 
reign,  and  had  appeared  to  be  quite  in  a  heavenly  state  of 
mind.  Immediately  after  which,  on  a  Sunday,  in  the 
public  streets  of  Paris,  the  Duke  of  Orleans  was  murdered  by 
a  party  of  twenty  men,  set  on  by  the  Duke  of  Burgundy — 
according  to  his  own  deliberate  confession.     The  widow  of 


178  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

King  Richard  had  been  married  in  France  to  the  eldest  son 
of  the  Duke  of  Orleans.  The  poor  mad  King  was  quite 
powerless  to  help  her,  and  the  Duke  of  Burgundy  became 
the  real  master  of  France.  Isabella  dying,  her  husband 
(Duke  of  Orleans  since  the  death  of  his  father)  married 
the  daughter  of  the  Count  of  Armagnac,  who,  being  a  much 
abler  man  than  his  young  son-in-law,  headed  his  party ; 
thence  called  after  him  Armagnacs.  Thus,  France  was 
now  in  this  terrible  condition,  that  it  had  in  it  the  party 
of  the  King's  son,  the  Dauphin  Louis;  the  party  of  the 
Duke  of  Burgundy,  who  was  the  father  of  the  Dauphin's 
ill-used  wife ;  and  the  party  of  the  Armagnacs ;  all  hating 
each  other ;  all  fighting  together ;  all  composed  of  the  most 
depraved  nobles  that  the  earth  has  ever  known ;  and  all 
tearing  unhappy  France  to  pieces. 

The  late  King  had  watched  these  dissensions  from  Eng- 
land, sensible  (like  the  French  people)  that  no  enemy  of 
France  could  injure  her  more  than  her  own  nobility.  The 
present  King  now  advanced  a  claim  to  the  French  throne. 
His  demand  being,  of  course,  refused,  he  reduced  his  pro- 
posal to  a  certain  large  amount  of  French  territory,  and  to" 
demanding  the  French  princess,  Catherine,  in  marriage, 
with  a  fortune  of  two  millions  of  golden  crowns.  He  was 
offered  less  territory  and  fewer  crowns,  and  no  princess ; 
but  he  called  his  ambassadors  home  and  prepared  for  war. 
Then,  he  proposed  to  take  the  princess  with  one  million 
of  crowns.  The  French  Court  replied  that  he  should  have 
the  princess  with  two  hundred  thousand  crowns  less;  he 
said  this  would  not  do  (he  had  never  seen  the  princess  in 
his  life),  and  assembled  his  army  at  Southampton.  There 
was  a  short  plot  at  home  just  at  that  time,  for  deposing 
him,  and  making  the  Earl  of  March  King;  but  the  conspir- 
ators were  all  speedily  condemned  and  executed,  and  the 
King  embarked  for  France. 

It  is  dreadful  to  observe  how  long  a  bad  example  will  be 
followed ;  but,  it  is  encouraging  to  know  that  a  good  ex- 
ample is  never  thrown  away.  The  King's  first  act  on  dis- 
embarking at  the  mouth  of  the  river  Seine,  three  miles 
from  Harfleur,  was  to  imitate  his  father,  and  to  proclaim 
his  solemn  orders  that  the  lives  and  property  of  the  peace- 
able inhabitants  should  be  respected  on  pain  of  death.  It 
is  agreed  by  French  writers,  to  his  lasting  renown,  that 
even  while  his  soldiers  were  suffering  the  greatest  dis- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  179 

tress  from  want  of  food,  these  commands  were  rigidly 
obeyed. 

With  an  army  in  all  of  thirty  thousand  men,  he  besieged 
the  town  of  Harfleur  both  by  sea  and  land  for  iive  weeks ; 
at  the  end  of  which  time  the  town  surrendered,  and  the  in- 
habitants were  allowed  to  depart  with  only  fivepence  each, 
and  a  part  of  their  clothes.  All  the  rest  of  their  posses- 
sions was  divided  amongst  the  English  army.  But,  that 
army  suffered  so  much,  in  spite  of  its  successes,  from  dis- 
ease and  privation,  that  it  was  already  reduced  one-half. 
Still,  the  King  was  determined  not  to  retire  until  he  had 
struck  a  greater  blow.  Therefore,  against  the  advice  of  all 
his  counsellors,  he  moved  on  with  his  little  force  towards 
Calais.  When  he  came  up  to  the  river  Somme  he  was  un- 
able to  cross,  in  consequence  of  the  fort  being  fortified ; 
and,  as  the  English  moved  up  the  left  bank  of  the  river 
looking  for  a  crossing,  the  French,  who  had  broken  all  the 
bridges,  moved  up  the  right  bank,  watching  them,  and  wait- 
ing to  attack  them  when  they  should  try  to  pass  it.  At 
last  the  English  found  a  crossing  and  got  safely  over. 
The  French  held  a  council  of  war  at  Rouen,  resolved  to 
give  the  English  battle,  and  sent  heralds  to  King  Henry  to 
know  by  which  road  he  was  going.  "  By  the  road  that  will 
take  me  straight  to  Calais!  "  said  the  King,  and  sent  them 
away  with  a  present  of  a  hundred  crowns. 

The  English  moved  on,  until  tliey  beheld  the  French, 
and  then  the  King  gave  ordeis  to  form  in  line  of  battle. 
The  French  not  coming  on,  the  army  broke  up  after  re- 
maining in  battle  array  till  night,  and  got  good  rest  and 
refreshment  at  a  neighbouring  village.  The  French  were 
now  all  lying  in  another  village,  through  which  they  knew 
the  English  must  pass.  They  were  resolved  that  the  Eng- 
lish should  begin  the  battle.  The  English  had  no  means 
of  retreat,  if  their  King  had  any  such  intention ;  and  so  the 
two  armies  passed  the  night,  close  together. 

To  understand  these  armies  well,  you  must  bear  in  mind 
that  the  immense  French  army  had,  among  its  notable  per- 
sons, almost  the  whole  of  that  wicked  nobility,  whose  de- 
bauchery had  made  France  a  desert ;  and  so  besotted  were 
they  by  pride,  and  by  contempt  for  the  common  people, 
that  they  had  scarcely  any  bowmen  (if  indeed  they  had 
any  at  all)  in  .their  whole  enormous  number:  which,  com- 
pared with  the  English  army,  was  at  least  as  six  to  one. 


180  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

For  these  proud  fools  had  said  that  the  bow  was  not  a  fit 
weapon  for  knightly  hands,  and  that  France  must  be  de- 
fended by  gentlemen  only.  We  shall  see,  presently,  what 
hand  the  gentlemen  made  of  it. 

Now,  on  the  English  side,  among  the  little  force,  there 
was  a  good  proportion  of  men  who  were  not  gentlemen  by 
any  means,  but  who  were  good  stout  archers  for  all  that. 
Among  them,  in  the  morning — having  slept  little  at  night, 
while  the  French  were  carousing  and  making  sure  of  vic- 
tory— the  King  rode,  on  a  grey  horse ;  wearing  on  his 
head  a  helmet  of  shining  steel,  surmounted  by  a  crown  of 
gold,  sparkling  with  precious  stones ;  and  bearing  over  his 
armour,  embroidered  together,  the  arms  of  England  and 
the  arms  of  France.  The  archers  looked  at  the  shining 
helmet  and  the  crown  of  gold  and  the  sparkling  jewels,  and 
admired  them  all ;  but,  what  they  admired  most  was  the 
King's  cheerful  face,  and  his  bright  blue  eye,  as  he  told 
them  that,  for  himself,  he  had  made  up  his  mind  to  con- 
quer there  or  to  die  there,  and  that  England  should  never 
have  a  ransom  to  pay  for  him.  There  was  one  brave  knight 
who  chanced  to  say  that  he  wished  some  of  the  many  gal- 
lant gentlemen  and  good  soldiers,  who  were  then  idle  at 
home  in  England,  were  there  to  increase  their  numbers. 
But  the  King  told  him  that,  for  his  part,  he  did  not  wish 
for  one  more  man.  "The  fewer  we  have,"  said  he,  "the 
greater  will  be  the  honour  we  shall  win !  "  His  men,  being 
now  all  in  good  heart,  were  refreshed  with  bread  and  wine, 
and  heard  prayers,  and  waited  quietly  for  the  French, 
the  King  waited  for  the  French,  because  they  were  drawn 
up  thirty  deep  (the  little  English  force  was  only  three 
deep),  on  very  difficult  and  heavy  ground;  and  he  knew 
that  when  they  moved,  there  must  be  confusion  among 
them. 

As  they  did  not  move,  he  sent  off  two  parties : — one  to  lie 
concealed  in  a  wood  on  the  left  of  the  French :  the  other, 
to  set  fire  to  some  houses  behind  the  French  after  the  bat- 
tle should  be  begun.  This  was  scarcely  done,  when  three 
of  the  proud  French  gentlemen,  who  were  to  defend  their 
country  without  any  help  from  the  base  peasants,  came 
riding  out,  calling  upon  the  English  to  surrender.  The 
King  warned  those  gentlemen  himself  to  retire  with  all 
speed  if  they  cared  for  their  lives,  and  ordered  the  English 
banners  to  advance.     Upon  that.  Sir  Thomas  Erpingham, 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAOT).  181 

a  great  English  general,  who  commanded  the  archers,  threw 
his  truncheon  into  the  air,  joyfully ;  and  all  the  English 
men,  kneeling  down  upon  the  ground  and  biting  it  as  if 
they  took  possession  of  the  country,  rose  up  with  a  great 
shout  and  fell  upon  the  French. 

Every  archer  was  furnished  with  a  great  stake  tipped 
with  iron;  and  his  orders  were,  to  thrust  this  stake  into 
the  ground,  to  discharge  his  arrow,  and  then  to  fall  back, 
when  the  French  horsemen  came  on.  As  the  haughty 
French  gentlemen,  who  were  to  break  the  English  archers 
and  utterly  destroy  them  with  their  knightly  lances,  came 
riding  up,  they  were  received  with  such  a  blinding  storm 
of  arrows,  that  they  broke  and  turned.  Horses  and  men 
rolled  over  one  another,  and  the  confusion  was  terrific. 
Those  who  rallied  and  charged  the  archers  got  among.the 
stakes  on  slippery  and  boggy  ground,  and  were  so  bewil- 
dered that  the  English  archers — who  wore  no  armour,  and 
even  took  off  their  leathern  coats  to  be  more  active — cut 
them  to  pieces,  root  and  branch.  Only  three  French  horse- 
men got  within  the  stakes,  and  those  were  instantly  de- 
spatched. All  this  time  the  dense  French  army,  being  in 
armour,  were  sinking  knee-deep  into  the  mire ;  while  the 
light  English  archers,  half-naked,  were  as  fresh  and  active 
as  if  they  were  fighting  on  a  marble  floor.  • 

But  now,  the  second  division  of  the  French  coming  to 
the  relief  of  the  first,  closed  up  in  a  firm  mass ;  the  Eng- 
lish, headed  by  the  King,  attacked  them ;  and  the  deadli- 
est part  of  the  battle  began.  The  King's  brother,  the  Duke 
of  Clarence,  was  struck  down,  and  numbers  of  the  French 
surrounded  him ;  but.  King  Henry,  standing  over  the  body, 
fought  like  a  lion  until  they  were  beaten  off. 

Presently,  came  up  a  band  of  eighteen  French  knights, 
bearing  the  banner  of  a  certain  French  lord,  who  had 
sworn  to  kill  or  take  the  English  King.  One  of  them 
struck  him  such  a  blow  with  a  battle-axe  that  he  reeled 
and  fell  upon  his  knees;  but,  his  faithful  men,  imme- 
diately closing  round  him,  killed  every  one  of  those 
eighteen  knights,  and  so  that  French  lord  never  kept  his 
oath. 

The  French  Duke  of  Alen^on,  seeing  this,  made  a  des- 
perate charge,  and  cut  his  way  close  up  to  the  Royal 
Standard  of  England.  He  beat  down  the  Duke  of  York, 
who  was  standing  near  it ;  and,  when  the  King  came  to  his 


182  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

rescue,  struck  off  a  piece  of  the  crown  he  wore.  But,  he 
never  struck  another  blow  in  this  world ;  for,  even  as  he 
was  in  the  act  of  saying  who  he  was,  and  that  he  surren- 
dered to  the  King ;  and  even  as  the  King  stretched  out  his 
hand  to  give  him  a  safe  and  honourable  acceptance  of  the 
offer ;  he  fell  dead,  pierced  by  innumerable  wounds. 

The  death  of  this  nobleman  decided  the  battle.  The 
third  division  of  the  French  army,  which  had  never  struck 
a  blow  yet,  and  which  was,  in  itself,  more  than  double 
the  whole  English  power,  broke  and  fled.  At  this  time  of 
the  iight,  the  English,  who  as  yet  had  made  no  prisoners, 
began  to  take  them  in  immense  numbers,  and  were  still  oc- 
cupied in  doing  so,  or  in  killing  those  who  would  not  sur- 
render, when  a  great  noise  arose  in  the  rear  of  the  French 
— their  flying  banners  were  seen  to  stop — and  King  Henry, 
supposing  a  great  reinforcement  to  have  arrived,  gave  or- 
ders that  all  the  prisoners  should  be  put  to  death.  As 
soon,  however,  as  it  was  found  that  the  noise  was  only 
occasioned  by  a  body  of  plundering  peasants,  the  terrible 
massacre  was  stopped. 

Then  King  Henry  called  to  him  the  French  herald,  and 
asked  him  to  whom  the  victory  belonged. 

The  herald  replied,  "To  the  King  of  England." 
•    "  We  have  not  made  this  havoc  and  slaughter,"  said  the 
King.     "  It  is  the  wrath  of  Heaven  on  the  sins  of  France. 
What  is  the  name  of  that  castle  yonder?  " 

The  herald  answered  him,  "  My  lord,  it  is  the  castle  of 
Azincourt." 

Said  the  King,  "From  henceforth  this  battle  shall  be 
known  to  posterity,  by  the  name  of  the  battle  of  Azin- 
court. " 

Our  English  historians  have  made  it  Agincourt;  but, 
under  that  name,  it  will  ever  be  famous  in  English  annals. 

The  loss  upon  the  French  side  was  enormous.  Three 
dukes  were  killed,  two  more  were  taken  prisoners,  seven 
counts  were  killed,  three  more  were  taken  prisoners,  and 
ten  thousand  knights  and  gentlemen  were  slain  upon  the 
field.  The  English  loss  amounted  to  sixteen  hundred  men, 
among  whom  were  the  Dnke  of  York  and  the  Earl  of 
Suffolk. 

War  is  a  dreadful  thing ;  and  it  is  appalling  to  know 
how  the  English  were  obliged,  next  morning,  to  kill  those 
prisoners  mortally  wounded,  who  yet  writhed  in  agony 


A  CHILD'S   HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND,  183 

upon  the  ground ;  how  the  dead  upon  the  French  side  were 
stripped  by  their  own  countrymen  and  countrywomen,  and 
afterwards  buried  in  great  pits ;  how  the  dead  upon  the 
English  side  were  piled  up  in  a  great  barn,  and  how  their 
bodies  and  the  barn  were  all  burned  together.  It  is  in 
such  things,  and  in  many  more  much  too  horrible  to  relate, 
that  the  real  desolation  and  wickedness  of  war  consist. 
Nothing  can  make  war  otherwise  than  horrible.  But  the 
dark  side  of  it  was  little  thought  of  and  soon  forgotten ; 
and  it  cast  no  shade  of  trouble  on  the  English  people,  ex- 
cept on  those  who  had  lost  friends  or  relations  in  the  light. 
They  welcomed  their  King  home  with  shouts  of  rejoicing, 
and  plunged  into  the  water  to  bear  him  ashore  on  their 
shoulders,  and  flocked  out  in  crowds  to  welcome  him  in 
every  town  through  which  he  passed,  and  hung  rich  car- 
pets and  tapestries  out  of  the  windows,  and  strewed  the 
streets  with  flowers,  and  made  the  fountains  run  with  wine, 
as  the  great  field  of  Agincourt  had  run  with  blood. 

SECOND  PART. 

That  proud  and  wicked  French  nobility  who  dragged 
their  country  to  destruction,  and  who  were  every  day  and 
every  year  regarded  with  deeper  hatred  and  detestation  in 
the  hearts  of  the  French  people,  learnt  nothing,  even  from 
the  defeat  of  Agincourt.  So  far  from  uniting  against  the 
common  enemy,  they  became,  among  themselves,  more 
violent,  more  bloody  nd  more  false — if  that  were  possi- 
ble— than  they  had  b  n  before.  The  Count  of  Armagnac 
persuaded  the  Fren  King  to  plunder  of  her  treasures 
Queen  Isabella  of  I  /aria,  and  to  make  her  a  prisoner. 
She,  who  had  hither:^  been  the  bitter  enemy  of  the  Duke 
of  Burgundy,  proposed  to  join  him,  in  revenge.  He  car- 
ried her  off  to  Troyes,  where  she  proclaimed  -herself  Regent 
of  France,  and  made  him  her  lieutenant.  The  Armagnac 
party  were  at  that  time  possessed  of  Paris ;  but,  one  of  the 
gates  of  the  city  being  secretly  opened  on  a  certain  night 
to  a  party  of  the  duke's  men,  they  got  into  Paris,  threw 
into  the  prisons  all  the  Armagnacs  upon  whom  they  could 
lay  their  hands,  and,  a  few  nights  afterwards,  with  the  aid 
of  a  furious  mob  of  sixty  thousand  people,  broke  the  pris- 
ons open,  and  killed  them  all.  The  former  Dauphin  was 
now  dead,  and  the  King's  third  son  bore  the  title.     Him, 


184  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

in  the  height  of  this  murderous  scene,  a  French  knight 
hurried  out  of  bed,  wrapped  in  a  sheet,  and  bore  away  to 
Poitiers,  So,  when  the  revengeful  Isabella  and  the  Duke 
of  Burgundy  entered  Paris  in  triumph  after  the  slaughter 
of  their  enemies,  the  Dauphin  was  proclaimed  at  Poitiers 
as  the  real  Regent. 

King  Henry  had  not  been  idle  since  his  victory  of  Agin- 
court,  but  had  repulsed  a  brave  attempt  of  the  French  to 
recover  Harfleur ;  had  gradually  conquered  a  great  part  of 
Normandy ;  and,  at  this  crisis  of  affairs,  took  the  impor- 
tant town  of  Rouen,  after  a  siege  of  half  a  year.  This 
great  loss  so  alarmed  the  French,  that  the  Duke  of  Bur- 
gundy proposed  that  a  meeting  to  treat  of  peace  should 
be  held  between  the  French  and  the  English  kings  in  a 
plain  by  the  river  Seine.  On  the  appointed  day.  King 
Henry  appeared  there,  with  his  two  brothers,  Clarence  and 
Gloucester,  and  a  thousand  men.  The  unfortunate  French 
King,  being  more  mad  than  usual  that  day,  could  not 
come;  but  the  Queen  came,  and  with  her  the  Princess 
Catherine  :  who  was  a  very  lovely  creature,  and  who  made 
a  real  impression  on  King  Henry,  now  that  he  saw  her  for 
the  first  time.  This  was  the  most  important  circumstance 
that  arose  out  of  the  meeting. 

As  if  it  were  impossible  for  a  French  nobleman  of  that 
time  to  be  true  to  his  word  of  honour  in  anything,  Henry 
discovered  that  the  Duke  of  Burgundy  was,  at  that  very 
moment,  in  secret  treaty  with  the  Dauphin;  and  he  there- 
fore abandoned  the  negotiation. 

The  Duke  of  Burgundy  and  the  Dauphin,  each  of  whom 
with  the  best  reason  distrusted  the  other  as  a  noble  ruffian 
surrounded  by  a  party  of  noble  ruffians,  were  rather  at  a 
loss  how  to  proceed  after  this ;  but,  at  length  they  agreed 
to  meet,  on  a  bridge  over  the  river  Yonne,  where  it  was 
arranged  that  there  should  be  two  strong  gates  put  up, 
with  an  empty  space  between  them;  and  that  the  Duke  of 
Burgundy  should  come  into  that  space  by  one  gate,  with 
ten  men  only ;  and  that  the  Dauphin  should  come  into  that 
space  by  the  other  gate,  also  with  ten  men,  and  no  more. 

So  far  the  Dauphin  kept  his  word,  bat  no  farther.  When 
the  Duke  of  Burgundy  was  on  his  knee  before  him  in  the 
act  of  speaking,  one  of  the  Dauphin's  noble  ruffians  cut 
the  said  duke  down  with  a  small  axe,  and  others  speedily 
finished  him. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  185 

It  was  in  vain  for  the  Dauphin  to  pretend  that  this  base 
murder  was  not  done  with  his  consent ;  it  was  too  bad,  even 
for  France,  and  caused  a  general  horror.  The  duke's  heir 
hastened  to  make  a  treaty  with  King  Henry,  and  the 
French  Queen  engaged  that  her  husband  should  consent  to 
it,  whatever  it  was.  Henry  made  peace,  on  condition  of 
receiving  the  Princess  Catherine  in  marriage,  and  being 
made  Regent  of  France  during  the  rest  of  the  King's  life- 
time, and  succeeding  to  the  French  crown  at  his  death. 
He  was  soon  married  to  the  beautiful  Princess,  and  took 
her  proudly  home  to  England,  where  she  was  crowned  with 
great  honour  and  glory. 

This  peace  was  called  the  Perpetual  Peace ;  we  shall  soon 
see  how  long  it  lasted.  It  gave  great  satisfaction  to  the 
French  people,  although  they  were  so  poor  and  miserable, 
that,  at  the  time  of  the  celebration  of  the  Royal  marriage, 
numbers  of  them  were  dying  with  starvation,  on  the  dung- 
hills in  the  streets  of  Paris.  There  was  some  resistance  on 
the  part  of  the  Dauphin  in  some  few  parts  of  France,  but 
King  Henry  beat  it  all  down. 

And  now,  with  his  great  possessions  in  France  secured, 
and  his  beautiful  wife  to  cheer  him,  and  a  son  born  to  give 
him  greater  happiness,  all  appeared  bright  before  him. 
But,  in  the  fulness  of  his  triumph  and  the  height  of  his 
power,  Death  came  upon  him,  and  his  day  was  done. 
When  he  fell  ill  at  Vincennes,  and  found  that  he  could  not 
recover,  he  was  very  calm  and  quiet,  and  spoke  serenely 
to  those  who  wept  around  his  bed.  His  wife  and  child,  he 
said,  he  left  to  the  loving  care  of  his  brother  the  Duke  of 
Bedford,  and  his  other  faithful  nobles.  He  gave  them  ad- 
vice that  England  should  establish  a  friendship  with  the 
new  Duke  of  Burgundy,  and  offer  him  the  Regency  of 
France ;  that  it* should  not  set  free  the  royal  princes  who 
had  been  taken  at  Agincourt ;  and  that,  whatever  quarrel 
might  arise  with  France,  England  should  never  make 
peace  without  holding  Normandy.  Then,  he  laid  down 
his  head,  and  asked  the  attendant  priests  to  chant  the  pen- 
itential psalms.  Amid  which  solemn  sounds,  on  the  thirty- 
first  of  August,  one  thousand  four  hundred  and  twenty- 
two,  in  only  the  thirty-fourth  year  of  his  age  and  the  tenth 
of  his  reign.  King  Henry  the  Fifth  passed  away. 

Slowly  and  mournfully  they  carried  his  embalmed  body 
in  a  procession  of  great  state  to  Paris,  and  thence  to  Rouen 


186  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

where  his  Queen  was :  from  whom  the  sad  intelligence  of 
his  death  was  concealed  until  he  had  been  dead  some  days. 
Thence,  lying  on  a  bed  of  crimson  and  gold,  with  a  golden 
crown  upon  the  head,  and  a  golden  ball  and  sceptre  lying 
in  the  nerveless  hands,  they  carried  it  to  Calais,  with  such 
a  great  retinue  as  seemed  to  dye  the  road  black.  The  King 
of  Scotland  acted  as  chief  mourner,  all  the  Royal  House- 
hold followed,  the  knights  wore  black  armour  and  black 
plumes  of  feathers,  crowds  of  men  bore  torches,  making 
the  night  as  light  as  day ;  and  the  widowed  Princess  fol- 
lowed last  of  all.  At  Calais  there  was  a  fleet  of  ships  to 
bring  the  funeral  host  to  Dover.  And  so,  by  way  of  Lon- 
don Bridge,  where  the  service  for  the  dead  was  chanted  as 
it  passed  along,  they  brought  the  body  to  Westminster 
Abbey,  and  there  buried  it  with  great  respect. 


CHAPTER    XXII. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  HENRY  THE  SIXTH. 

PABT   THE  FIBST. 

It  had  been  the  wish  of  the  late  King,  that  while  his 
infant  son  King  Henky  the  Sixth,  at  this  time  only  nine 
months  old,  was  under  age,  the  Duke  of  Gloucester  should 
be  appointed  Regent.  The  English  Parliament,  however, 
preferred  to  appoint  a  Council  of  Regency,  with  the  Duke 
of  Bedford  at  its  head :  to  be  represented,  in  his  absence 
only,  by  the  Duke  of  Gloucester.  The  Parliament  would 
seem  to  have  been  wise  in  this,  for  Gloucester  soon  showed 
himself  to  be  ambitious  and  troublesome,  and,  in  the  grati- 
fication of  his  own  personal  schemes,  gave  dangerous  offence 
to  the  Duke  of  Burgundy,  which  was  with  difficulty  ad- 
justed. 

As  that  duke  declined  the  Regency  of  France,  it  was  be- 
stowed by  the  poor  French  King  upon  the  Duke  of  Bedford. 
But,  the  French  King  dying  within  two  months,  the 
Dauphin  instantly  asserted  his  claim  to  the  French  throne, 
and  was  actually  crowned  under  the  title  of  Charles  the 
Seventh.     The  Duke  of  Bedford,  to  be  a  match  for  him, 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  187 

entered  into  a  friendly  league  with  tlie  Dukes  of  Burgundy 
and  Brittany,  and  gave  them  his  two  sisters  in  marriage. 
War  with  France  was  immediately  renewed,  and  the  Per- 
petual Peace  came  to  an  untimely  end. 

In  the  first  campaign,  the  English,  aided  by  this  alli- 
ance, were  speedily  successful.  As  Scotland,  however, 
had  sent  the  French  five  thousand  men,  and  might  send 
more,  or  attack  the  North  of  England  while  England  was 
busy  with  France,  it  was  considered  that  it  would  be  a  good 
thing  to  offer  the  Scottish  King,  James,  who  had  been  so 
long  imprisoned,  his  liberty,  on  his  paying  forty  thousand 
pounds  for  his  board  and  lodging  during  nineteen  years, 
and  engaging  to  forbid  his  subjects  from  serving  under  the 
flag  of  France.  It  is  pleasant  to  know,  not  only  that  the 
amiable  captive  at  last  regained  his  freedom  upon  these 
terms,  but,  that  he  married  a  noble  English  lady,  with 
whom  he  had  been  long  in  love,  and  became  an  excellent 
King.  I  am  afraid  we  have  met  with  some  Kings  in  this 
history,  and  shall  meet  with  some  more,  who  would  have 
been  very  much  the  better,  and  would  have  left  the  world 
much  happier,  if  they  had  been  imprisoned  nineteen  years 
too. 

In  the  second  campaign,  the  English  gained  a  consider- 
able victory  at  Verneuil,  in  a  battle  which  was  chiefly  re- 
markable, otherwise,  for  their  resorting  to  the  odd  expedi- 
ent of  tying  their  baggage-horses  together  by  the  heads  and 
tails,  and  jumbling  them  up  with  the  baggage,  so  as  to 
convert  them  into  a  sort  of  live  fortification — which  was 
found  useful  to  the  troops,  but  which  I  should  think  was 
not  agreeable  to  the  horses.  For  three  years  afterwards 
very  little  was  done,  owing  to  both  sides  being  too  poor  for 
war,  which  is  a  very  expensive  entertainment ;  but,  a  coun- 
cil was  then  held  in  Paris,  in  which  it  was  decided  to  lay 
siege  to  the  town  of  Orleans,  which  was  a  place  of  great 
importance  to  the  Dauphin's  cause.  An  English  army  of 
ten  thousand  men  was  despatched  on  this  service,  under 
the  command  of  the  Earl  of  Salisbury,  a  general  of  fame. 
He  being  unfortunately  killed  early  in  the  siege,  the  Earl 
of  Suffolk  took  his  place;  under  whom  (reinforced  by  Sik 
John  Falstaff,  who  brought  up  four  hundred  wagons 
laden  with  salt  herrings  and  other  provisions  for  the  troops, 
and,  beating  off  the  French  who  tried  to  intercept  him, 
came  victorious  out  of  a  hot  skirmish,  which  was  after- 


188  A  CHILB'S  HISTORY  0"P  ENGLAND. 

wards  called  in  jest  the  Battle  of  the  Herrings),  the  town 
of  Orleans  was  so  completely  hemmed  in,  that  the  be- 
sieged proposed  to  yield  it  up  to  their  countryman  the 
Duke  of  Burgundy.  The  English  general,  however,  replied 
that  his  English  men  had  won  it,  so  far,  by  their  blood  and 
valour,  and  that  his  English  men  must  have  it.  There 
seemed  to  be  no  hope  for  the  town,  or  for  the  Dauphin,  who 
was  so  dismayed  that  he  even  thought  of  flying  to  Scotland 
or  to  Spain — when  a  peasant  girl  rose  up  and  changed  the 
whole  state  of  affairs. 

The  story  of  this  peasant  girl  I  have  now  to  tell. 

PART    THE    SECOND. 

The  Story  of  Joan  of  Arc, 

In  a  remote  village  among  some  wild  hills  in  the  prov- 
ince of  Lorraine,  there  lived  a  countryman  whose  name  was 
Jacques  d'Arc.  He  had  a  daughter,  Joan  of  Arc,  who 
was  at  this  time  in  her  twentieth  year.  She  had  been  a 
solitary  girl  from  her  childhood;  she  had  often  tended 
sheep  and  cattle  for  whole  days  where  no  human  figure 
was  seen  or  human  voice  heard ;  and  she  had  often  knelt, 
for  hours  together,  in  the  gloomy  empty  little  village  chapel, 
looking  up  at  the  altar  and  at  the  dim  lamp  burning  before 
it,  until  she  fancied  that  she  saw  shadowy  figures  standing 
there,  and  even  that  she  heard  them  speak  to  her.  The 
people  in  that  part  of  France  were  very  ignorant  and  su- 
perstitious, and  they  had  many  ghostly  tales  to  tell  about 
what  they  had  dreamed,  and  what  they  saw  among  the 
lonely  hills  when  the  clouds  and  the  mists  were  resting  on 
them.  So,  they  easily  believed  that  Joan  saw  strange 
sights,  and  they  whispered  among  themselves  that  angels 
and  spirits  talked  to  her. 

At  last,  Joan  told  her  father  that  she  had  one  day  been 
surprised  by  a  great  unearthly  light,  and  httd  afterwards 
heard  a  solemn  voice,  which  said  it  was  Saint  Michael's 
voice,  telling  her  that  she  was  to  go  and  help  the  Dauphin. 
Soon  after  this  (she  said).  Saint  Catherine  and  Saint  Mar- 
garet had  appeared  to  her  with  sparkling  crowns  upon  their 
heads,  and  had  encouraged  her  to  be  virtuous  and  resolute. 
These  visions  had  returned  sometimes ;  but  the  Voices  very 
often;  and  the  Voices  always  said,  "Joan,  thou  art  ap- 


A  CHILD  S   HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND.  189 

pointed  by  Heaven  to  go  and  help  the  Dauphin !  "  She 
almost  always  heard  them  while  the  chapel  bells  were 
ringing. 

There  is  no  doubt,  now,  that  Joan  believed  she  saw  and 
heard  these  things.  It  is  very  well  known  that  such  delu- 
sions are  a  disease  which  is  not  by  any  means  uncommon. 
It  is  probable  enough  that  there  were  figures  of  Saint 
Michael,  and  Saint  Catherine,  and  Saint  Margaret,  in  the 
little  chapel  (where  they  would  be  very  likely  to  have  shin- 
ing crowns  upon  their  heads),  and  that  they  first  gave  Joan 
the  idea  of  those  three  personages.  She  had  long  been  a 
moping,  fanciful  girl,  and,  though  she  was  a  very  good  girl, 
I  dare  say  she  was  a  little  vain,  and  wishful  for  notoriety. 

Her  father,  something  wiser  than  his  neighbours,  said, 
"  I  tell  thee,  Joan,  it  is  thy  fancy.  Thou  hadst  better 
have  a  kind  husband  to  take  care  of  thee,  girl,  and  work  to 
employ  thy  mind ! "  But  Joan  told  him  in  reply,  that  she 
had  taken  a  vow  never  to  have  a  husband,  and  that  she 
must  go  as  Heaven  directed  her,  to  help  the  Dauphin. 

It  happened,  unfortunately  for  her  father's  persuasions, 
and  most  unfortunately  for  the  poor  girl,  too,  that  a  party 
of  the  Dauphin's  enemies  found  their  way  into  the  village 
while  Joan's  disorder  was  at  this  point,  and  burnt  the 
chapel,  and  drove  out  the  inhabitants.  The  cruelties  she 
saw  committed,  touched  Joan's  heart  and  made  her  worse. 
She  said  that  the  Voices  and  the  figures  were  now  continu- 
ally with  her;  that  they  told  her  she  was  the  girl  who, 
according  to  an  old  prophecy,  was  to  deliver  France ;  and 
she  must  go  and  help  the  Dauphin,  and  must  remain  with 
him  until  he  should  be  crowned  at  Rheims :  and  that  she 
must  travel  a  long  way  to  a  certain  lord  named  Baudri- 
couRT,  who  could  and  would  bring  her  into  the  Dauphin's 
presence. 

As  her  father  still  said,  "  I  tell  thee,  Joan,  it  is  thy 
fancy,"  she  set  off  to  find  out  this  lord,  accompanied  by  an 
uncle,  a  poor  village  wheelwright  and  cart-maker,  who  be- 
lieved in  the  reality  of  her  visions.  They  travelled  a  long 
way  and  went  on  and  on,  over  a  rough  country,  full  of  the 
Duke  of  Burgundy's  men,  and  of  all  kinds  of  robbers  and 
marauders,  until  they  came  to  where  this  lord  was. 

When  his  servants  told  him  that  there  was  a  poor  peas- 
ant girl  named  Joan  of  Arc,  accompanied  by  nobody  but  an 
old  village  wheelwright  and  cart-maker,  who  wished  to  see 


190  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

him  because  she  was  commanded  to  help  the  Dauphin  and 
save  France,  Baudricourt  burst  out  a  laughing,  and  bade 
them  send  the  girl  away.  But,  he  soon  heard  so  much 
about  her  lingering  in  the  town,  and  praying  in  the  churches, 
and  seeing  visions,  and  doing  harm  to  no  one,  that  he  sent 
for  her,  and  questioned  her.  As  she  said  the  same  things 
after  she  had  been  well  sprinkled  with  holy  water  as  she 
had  said  before  the  sprinkling,  Baudricourt  began  to  think 
there  might  be  something  in  it.  At  all  events,  he  thought 
it  worth  while  to  send  her  on  to  the  town  of  Chinon,  where 
the  Dauphin  was.  So,  he  bought  her  a  horse,  and  a  sword, 
and  gave  her  two  squires  to  conduct  her.  As  the  Voices 
had  told  Joan  that  she  was  to  wear  a  man's  dress,  now, 
she  put  one  on,  and  girded  her  sword  to  her  side,  and  bound 
spurs  to  her  heels,  and  mounted  her  horse  and  rode  away 
with  her  two  squires.  As  to  her  uncle  the  wheelwright, 
he  stood  staring  at  his  niece  in  wonder  until  she  was  out  of 
sight — as  well  he  might — and  then  went  home  again. 
The  best  place,  too. 

Joan  and  her  two  squires  rode  on  and  on,  until  they 
came  to  Chinon,  where  she  was,  after  some  doubt,  ad- 
mitted into  the  Dauphin's  presence.  Picking  him  out  im- 
mediately from  all  his  court,  she  told  him  that  she  came 
commanded  by  Heaven  to  subdue  his  enemies  and  conduct 
him  to  his  coronation  at  Rheims.  She  also  told  him  (or 
he  pretended  so  afterwards,  to  make  the  greater  impression 
upon  his  soldiers)  a  number  of  his  secrets  known  only  to 
himself,  and,  furthermore,  she  said  there  was  an  old,  old 
sword  in  the  cathedral  of  Saint  Catherine  at  Fierbois, 
marked  with  five  old  crosses  on  the  blade,  which  Saint 
Catherine  had  ordered  her  to  wear. 

Now,  nobody  knew  anything  about  this  old,  old  sword, 
but  when  the  cathedral  came  to  be  examined — which  was 
immediately  done — there,  sure  enough,  the  sword  Avas 
found!  The  Dauphin  then  required  a  number  of  grave 
priests  and  bishops  to  give  him  their  opinion  whether  the 
girl  derived  her  power  from  good  spirits  or  from  evil  spir- 
its, which  they  held  prodigiously  long  debates  about,  in  the 
course  of  which  several  learned  men  fell  fast  asleep  and 
snored  loudly.  At  last,  when  one  grulf  old  gentleman  had 
said  to  Joan,  "  What  language  do  your  Voices  speak? " 
and  when  Joan  had  replied  to  the  gruff  old  gentleman,  "  A 
pleasanter  language  than  yours,"  they  agreed  that  it  was 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  191 

all  correct,  and  that  Joan  of  Arc  was  inspired  from  Heav- 
en. This  wonderful  circumstance  put  new  heart  into  the 
Dauphin's  soldiers  when  they  heard  of  it,  and  dispirited 
the  English  army,  who  took  Joan  for  a  witch. 

So  Joan  mounted  horse  again,  and  again  rode  on  and  on, 
until  she  came  to  Orleans.  But  she  rode  now,  as  never 
peasant  girl  had  ridden  yet.  She  rode  upon  a  white  war- 
horse,  in  a  suit  of  glittering  armour;  with  the  old,  old 
sword  from  the  cathedral,  newly  burnished,  in  her  belt ; 
with  a  white  flag  carried  before  her,  upon  which  were  a 
picture  of  God,  and  the  words  Jesus  Maria.  In  this 
splendid  state,  at  the  head  of  a  great  body  of  troops  escort- 
ing provisions  of  all  kinds  for  the  starving  inhabitants  of 
Orleans,  she  appeared  before  that  beleaguered  city. 

When  the  people  on  the  walls  beheld  her,  they  cried  out 
"  The  Maid  is  come !  The  Maid  of  the  Prophecy  is  come 
to  deliver  us !  "  And  this,  and  the  sight  of  the  Maid  fight- 
ing at  the  head  of  their  men,  made  the  French  so  bold, 
and  made  the  English  so  fearful,  that  the  English  line  of 
forts  was  soon  broken,  the  troops  and  provisions  were  got 
into  the  town,  and  Orleans  was  saved. 

Joan,  henceforth  called  The  Maid  of  Obleans,  re- 
mained within  the  walls  for  a  few  days,  and  caused  letters 
to  be  thrown  over,  ordering  Lord  Suffolk  and  his  English- 
men to  depart  from  before  the  town  according  to  the  will 
of  Heaven,  As  the  English  general  very  positively  declined 
to  believe  that  Joan  knew  anything  about  the  will  of 
Heaven  (which  did  not  mend  the  matter  with  his  soldiers, 
for  they  stupidly  said  if  she  were  not  inspired  she  was  a 
witch,  and  it  was  of  no  use  to  fight  against  a  witch),  she 
mounted  her  white  war-horse  again,  and  ordered  her  white 
banner  to  advance. 

The  besiegers  held  the  bridge,  and  some  strong  towers 
upon  the  bridge ;  and  here  the  Maid  of  Orleans  attacked 
them.  The  fight  was  fourteen  hours  long.  She  planted  a 
scaling  ladder  with  her  own  hands,  and  mounted  a  towel 
wall,  but  was  struck  by  an  English  arrow  in  the  neck,  and 
fell  into  the  trench.  She  was  carried  away  and  the  arrow 
was  taken .  out,  during  which  operation  she  screamed  and 
ciied  with  the  pain,  as  any  other  girl  might  have  done ; 
but  presently  she  said  that  the  Voices  were  speaking  to  her 
and  soothing  her  to  rest.  After  a  while,  she  got  up,  and 
was  again  foremost  in  the  fight.     When  the  English  who 


192  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND. 

had  seen  her  fall  and  supposed  her  dead,  saw  this,  they 
were  troubled  with  the  strangest  fears,  and  some  of  them 
cried  out  that  they  beheld  Saint  Michael  on  a  white  horse 
(probably  Joan  herself)  fighting  for  tlie  French.  They 
lost  the  bridge,  and  lost  the  towers,  and  next  day  set  their 
chain  of  forts  on  fire,  and  left  the  place. 

But  as  Lord  Suffolk  himself  retired  no  farther  than  the 
town  of  Jargeau,  which  was  only  a  few  miles  off,  the  Maid 
of  Orleans  besieged  him  there,  and  he  was  taken  prisoner. 
As  the  white  banner  scaled  the  wall,  she  was  struck  upon 
the  head  with  a  stone,  and  was  again  tumbled  down  into 
the  ditch;  but,  she  only  cried  all  the  more,  as  she  lay 
there,  "On,  on,  my  countrymen!  And  fear  nothing,  for 
the  Lord  hath  delivered  them  into  our  hands !  "  After  this 
new  success  of  the  Maid's,  several  other  fortresses  and 
places  which  had  previously  held  out  against  the  Dauphin 
were  delivered  up  without  a  battle ;  and  at  Patay  she  de- 
feated the  remainder  of  the  English  army,  and  set  up  her 
victorious  white  banner  on  a  field  where  twelve  hundred 
Englishmen  lay  dead. 

She  now  urged  the  Dauphin  (who  always  kept  out  of  the 
way  when  there  was  any  fighting)  to  proceed  to  Rheims, 
as  the  first  part  of  her  mission  was  accomplished ;  and  to 
complete  the  whole  by  being  crowned  there.  The  Dauphin 
was  in  no  particular  hurry  to  do  this,  as  Rheims  was  a  long 
way  off,  and  the  English  and  the  Duke  of  Burgundy  were 
still  strong  in  the  country  through  which  the  road  lay. 
However,  they  set  forth,  with  ten  thousand  men,  and  again 
the  Maid  of  Orleans  rode 'on  and  on,  upon  her  white  war- 
horse,  and  in  her  shining  armour.  Whenever  they  came 
to  a  town  which  yielded  readily,  the  soldiers  believed  in 
her ;  but,  whenever  they  came  to  a  town  which  gave  them 
any  troulsle,  they  began  to  murmur  that  she  was  an  impos- 
tor. The  latter  was  particularly  the  case  at  Troyes,  which 
finally  yielded,  however,  through  the  persuasion  of  one 
Richard,  a  friar  of  the  place.  Friar  Richard  was  in  the 
old  doubt  about  the  Maid  of  Orleans,  until  he  had  sprinkled 
her  well  with  holy  water,  and  had  also  well  sprinkled  the 
threshold  of  the  gate  by  which  she  came  into  the  city. 
Finding  that  it  made  no  change  in  her  or  the  gate,  he  said, 
as  the  other  grave  old  gentlemen  had  said,  that  it  was  all 
right,  and  became  her  great  ally 

So,  at  last,  by  dint  of  riding  on  and  on,  the  Maid  of 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  193 

Orleans,  and  the  Dauphin,  and  the  ten  thousand  sometimes 
believing  and  sometimes  unbelieving  men,  came  to  Rheims. 
And  in  the  great  cathedral  of  Rheims,  the  Dauphin  actually 
was  crowned  Charles  the  Seventh  in  a  great  assembly  of 
the  people.  Then,  the  Maid,  who  with  her  white  banner 
stood  beside  the  King  in  that  hour  of  his  triumph,  kneeled 
down  upon  the  pavement  at  his  feet,  and  said,  with  tears, 
that  what  she  had  been  inspired  to  do,  was  done,  and  that 
the  only  recompense  she  asked  for,  was,  that  she  should  now 
have  leave  to  go  back  to  her  distant  home,  and  her  sturdily 
incredulous  father,  and  her  first  simple  escort  the  village 
wheelwright  and  cart-maker.  But  the  King  said  "No!  " 
and  made  her  and  her  family  as  noble  as  a  King  could,  and 
settled  upon  her  the  income  of  a  Count. 

Ah !  happy  had  it  been  for  the  Maid  of  Orleans,  if  she 
had  resumed  her  rustic  dress  that  day,  and  had  gone  home 
to  the  little  chapel  and  the  wild  hills,  and  had  forgotten 
all  these  things,  and  had  been  a  good  man's  wife,  and  had 
heard  no  stranger  voices  than  the  voices  of  little  chil- 
dren ! 

It  was  not  to  be,  and  she  continued  helping  the  King 
(she  did  a  world  for  him,  in  alliance  with  Friar  Richard), 
and  trying  to  improve  the  lives  of  the  coarse  soldiers,  and 
leading  a  religious,  an  unselfish,  and  a  modest  life,  herself, 
beyond  any  doubt.  Still,  many  times  she  prayed  the  King 
to  let  her  go  home ;  and  once  she  even  took  off  her  bright 
armour  and  hung  it  up  in  a  church,  meaning  never  to  wear 
it  more.  But,  the  King  always  won  her  back  again — while 
she  was  of  any  use  to  him — and  so  she  went  on  and  on  and 
on,  to  her  doom. 

When  the  Duke  of  Bedford,  who  was  a  very  able  man, 
began  to  be  active  for  England,  and,  by  bringing  the  war 
back  into  France  and  by  holding  the  Duke  of  Burgundy  to 
his  faith,  to  distress  and  disturb  Charles  very  much,  Charles 
sometimes  asked  the  Maid  of  Orleans  what  the  Voices  said 
about  it?  But,  the  Voices  had  become  (very  like  ordinary 
voices  in  perplexed  times)  contradictory  and  confused,  so 
that  now  they  said  one  thing,  and  now  said  another,  and 
the  Maid  lost  credit  every  day.  Charles  marched  on  Paris, 
which  was  opposed  to  him,  and  attacked  the  suburb  of 
Saint  Honore.  In  this  fight,  being  again  struck  down  into 
the  ditch,  she  was  abandoned  by  the  whole  army.  She  lay 
unaided  among  a  heap  of  dead,  and  crawled  out  how  she 


194  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

could.  Then,  some  of  her  believers  went  over  to  an  oppo- 
sition Maid,  Catherine  of  La  Rochelle,  who  said  she  was 
inspired  to  tell  where  there  were  treasures  of  buried  money 
— though  she  never  did — and  then  Joan  accidentally  broke 
the  old,  old  sword,  and  others  said  that  her  power  was 
broken  with  it.  Finally,  at  the  siege  of  Compiegne,  held 
by  the  Duke  of  Burgundy,  where  she  did  valiant  service, 
she  was  basely  left  alone  in  a  retreat,  though  facing  about 
and  fighting  to  the  last ;  and  an  archer  pulled  her  off  her 
horse. 

0  the  uproar  that  was  made,  and  the  thanksgivings  that 
were  sung,  about  the  capture  of  this  one  poor  country-girl ! 
O  the  way  in  which  she  was  demanded  to  be  tried  for  sor- 
cery and  heresy,  and  anything  else  you  like,  by  the  Inquis- 
itor-General of  France,  and  by  this  great  man,  and  by  that 
great  man,  until  it  is  wearisome  to  think  of!  She  was 
bought  at  last  by  the  Bishop  of  Beauvais  for  ten  thousand 
francs,  and  was  shut  up  in  her  narrow  prison :  plain  Joan 
of  Arc  again,  and  Maid  of  Orleans  no  more. 

1  should  never  have  done  if  I  were  to  tell  you  how  they 
had  Joan  out  to  examine  her,  and  cross-examine  her,  and 
re-examine  her,  and  worry  her  into  saying  anything  and 
everything ;  and  how  all  sorts  of  scholars  and  doctors  be- 
stowed their  utmost  tediousness  upon  her.  Sixteen  times 
she  was  brought  out  and  shut  up  again,  and  worried,  and 
entrapped,  and  argued  with,  until  she  was  heart-sick  of  the 
dreary  business.  On  the  last  occasion  of  this  kind  she  was 
brought  into  a  burial-place  at  Rouen,  dismally  decorated 
with  a  scaffold,  and  a  stake  and  faggots,  and  the  execu- 
tioner, and  a  pulpit  with  a  friar  therein,  and  an  awful  ser- 
mon ready.  It  is  very  affecting  to  know  that  even  at  that 
pass  the  poor  girl  honoured  the  mean  vermin  of  a  King, 
who  had  so  used  her  for  his  purposes  and  so  abandoned  her ; 
and,  that  while  she  had  been  regardless  of  reproaches 
heaped  upon  herself,  she  spoke  out  courageously  for  him. 

It  was  natural  in  one  so  young  to  hold  to  life.  To  save 
her  life,  she  signed  a  declaration  prepared  for  her — signed 
it  with  a  cross,  for  she  couldn't  write — that  all  her  visions 
and  Voices  had  come  from  the  Devil.  Upon  her  recanting 
the  past,  and  protesting  that  she  would  never  wear  a  man's 
dress  in  future,  she  was  condemned  to  imprisonment  for 
life,  "on  the  brfead  of  sorrow  and  the  water  of  afflic- 
tion." 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  195 

But,  on  the  bread  of  sorrow  and  the  water  of  affliction, 
the  visions  and  the  Voices  soon  returned.  It  was  quite 
natural  that  they  should  do  so,  for  that  kind  of  disease  is 
much  aggravated  by  fasting,  loneliness,  and  anxiety  of 
mind.  It  was  not  only  got  out  of  Joan  that  she  considered 
herself  inspired  again,  but,  she  was  taken  in  a  man's  dress, 
which  had  been  left — to  entrap  her — in  her  prison,  and 
which  she  put  on,  in  her  solitude ;  perhaps,  in  remembrance 
of  her  past  glories,  perhaps,  because  the  imaginary  Voices 
told  her.  For  this  relapse  into  the  sorcery  and  heresy  and 
anything  else  you  like,  she  was  sentenced  to  be  burnt  to 
death.  And,  in  the  market-place  of  Eouen,  in  the  hideous 
dress  which  the  monks  had  invented  for  such  spectacles ; 
with  priests  and  bishops  sitting  in  a  gallery  looking  on, 
though  some  had  the  Christian  grace  to  go  away,  unable  to 
endure  the  infamous  scene ;  this  shrieking  girl — last  seen 
amidst  the  smoke  and  fire,  holding  a  crucifix  between  her 
hands ;  last  heard,  calling  upon  Christ — was  burnt  to  ashes. 
They  threw  her  ashes  into  the  river  Seine ;  but  they  will 
rise  against  her  murderers  on  the  last  day. 

From  the  moment  of  her  capture,  neither  the  French 
King  nor  one  single  man  in  all  his  court  raised  a  finger  to 
save  her.  It  is  no  defence  of  them  that  they  may  have 
never  really  believed  in  her,  or  that  they  may  have  won  her 
victories  by  their  skill  and  bravery.  The  more  they  pre- 
tended to  believe  in  her,  the  more  they  had  caused  her  to 
believe  in  herself ;  and  she  had  ever  been  true  to  them,  ever 
brave,  ever  nobly  devoted.  But,  it  is  no  wonder,  that  they, 
who  were  in  all  things  false  to  themselves,  false  to  one 
another,  false  to  their  country,  false  to  Heaven,  false  to 
Earth,  should  be  monsters  of  ingratitude  and  treachery  to 
a  helpless  peasant  girl. 

In  the  picturesque  old  town  of  Rouen,  where  weeds  and 
grass  grow  high  on  the  cathedral  towers,  and  the  venerable 
Norman  streets  are  still  warm  in  the  blessed  sunlight 
though  the  monkish  fires  that  once  gleamed  horribly  upon 
them  have  long  grown  cold,  there  is  a  statue  of  Joan  of 
Arc,  in  the  scene  of  her  last  agony,  the  square  to  which 
she  has  given  its  present  name.  I  know  some  statues  of 
modern  times — even  in  the  World's  metropolis,  I  think — 
which  commemorate  less  constancy,  less  earnestness, 
smaller  claims  upon  the  world's  attention,  and  much  gieatei 
impostors. 


196  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 


PABT    THE    THIRD. 

Bad  deeds  seldom  prosper,  happily  for  mankind ;  and  the 
English  cause  gained  no  advantage  from  the  cruel  death  of 
Joan  of  Arc.  For  a  long  time,  the  war  went  heavily  on. 
The  Duke  of  Bedford  died ;  the  alliance  with  the  Duke  of 
Burgundy  was  broken ;  and  Lord  Talbot  became  a  great 
general  on  the  English  side  in  France.  But,  two  of  the 
consequences  of  wars  are.  Famine — because  the  people 
cannot  peacefully  cultivate  the  ground — and  Pestilence, 
which  comes  of  want,  misery,  and  suffering.  Both  these 
horrors  broke  out  in  both  countries,  and  lasted  for  two 
wretched  years.  Then,  the  war  went  on  again,  and  came 
by  slow  degrees  to  be  so  badly  conducted  by  the  English 
government,  that,  within  twenty  years  from  the  execution 
of  the  Maid  of  Orleans,  of  all  the  great  French  conquests, 
the  town  of  Calais  alone  remained  in  English  hands 

While  these  victories  and  defeats  were  taking  place  in  the 
course  of  time,  many  strange  things  happened  at  home. 
The  young  King,  as  he  grew  up,  proved  to  be  very  unlike 
his  great  father,  and  showed  himself  a  miserable  puny 
creature.  There  was  no  harm  in  him — he  had  a  great 
aversion  to  shedding  blood :  which  was  something — but,  he 
was  a  weak,  silly,  helpless  young  man,  and  a  mere  shuttle- 
cock to  the  great  lordly  battledores  about  the  Court. 

Of  these  battledores.  Cardinal  Beaufort,  a  relation  of  the 
King,  and  the  Duke  of  Gloucester,  were  at  first  the  most 
powerful.  The  Duke  of  Gloucester  had  a  wife,  who  was 
nonsensically  accused  of  practising  witchcraft  to  cause  the 
King's  death  and  lead  to  her  husband's  coming  to  the  throne, 
he  being  the  next  heir.  She  was  charged  with  having,  by 
the  help  of  a  ridiculous  old  woman  named  Margery  (who 
was  called  a  witch),  made  a  little  waxen  doll  in  the  King's 
likeness,  and  put  it  before  a  slow  tire  that  it  might  gradu- 
ally melt  away.  It  was  supposed,  in  such  cases,  that  the 
death  of  the  person  whom  the  doll  was  made  to  represent, 
was  sure  to  happen.  Whether  the  duchess  was  as  ignorant 
as  the  rest  of  them,  and  really  did  make  such  a  doll  with 
such  an  intention,  I  don't  know;  but,  you  and  I  know  very 
well  that  she  might  have  made  a  thousand  dolls,  if  she  had 
been  stupid  enough,  and  might  have  melted  them  all,  with- 
out hurting  the  King  or  anybody  else.     However,  she  was 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  197 

tried  for  it,  and  so  was  old  Margery,  and  so  was  one  of  the 
duke's  chaplains,  who  was  charged  with  having  assisted 
them.  Both  he  and  Margery  were  pat  to  death,  and  the 
duchess,  after  being  taken  on  foot  and  bearing  a  lighted 
caudle,  three  times  round  the  City,  as  a  penance,  was  im- 
prisoned for  life.  The  duke,  himself,  took  all  this  pretty 
quietly,  and  made  as  little  stir  about  the  matter  as  if  he 
were  rather  glad  to  be  rid  of  the  duchess. 

But,  he  was  not  destined  to  keep  himself  out  of  trouble 
long.  The  royal  shuttlecock  being  three-and-twenty,  the 
battledores  were  very  anxious  to  get  him  married.  The 
Duke  of  Gloucester  wanted  him  to  marry  a  daughter  of 
the  Count  of  Armagnac ;  but,  the  Cardinal  and  the  Earl  of 
Suffolk  were  all  for  Margaret,  the  daughter  of  the  King 
of  Sicil}^,  who  they  knew  was  a  resolute  ambitious  woman 
and  would  govern  the  King  as  she  chose.  To  make 
friends  with  this  lady,  the  Earl  of  Suffolk,  who  went  over 
to  arrange  the  match,  consented  to  accept  her  for  the 
King's  wife  without  any  fortune,  and  even  to  give  up  the 
two  most  valuable  possessions  England  then  had  in  France. 
So,  the  marriage  was  arranged,  on  terms  very  advantageous 
to  the  lady ;  and  Lord  Suffolk  brought  her  to  England,  and 
she  was  married  at  Westminster.  On  what  pretence  this 
Queen  and  her  party  charged  the  Duke  of  Gloucester  with 
high  treason  within  a  couple  of  years,  it  is  impossible  to 
make  out,  the  matter  is  so  confused ;  but,  they  pretended 
that  the  King's  life  was  in  danger,  and  they  took  the  duke 
prisoner.  A  fortnight  afterwards,  he  was  found  dead  in 
bed  (they  said),  and  his  body  was  shown  to  the  people, 
and  Lord  Suffolk  came  in  for  the  best  part  of  his  estates. 
You  know  by  this  time  how  strangely  liable  state  prisoners 
were  to  sudden  death. 

If  Cardinal  Beaufort  had  any  hand  in  this  matter,  it  did 
him  no  good,  for  he  died  within  six  weeks ;  thinking  it 
very  hard  and  curious — at  eighty  years  old! — that  he  could 
not  live  to  be  Pope. 

This  was  the  time  when  England  had  completed  her  loss 
of  all  her  great  French  conquests.  The  people  charged  the 
loss  principally  upon  the  Earl  of  Suffolk,  now  a  duke,  who 
had  made  those  easy  terms  about  the  Royal  Marriage,  and 
who,  they  believed,  had  even  been  bought  by  France.  So 
he  was  impeached  as  a  traitor,  on  a  great  number  of 
charges,  but  chiefly  on  accusations  of  having  aided  the 


198  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

French  King,  and  of  designing  to  make  his  own  son  King 
of  England.  The  Commons  and  the  people  being  violent 
against  him,  the  King  was  made  (by  his  friends)  to  inter- 
pose to  save  him,  by  banishing  him  for  five  years,  and  pro- 
roguing the  Parliament.  The  duke  had  much  ado  to  es- 
cape from  a  London  mob,  two  thousand  strong,  who  lay  in 
wait  for  him  in  Saint  Giles's  fields;  but,  he  got  down  to 
his  own  estates  in  Suffolk,  and  sailed  away  from  Ipswich, 
Sailing  across  the  Channel,  he  sent  into  Calais  to  know  if 
he  might  laud  there ;  but,  they  kept  his  boat  and  men  in 
the  harbour,  until  an  English  ship,  carrying  a  hundred  and 
fifty  men  and  called  the  Nicholas  of  the  Tower,  came 
alongside  his  little  vessel,  and  ordered  him  on  board. 
"  Welcome,  traitor,  as  men  say,"  was  the  captain's  grim 
and  not  very  respectful  salutation.  He  was  kept  on  board, 
a  prisoner,  for  eight-and-forty  hours,  and  then  a  small 
boat  appeared  rowing  toward  the  ship.  As  this  boat  came 
nearer,  it  was  seen  to  have  in  it  a  block,  a  rusty  sword,  and 
an  executioner  in  a  black  mask.  The  duke  was  handed 
down  into  it,  and  there  his  head  was  cut  off  with  six  strokes 
of  the  rusty  sword.  Then,  the  little  boat  rowed  away  to 
Dover  beach,  where  the  body  was  cast  out,  and  left  until 
the  duchess  claimed  it.  By  whom,  high  in  authority,  this 
murder  was  committed,  has  never  appeared  No  one  was 
ever  punished  for  it. 

There  now  arose  in  Kent  an  Irishman,  who  gave  himself 
the  name  of  Mortimer,  but  whose  real  name  was  Jack 
Cade.  Jack,  in  imitation  of  Wat  Tyler,  though  he  was  a 
very  different  and  inferior  sort  of  man,  addressed  the 
Kentish  men  upon  their  wrongs,  occasioned  by  the  bad 
government  of  England,  among  so  many  battledores  and 
such  a  poor  shuttlecock ;  and  the  Kentish  men  rose  up  to 
the  number  of  twenty  thousand.  Their  place  of  assembly 
was  Blackheath,  where,  headed  by  Jack,  they  put  forth 
two  papers,  which  they  called  "  Tlie  Complaint  of  the 
Commons  of  Kent,"  and  "The  Requests  of  the  Captain 
of  the  Great  Assembly  in  Kent."  They  then  retired  to 
Sevenoaks.  The  royal  army  coming  up  with  them  here, 
they  beat  it  and  killed  their  general.  Then,  Jack  dressed 
himself  in  the  dead  general's  armour,  and  led  his  men  to 
London. 

Jack  passed  into  the  City  from  Southwark,  over  the 
bridge,  and  entered  it  in  triumph,  giving  the  strictest  orders 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  199 

to  his  men  not  to  plunder.  Having  made  a  show  of  his 
forces  there,  while  the  citizens  looked  on  quietly,  he  went 
back  into  South wark  in  good  order,  and  passed  the  night. 
Next  day,  he  came  back  again,  having  got  hold  in  the  mean- 
time of  Lord  Say,  an  unpopular  nobleman.  Says  Jack  to 
the  Lord  Mayor  and  judges :  "  Will  you  be  so  good  as  to 
make  a  tribunal  in  Guildhall,  and  try  me  this  nobleman?  " 
The  court  being  hastily  made,  he  was  found  guilty,  and 
Jack  and  his  men  cut  his  head  oft"  on  Cornhill.  They  also 
cut  off  the  head  of  his  son-in-law,  and  then  went  back  in 
good  order  to  Southwark  again. 

But,  although  the  citizens  could  bear  the  beheading  of 
an  unpopular  lord,  they  could  not  bear  to  have  their  houses 
pillaged.  And  it  did  so  happen  that  Jack,  after  dinner — 
perhaps  he  had  drunk  a  little  too  much — began  to  plunder 
the  house  where  he  lodged;  upon  which,  of  course,  his 
men  began  to  imitate  him.  Wherefore,  the  Londoners  took 
counsel  with  Lord  Scales,  who  had  a  thousand  soldiers  in 
the  Tower ;  and  defended  London  Bridge,  and  kept  Jack 
and  his  people  out.  This  advantage  gained,  it  was  resolved 
by  divers  great  men  to  divide  Jack's  army  in  the  old  way, 
by  making  a  great  many  promises  on  behalf  of  the  state, 
that  were  never  intended  to  be  performed.  This  did  divide 
them;  some  of  Jack's  men  saying  that  they  ought  to  take 
the  conditions  which  were  offered,  and  others  saying  that 
they  ought  not,  for  they  were  only  a  snare ;  some  going 
home  at  once;  others  staying  where  they  were;  and  all 
doubting  and  quarrelling  among  themselves. 

Jack,  who  was  in  two  minds  about  fighting  or  accepting 
a  pardon,  and  who  indeed  did  both,  saw  at  last  that  there 
was  nothing  to  expect  from  his  men,  and  that  it  was  very 
likely  some  of  them  would  deliver  him  up  and  get  a  reward 
of  a  thousand  marks,  which  was  offered  for  his  apprehen- 
sion. So,  after  they  had  travelled  and  quarrelled  all  the 
way  from  Southwark  to  Blackheath,  and  from  Clackheath 
to  Rochester,  he  mounted  a  good  horse  and  galloped  away 
into  Sussex.  But,  there  galloped  after  him,  on  a  better 
horse,  one  Alexander  Iden,  who  came  up  with  him,  had 
a  hard  fight  with  him,  and  killed  him.  Jack's  head  was 
set  aloft  on  London  Bridge,  with  the  face  looking  towards 
Blackheath,  where  he  had  raised  his  flag;  and  Alexander 
Iden  got  the  thousand  marks. 

It  is  supposed  by  some,  that  the  Duke  of  York,  who  had 


200  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND. 

been  removed  from  a  high  post  abroad  through  the  Queen's 
influence,  and  sent  out  of  the  way,  to  govern  Ireland,  was 
at  the  bottom  of  this  rising  of  J  ack  and  his  men,  because 
he  wanted  to  trouble  the  government.  He  claimed  (though 
not  yet  publicly)  to  have  a  better  right  to  the  throne  than 
Henry  of  Lancaster,  as  one  of  the  family  of  the  Earl  of 
March,  whom  Henry  the  Fourth  had  set  aside.  Touching 
this  claim,  which,  being  through  female  relationship,  was 
not  according  to  the  usual  descent,  it  is  enough  to  say  that 
Henry  the  Fourth  was  the  free  choice  of  the  people  and  the 
Parliament,  and  that  his  family  had  now  reigned  undisputed 
for  sixty  years.  The  memory  of  Henry  the  Fifth  was  so 
famous,  and  the  English  people  loved  it  so  much,  that  the 
Duke  of  York's  claim  would,  perhaps,  never  have  been 
thought  of  (it  would  have  been  so  hopeless)  but  for  the  un- 
fortunate circumstance  of  the  present  King's  being  by  this 
time  quite  an  idiot,  and  the  country  very  ill  governed. 
These  two  circumstances  gave  the  Duke  of  York  a  power 
he  could  not  otherwise  have  had. 

Whether  the  duke  knew  anything  of  Jack  Cade,  or  not, 
he  came  over  from  Ireland  while  Jack's  head  was  on  Lon- 
don Bridge ;  being  secretly  advised  that  the  Queen  was  set- 
ting up  his  enemy,  the  Duke  of  Somerset,  against  him. 
He  went  to  Westminster,  at  the  head  of  four  thousand  men, 
and  on  his  knees  before  the  King,  represented  to  him  the 
bad  state  of  the  country,  and  petitioned  him  to  summon 
a  Parliament  to  consider  it.  This  the  King  promised. 
When  the  Parliament  was  summoned,  the  Duke  of  York 
accused  the  Duke  of  Somerset,  and  the  Duke  of  Somerset 
accused  the  Duke  of  York ;  and,  both  in  and  out  of  Parlia- 
ment, the  followers  of  each  party  were  full  of  violence  and 
hatred  towards  the  other.  At  length  the  Duke  of  York  put 
himself  at  the  head  of  a  large  force  of  his  tenants,  and,  in 
arms,  demanded  the  reformation  of  the  Government.  Be- 
ing shut  out  of  London,  he  encamped  at  Dartford,  and 
the  royal  army  encamped  at  Blackheatli.  According  as 
either  side  triumphed,  the  Duke  of  York  was  arrested,  or 
the  Duke  of  Somerset  was  arrested.  The  trouble  ended, 
for  the  moment,  in  the  Duke  of  York  renewing  his  oath 
of  allegiance,  and  going  in  peace  to  one  of  his  own 
castles. 

Half  a  year  afterwards  the  Queen  gave  birth  to  a  son, 
who  was  very  ill  received  by  the  people,  and  not  believed 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  *^1 

to  be  the  son  of  the  King,  It  shows  the  Duke  of  York  to 
have  been  a  moderate  man,  unwilling  to  involve  England  in 
new  troubles,  that  he  did  not  take  advantage  of  the  gen- 
eral discontent  at  this  time,  but  really  acted  for  the  public 
good.  He  was  made  a  member  of  the  cabinet,  and  the 
King  being  now  so  much  worse  that  he  could  not  be  carried 
about  and  shown  to  the  people  with  any  decency,  the  duke 
was  made  Lord  Protector  of  the  kingdom,  until  the  King 
should  recover,  or  the  Prince  should  come  of  age.  At  the 
same  time  the  Duke  of  Somerset  was  committed  to  the 
Tower.  So,  now  the  Duke  of  Somerset  was  down,  and 
the  Duke  of  York  was  up.  By  the  end  of  the  year,  how- 
ever, the  King  recovered  his  memory  and  some  spark  of 
sense;  upon  which  the  Queen  used  her  power — which 
recovered  with  him — to  get  the  Protector  disgraced,  and  her 
favourite  released.  So  now  the  Duke  of  York  was  down, 
and  the  Duke  of  Somerset  was  up. 

These  ducal  ups  and  downs  gradually  separated  the 
whole  nation  into  the  two  parties  of  York  and  Lancaster, 
and  led  to  those  terrible  civil  wars  long  known  as  the  Wars 
of  the  Red  and  White  Roses,  because  the  red  rose  was  the 
badge  of  the  House  of  Lancaster,  and  the  white  rose  was 
the  badge  of  the  House  of  York. 

The  Duke  of  York,  joined  by  some  other  powerful  noble- 
men of  the  Wliite  Rose  party,  and  leading  a  small  army, 
met  the  King  with  another  small  army  at  St.  Alban's,  and 
demanded  that  the  Duke  of  Somerset  should  be  given  up. 
The  poor  King,  being  made  to  say  in  answer  that  he  would 
sooner  die,  was  instantly  attacked.  The  Duke  of  Somer- 
set was  killed,  and  the  King  himself  was  wounded  in  the 
neck,  and  took  refuge  in  the  house  of  a  poor  tanner. 
Whereupon,  the  Duke  of  York  went  to  him,  led  him  with 
great  submission  to  the  Abbey,  and  said  he  was  very  sorry 
for  what  had  happened.  Having  now  the  King  in  his  pos- 
session, he  got  a  Parliament  summoned  and  himself  once 
more  made  Protector,  but,  only  for  a  few  months ;  for,  on 
the  King  getting  a  little  better  again,  the  Queen  and  her 
party  got  him  into  their  possession,  and  disgraced  the  duke 
once  more.     So,  now  the  Duke  of  York  was  down  again. 

Some  of  the  best  men  in  power,  seeing  the  danger  of 
these  constant  changes,  tried  even  then  to  prevent  the  Red 
and  the  White  Rose  Wars.  They  brought  about  a  great 
council  in  London  between  the  two  parties.     The  White 


202  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND. 

Roses  assembled  in  Blackfriars,  the  Red  Roses  in  White- 
friars;  and  some  good  priests  communicated  between  them, 
and  made  the  proceedings  known  at  evening  to  the  King 
and  the  judges.  They  ended  in  a  peaceful  agreement  that 
there  should  be  no  more  quarrelling ;  and  there  was  a  great 
royal  procession  to  Saint  Paul's,  in  which  the  Queen  walked 
arm-in-arm  with  her  old  enemy,  the  Duke  of  York,  to 
show  the  people  how  comfortable  they  all  were.  This 
state  of  peace  lasted  half  a  year,  when  a  dispute  between 
the  Earl  of  Warwick  (one  of  the  Duke's  powerful  friends) 
and  some  of  the  King's  servants  at  Court,  led  to  an 
attack  upon  that  Earl — who  was  a  White  Rose — and  to  a 
sudden  breaking  out  of  all  old  animosities.  So,  here  were 
greater  ups  and  downs  than  ever. 

There  were  even  greater  ups  and  downs  than  these,  soon 
after.  After  various  battles,  the  Duke  of  York  fled  to  Ire- 
land, and  his  son  the  Earl  of  March  to  Calais,  with  their 
friends  tlie  Earls  of  Salisbury  and  Warwick;  and  a  Parlia- 
ment was  held  declaring  them  ^11  traitors.  Little  the 
worse  for  this,  the  Earl  of  Warwick  presently  came  back, 
landed  in  Kent,  was  joined  by  the  Archbishop  of  Canter- 
bury and  other  powerful  noblemen  and  gentlemen,  engaged 
the  King's  forces  at  Northampton,  signally  defeated  them, 
and  took  the  King  himself  prisoner,  who  was  found  in  his 
tent.  Warwick  would  have  been  glad,  I  dare  say,  to  have 
taken  the  Queen  and  Prince  too,  but  they  escaped  into 
Wales  and  thence  into  Scotland. 

The  King  was  carried  by  the  victorious  force  straight  to 
London,  and  made  to  call  a  new  Parliament,  which  imme- 
diately declared  that  the  Duke  of  York  and  those  other 
noblemen  were  not  traitors,  but  excellent  subjects.  Then, 
back  comes  the  duke  from  Ireland  at  the  head  of  five  hun- 
dred horsemen,  rides  from  London  to  Westminster,  and  en- 
ters the  House  of  Lords.  There,  he  laid  his  hand  upon  the 
cloth  of  gold  which  covered  the  empty  throne,  as  if  he  had 
half  a  mind  to  sit  down  in  it— but  he  did  not.  On  the 
Archbishop  of  Canterbury  asking  him  if  he  would  visit  the 
King,  who  was  in  his  palace  close  by,  he  replied  "  I  know 
no  one  in  this  country,  my  lord,  who  ought  not  to  visit 
me."  None  of  the  lords  present  spoke  a  single  word;  so, 
the  duke  went  out  as  he  had  come  in,  established  himself 
royally  in  the  King's  palace,  and,  six  days  afterwards, 
Bent  in  to  the  Lords  a  formal  statement  of  his  claim  to  the 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  203 

throne.  The  Lords  went  to  the  King  on  this  momentous 
subject,  and  after  a  great  deal  of  discussion,  in  which  the 
judges  and  the  other  law  officers  were  afraid  to  give  an 
opinion  on  either  side,  the  question  was  compromised.  It 
was  agreed  that  the  present  King  should  retain  the  crown 
for  his  life,  and  that  it  should  then  pass  to  the  Duke  of 
York  and  his  heirs. 

But,  the  resolute  Queen,  determined  on  asserting  her 
son's  right,  would  hear  of  no  such  thing.  She  came  from 
Scotland  to  the  north  of  England,  where  several  powerful 
lords  armed  in  her  cause.  The  Duke  of  York,  for  his  part, 
set  off  with  some  five  thousand  men,  a  little  time  before 
Christmas  Day,  one  thousand  four  hundred  and  sixty,  to 
give  her  battle.  He  lodged  at  Sandal  Castle,  near  Wake- 
fied,  and  the  Ked  Roses  defied  him  to  come  out  on  Wake- 
field Green,  and  fight  them  then  and  there.  His  generals 
said,  he  had  best  wait  until  his  gallant  son,  the  Earl  of 
March,  came  up  with  his  power ;  but,  he  was  determined 
to  accept  the  challenge.  He  did  so,  in  an  evil  hour.  He 
was  hotly  pressed  on  all  sides,  two  thousand  of  his  men  lay 
dead  on  Wakefield  Green,  and  he  himself  was  taken  pris- 
oner. They  set  him  down  in  mock  state  on  an  ant-hill, 
and  twisted  grass  about  his  head,  and  pretended  to  pay 
court  to  him  on  their  knees,  saying,  "  0  King,  without  a 
kingdom,  and  Prince  without  a  people,  we  hope  your  gra- 
cious Majesty  is  very  well  and  happy !  "  They  did  worse 
than  this ;  they  cut  his  head  off,  and  handed  it  on  a  pole  to 
the  Queen,  who  laughed  with  delight  when  she  saw  it  (you 
recollect  their  walking  so  religiously  and  comfortably  to 
Saint  Paul's!),  and  had  it  fixed,  with  a  paper  crown  upon 
its  head,  on  the  walls  of  York.  The  Earl  of  Salisbury  lost 
his  head,  too;  and  the  Duke  of  York's  second  son,  a  hand- 
some boy  who  was  flying  with  his  tutor  over  Wakefield 
Bridge,  was  stabbed  in  the  heart  by  a  murderous  lord — 
Lord  Clitford  by  name — whose  father  had  been  killed  by 
the  Wliite  Roses  in  the  fight  at  St.  Alban's.  There  was 
awful  sacrifice  of  life  in  this  battle,  for  no  quarter  was 
given,  and  the  Queen  was  wild  for  revenge.  When  men 
unnaturally  fight  against  their  own  countrymen,  they  are 
always  observed  to  be  more  unnaturally  cruel  and  filled 
with  rage  than  they  are  against  any  other  enemy. 

But,  Lord  Clifford  had  stabbed  the  second  son  of  the 
Duke  of  York — not  the  first.     Tlie  eldest  son,  Edward  Earl 


204  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND 

of  March,  was  at  Gloucester ;  and,  vowing  vengeance  for 
the  death  of  his  father,  his  brother,  and  their  faithful 
friends,  he  began  to  march  against  the  Queen.  He  had  to 
turn  and  fight  a  great  body  of  Welsh  and  Irish  first,  who 
worried  his  advance.  These  he  defeated  in  a  great  fight  at 
Mortimer's  Cross,  near  Hereford,  where  he  beheaded  a 
number  of  the  Red  Koses  taken  in  battle,  in  retaliation  for 
the  beheading  of  the  White  Roses  at  Wakefield.  The 
Queen  had  the  next  turn  of  beheading.  Having  moved 
towards  London,  and  falling  in,  between  St.  Alban's  and 
Barnet,  with  the  Earl  of  Warwick  and  the  Duke  of  Nor- 
folk, White  Roses  both,  who  were  there  with  an  army  to 
oppose  her,  and  had  got  the  King  with  them ;  she  defeated 
them  with  great  loss,  and  struck  off  the  heads  of  two  pris- 
oners of  note,  who  were  in  the  King's  tent  with  him,  and 
to  whom  the  King  had  promised  his  protection.  Her  tri- 
umph, however,  was  very  short.  She  had  no  treasure,  and 
her  army  subsisted  by  pKinder.  This  caused  them  to  be 
hated  and  dreaded  by  the  people,  and  particularly  by  the 
London  people,  who  were  wealthy.  As  soon  as  the  Lon- 
doners heard  that  Edward,  Earl  of  March,  united  with  the 
Earl  of  Warwick,  was  advancing  towards  the  city,  they  re- 
fused to  send  the  Queen  supplies,  and  made  a  great  rejoic- 
ing. 

The  Queen  and  her  men  retreated  with  all  speed,  and 
Edward  and  Warwick  came  on,  greeted  with  loud  acclama- 
tions on  every  side.  The  courage,  beauty,  aud  virtues  of 
young  Edward  could  not  be  sufficiently  praised  by  tlie 
whole  people.  He  rode  into  London  like  a  conqueror,  and 
met  with  an  enthusiastic  welcome.  A  few  days  afterwards, 
Lord  Ealconbridge  and  tlie  Bishop  of  Exeter  assembled  the 
citizens  in  Saint  John's  Field,  Clerkenwell,  and  asked  them 
if  they  would  have  Henry  of  Lancaster  for  their  King?  To 
this  they  all  roared,  "No,  no,  no!"  and  "King  Edward! 
King  Edward!  "  Then,  said  those  noblemen,  would  they 
love  and  serve  young  Edward!  To  this  they  all  cried, 
"  Yes,  yes ! "  and  threw  up  their  caps  and  clapped  their 
hands,  and  cheered  tremendously. 

Therefore,  it  was  declared  that  by  joining  the  Queen  and 
not  protecting  those  two  prisoners  of  note,  Henry  of  Lan- 
caster had  forfeited  the  crown ;  and  Edward  of  York  was 
proclaimed  King.  He  made  a  great  speech  to  the  ap- 
plauding people  at  Westminster,  and  sat  down  as  sover- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  205 

eign  of  England  on  that  throne,  on  the  golden  covering  of 
which  his  father — worthy  of  a  better  fate  than  the  bloody 
axe  which  cut  the  thread  of  so  many  lives  in  Englau(^ 
through  so  many  years — liad  laid  his  hand. 


CHAPTER    XXIII. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  EDWARD  THE  FOURTH. 

King  Edward  the  Fourth  was  not  quite  twenty-one 
years  of  age  when  he  took  that  unquiet  seat  upon  the 
throne  of  England.  The  Lancaster  party,  the  Red  Roses, 
were  then  assembling  in  great  numbers  near  York,  and  it 
was  necessary  to  give  them  battle  instantly.  But,  the  stout 
Earl  of  Warwick  leading  for  the  young  King,  and  the 
young  King  himself  closely  following  him,  and  the  Eng- 
lish people  crowding  round  the  Royal  standard,  the  White 
and  the  Red  Roses  met,  on  a  wild  March  day  when  the 
snow  was  falling  heavily,  at  Towton;  and  there  such  a 
furious  battle  raged  between  them,  that  the  total  loss 
amounted  to  forty  thousand  men — all  Englishmen,  fight- 
ing, upon  English  ground,  against  one  another.  The 
young  King  gained  the  day,  took  down  the  heads  of  his 
father  and  brother  from  the  walls  of  York,  and  put  up  the 
heads  of  some  of  the  most  famous  noblemen  engaged  in  the 
battle  on  the  other  side.  Then,  he  went  to  London  and 
was  crowned  with  great  splendour. 

A  new  Parliament  met.  No  fewer  than  one  hundred 
and  iifty  of  the  principal  noblemen  and  gentlemen  on  the 
Lancaster  side  were  declared  traitors,  and  the  King — who 
had  very  little  humanity,  though  he  was  handsome  in  per- 
son and  agreeable  in  manners — resolved  to  do  all  he  could, 
to  pluck  up  the  Red  Rose  root  and  branch. 

Qi^een  Margaret,  however,  was  still  active  for  her  young 
son.  She  obtained  help  from  Scotland  and  from  Nor- 
mandy, and  took  several  important  English  castles.  But, 
Warwick  soon  retook  them ;  the  Queen  lost  all  her  treasure 
on  board  ship  in  a  great  storm;  and  both  she  and  her  sou 
suffered  great  misfortunes.  Once,  in  the  winter  weather, 
as  they  were  riding  through  a  forest,  they  were  attacked 


206  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

and  plundered  by  a  party  of  robbers ;  and,  when  they  had 
escaped  from  these  men  and  were  passing  alone  and  on  foot 
through  a  thick  dark  part  of  the  wood,  they  came,  all  at 
once,  upon  another  robber.  So  the  Queen,  with  a  stout 
heart,  took  the  little  Prince  by  the  hand,  and  going 
straight  up  to  that  robber,  said  to  him,  "  My  friend,  this 
is  the  young  son  of  your  lawful  King !  I  confide  him  to 
your  care. "  The  robber  was  surprised,  but  took  the  boy 
in  his  arms,  and  faithfully  restored  him  and  his  mother 
to  their  friends.  In  the  end,  the  Queen's  soldiers  being 
beaten  and  dispersed,  she  went  abroad  again,  and  kept  quiet 
for  the  present. 

Now,  all  this  time,  the  deposed  King  Henry  was  con- 
cealed hj  a  Welsh  knight,  who  kept  him  close  in  his  cas- 
tle. But,  next  year,  the  Lancaster  party  recovering  their 
spirits,  raised  a  large  body  of  men,  and  called  him  out  of 
his  retirement,  to  put  him  at  their  head.  They  were 
joined  by  some  powerful  noblemen  who  had  sworn  fidelity 
to  the  new  King,  but  who  were  ready,  as  usual,  to  break 
their  oaths,  whenever  they  thought  there  was  anything  to 
be  got  by  it.  One  of  the  worst  things  in  the  history  of  the 
war  of  the  Red  and  White  Roses  is  the  ease  with  which 
these  noblemen,  who  should  have  set  an  example  of  hon- 
our to  the  people,  left  either  side  as  they  took  slight  of- 
fence, or  were  disappointed  in  their  greedy  expectations, 
and  joined  the  other.  Well !  Warwick's  brother  soon  beat 
the  Lancastrians,  and  the  false  noblemen,  being  taken, 
were  beheaded  without  a  moment's  loss  of  time.  The  de- 
posed King  had  a  narrow  escape;  three  of  his  servants 
were  taken,  and  one  of  them  bore  his  cap  of  estate,  which 
was  set  with  pearls  and  embroidered  with  two  golden 
crowns.  However,  the  head  to  which  the  cap  belonged  got 
safely  into  Lancashire,  and  lay  pretty  quietty  there  (the' 
people  in  the  secret  being  very  true)  for  more  than  a  year. 
At  length,  an  old  monk  gave  such  intelligence  as  led  to 
Henry's  being  taken  while  he  was  sitting  at  dinner  in  a 
place  called  Waddington  Hall.  He  was  immediately  sent 
to  London,  and  met  at  Islington  by  the  Earl  of  Warwick, 
by  whose  directions  he  was  put  upon  a  horse,  with  his  legs 
tied  under  it,  and  paraded  three  times  round  the  pillory. 
Then,  he  was  carried  off  to  the  Tower,  where  they  treated 
him  well  enough. 

Tile  White  Rose  being  »o  triumphant,  the  young  Kingf 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  207 

abandoned  himself  entirely  to  pleasure,  and  led  a  jovial 
life.  But,  thorns  were  springing  up  under  his  bed  of  roses, 
as  he  soon  found  out.  For,  having  been  privately  married 
to  Elizabeth  Woodville,  a  young  widow  lady,  very  beau- 
tiful and  very  captivating;  and  at  last  resolving  to  make 
his  secret  known,  and  to  declare  her  his  Queen ;  he  gave 
some  offence  to  the  Earl  of  Warwick,  who  was  usually 
called  the  King-Maker,  because  of  his  power  and  influence, 
and  because  of  his  having  lent  such  great  help  to  placing 
Edward  on  the  throne.  This  offence  was  not  lessened 
by  the  jealousy  with  which  the  Nevil  family  (the  Earl  of 
Warwick's)  regarded  the  promotion  of  the  Woodville  fam- 
ily. For,  the  young  Queen  was  so  bent  on  providing  for 
her  relations,  that  she  made  her  father  an  earl  and  a  great 
officer  of  state ;  married  her  five  sisters  to  young  noblemen 
of  the  highest  rank ;  and  provided  for  her  younger  brother, 
a  young  man  of  twenty,  by  marrying  him  to  an  immensely 
rich  old  duchess  of  eighty.  The  Earl  of  Warwick  took  all 
this  pretty  graciously  for  a  man  of  his  proud  temper,  until 
the  question  arose  to  whom  the  King's  sister,  Margaret, 
should  be  married.  The  Earl  of  Warwick  said,  "  To  one 
of  the  French  King's  sons,"  and  was  allowed  to  go  over  to 
the  French  King  to  make  friendly  proposals  for  that  pur- 
pose, and  to  hold  all  manner  of  friendly  interviews  with 
him.  But,  while  he  was  so  engaged,  the  Woodville  party 
married  the  young  lady  to  the  Duke  of  Burgundy!  Upon 
this  he  came  back  in  great  rage  and  scorn,  and  shut  himself 
up  discontented,  in  his  Castle  of  Middleham. 

A  reconciliation,  though  not  a  very  sincere  one,  was 
patched  up  between  the  Earl  of  Warwick  and  the  King, 
and  lasted  until  the  earl  married  his  daughter,  against  the 
King's  wishes,  to  the  Duke  of  Clarence.  While  the  mar- 
riage was  being  celebrated  at  Calais,  the  people  in  the  north 
of  England,  where  the  influence  of  the  Nevil  family  was 
strongest,  broke  out  into  rebellion;  their  complaint  was, 
that  England  was  oppressed  and  plundered  by  the  Wood- 
ville family,  whom  they  demanded  to  have  removed  from 
power.  As  they  were  joined  by  great  numbers  of  people, 
and  as  they  openly  declared  that  they  were  supported  by 
the  Earl  of  Warwick,  the  King  did  not  know  what  to  do. 
At  last,  as  he  wrote  to  the  earl  beseeching  his  aid,  he  and 
his  new  son-in-law  came  over  to  England,  and  began  to 
arrange  the  business  by  shutting  the  King  up  in  Middleham 


208  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

Castle  in  the  safe  keeping  of  the  Archbishop  of  York ;  so 
England  was  not  only  in  the  strange  position  of  having 
two  Kings  at  once,  but  they  were  both  prisoners  at  the 
same  time. 

Even  as  yet,  however,  the  King-Maker  was  so  far  true 
to  the  King,  that  he  dispersed  a  new  rising  of  the  Lancas- 
trians, took  their  leader  prisoner,  and  brought  him  to  the 
King,  who  ordered  him  to  be  immediately  executed.  He 
presently  allowed  the  King  to  return  to  London,  and  there 
innumerable  pledges  of  forgiveness  and  friendship  Avere  ex- 
changed between  them,  and  between  the  Nevils  and  the 
Woodvilles;  the  King's  eldest  daughter  was  promised  in 
marriage  to  the  heir  of  the  Nevil  family ;  and  more  friendly 
oaths  were  sworn,  and  more  friendly  promises  made,  than 
this  book  would  hold. 

They  lasted  about  three  months.  At  the  end  of  that 
time,  the  Archbishop  of  York  made  a  feast  for  the  King, 
the  Earl  of  Warwick,  and  the  Duke  of  Clarence,  at  his 
house,  the  Moor,  in  Hertfordshire.  The  King  was  wash- 
ing his  hands  before  supper,  when  some  one  whispered  him 
that  a  body  of  a  hundred  men  were  lying  in  ambush  out- 
side the  house.  Whether  this  were  true  or  untrue,  the 
King  took  fright,  mounted  his  horse,  and  rode  through  the 
dark  night  to  Windsor  Castle.  Another  reconciliation  was 
patched  up  between  him  and  the  King-Maker,  bat  it  was  a 
short  one,  and  it  was  the  last.  A  new  rising  took  place  in 
Lincolnshire,  and  the  King  marched  to  repress  it.  Having 
done  so,  he  proclaimed  that  both  the  Earl  of  Warwick  and 
the  Duke  of  Clarence  were  traitors,  who  had  secretly  as 
sisted  it,  and  who  had  been  prepared  publicly  to  join  it  on 
the  following  day.  In  these  dangerous  circumstances  they 
both  took  ship  and  sailed  away  to  the  French  court. 

And  here  a  meeting  took  place  between  the  Earl  of  War- 
wick and  his  old  enemy,  the  Dowager  Queen  Margaret, 
through  whom  his  father  had  had  his  head  struck  off,  and 
to  whom  he  had  been  a  bitter  foe.  But,  now,  when  he 
said  that  he  had  done  with  the  ungrateful  and  perfidious 
Edward  of  York,  and  that  henceforth  he  devoted  himself 
to  the  restoration  of  the  House  of  Lancaster,  either  in  the 
person  of  her  husband  or  of  her  little  son,  she  embraced 
him  as  if  he  had  ever  been  her  dearest  friend.  She  did 
more  than  that ;  she  married  her  son  to  his  second  daugh- 
ter, the  Lady  Anne.     However  agreeable  this  marriage  was 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  209 

to  the  new  friends,  it  was  very  disagreeable  to  the  Duke  of 
Clarence,  who  perceived  that  his  father-in-law,  the  King- 
Maker,  would  never  make  him  King,  now.  So,  being  but 
a  weak-minded  young  traitor,  possessed  of  very  little  worth 
or  sense,  he  readily  listened  to  an  artful  court  lady  sent 
over  for  the  purpose,  and  promised  to  turn  traitor  once 
more,  and  go  over  to  his  brother.  King  Edward,  when  a 
fitting  opportunity  should  come. 

The  Earl  of  Warwick,  knowing  nothing  of  this,  soon  re- 
deemed his  promise  to  the  Dowager  Queen  Margaret,  by 
invading  England  and  landing  at  Plymouth,  where  he  in- 
stantly proclaimed  King  Henry,  and  summoned  all  Eng- 
lishmen between  the  ages  of  sixteen  and  sixty,  to  join  his 
banner.  Then,  with  his  army  increasing  as  he  marched 
along,  he  went  northward,  and  came  so  near  King  Edward, 
who  was  in  that  part  of  the  country,  that  Edward  had  to 
ride  hard  for  it  to  the  coast  of  Norfolk,  and  thence  to  get 
away  in  such  ships  as  he  could  find,  to  Holland.  There- 
upon, the  triumphant  King-Maker  and  his  false  son-in-law, 
the  Duke  of  Clarence,  went  to  London,  took  the  old  King 
out  of  the  Tower,  and  walked  him  in  a  great  procession  to 
Saint  Paul's  Cathedral  with  the  crown  upon  his  head. 
This  did  not  improve  the  temper  of  the  Duke  of  Clarence, 
who  saw  himself  farther  off  from  being  King  than  ever; 
but  he  kept  his  secret,  and  said  nothing.  The  Nevil  family 
were  restored  to  all  their  honours  and  glories,  and  the 
Woodvilles  and  the  rest  were  disgraced.  The  King-Maker, 
less  sanguinary  than  the  King,  shed  no  blood  except  that 
of  the  Earl  of  Worcester,  who  had  been  so  cruel  to  the 
people  as  to  have  gained  the  title  of  the  Butcher.  Him 
they  caught  hidden  in  a  tree,  and  him  they  tried  and  exe- 
cuted.    No  other  death  stained  the  King-Maker's  triumph. 

To  dispute  this  triumph,  back  came  King  Edward  again, 
next  year,  landing  at  Raven  spur,  coming  on  to  York, 
causing  all  his  men  to  cry  "  Long  live  King  Henry ! "  and 
swearing  on  the  altar,  without  a  blush,  that  he  came  to  lay 
no  claim  to  the  crown.  Now  was  the  time  for  the  Duke 
of  Clarence,  who  ordered  his  men  to  assume  the  White 
Rose,  and  declare  for  his  brother.  The  Marquis  of  Mon- 
tague, though  the  Earl  of  Warwick's  brother,  also  declin- 
ing to  fight  against  King  Edward,  he  went  on  successfully 
to  London,  where  the  Archbishop  of  York  let  him  into  the 
City,  and   where   the  people   made  great    demonstrations 


210  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

in  his  favour.  For  this  they  had  four  reasons.  Firstly, 
there  were  great  numbers  of  the  King's  adherents  hiding 
in  the  City  and  ready  to  break  out ;  secondly,  the  King 
owed  them  a  great  deal  of  money,  which  they  could  never 
hope  to  get  if  he  were  unsuccessful ;  thirdly,  there  was  a 
young  prince  to  inherit  the  crown ;  and  fourthly,  the  King 
was  gay  and  handsome,  and  more  popular  than  a  better 
man  might  have  been  with  the  City  ladies.  After  a  stay 
of  only  two  days  with  these  worthy  supporters,  the  King 
marched  out  to  Barnet  Common,  to  give  the  Earl  of  War- 
wick battle.  And  now  it  was  to  be  seen,  for  the  last  time, 
whether  the  King  or  the  King-Maker  was  to  carry  the  day. 

While  the  battle  was  yet  pending,  the  faint-hearted  Duke 
of  Clarence  began  to  repent,  and  sent  over  secret  messages 
to  his  father-in-law,  offering  his  services  in  mediation  with 
the  King.  But,  tlie  Eai-1  of  Warwick  disdainfully  rejected 
them,  and  replied  that  Clarence  was  false  and  perjured, 
and  that  he  would  settle  the  quarrel  by  the  sword.  The 
battle  began  at  four  o'clock  in  the  morning  and  lasted  until 
ten,  and  during  the  greater  part  of  the  time  it  was  fought 
in  a  thick  mist — absurdly  supposed  to  be  raised  by  a  magi- 
cian. The  loss  of  life  was  very  great,  for  the  hatred  was 
strong  on  both  sides.  The  King-Maker  was  defeated,  and 
the  King  triumphed.  Both  the  Earl  of  Warwick  and  his 
brother  were  slain,  and  their  bodies  lay  in  Saint  Paul's,  for 
some  days,  as  a  spectacle  to  the  people. 

Margaret's  spirit  was  not  broken  even  by  this  great  blow. 
Within  five  days  she  was  in  arms  again,  and  raised  her 
standard  in  Bath,  whence  she  set  off  with  her  army,  to  try 
and  join  Lord  Pembroke,  who  had  a  force  in  Wales.  But, 
the  King,  coming  up  with  her  outside  the  town  of  Tewkes- 
bury, and  ordering  his  brother,  the  Duke  of  Gloucester, 
who  was  a  brave  soldier,  to  attack  her  men,  she  sustained 
an  entire  defeat,  and  was  taken  prisoner,  together  with  her 
son,  now  only  eighteen  years  of  age.  The  conduct  of  the 
King  to  this  poor  youth  was  worthy  of  his  cruel  character. 
He  ordered  him  to  be  led  into  his  tent,  "  And  what,"  said 
he,  "  brought  you  to  England?  "  "  I  came  to  England," 
replied  the  prisoner,  with  a  spirit  which  a  man  of  spirit 
might  have  admired  in  a  captive,  "to  recover  my  father's 
kingdom,  which  descended  to  him  as  his  right,  and  from 
him  descends  to  me,  as  mine."  The  King,  drawing  off  his 
iron  gauntlet,  struck  him  with  it  in  the  face ;  and  the  Duke 


INTER VI K\V    I5KTWKKN    KDWARD    IV.    AND    LOUIS    XI 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  211 

of  Clarence  and  some  other  lords,  who  were  there,  drew 
their  noble  swords,  and  killed  him. 

His  mother  survived  him,  a  prisoner,  for  five  years; 
after  her  ransom  by  the  King  of  France,  she  survived  for 
six  years  more.  Within  three  weeks  of  this  murder,  Henry 
died  one  of  those  convenient  sudden  deaths  which  were  so 
common  in  the  Tower ;  in  plainer  words,  he  was  murdered 
by  the  King's  order. 

Having  no  particular  excitement  on  his  hands  after  this 
great  defeat  of  the  Lancaster  party,  and  being  perhaps  de- 
sirous to  get  rid  of  some  of  his  fat  (for  he  was  now  getting 
too  corpulent  to  be  handsome),  the  King  thought  of  mak- 
ing war  on  France.  As  he  wanted  more  money  for  this 
purpose  than  the  Parliament  could  give  him,  though  they 
were  usually  ready  enough  for  war,  he  invented  a  new  way 
of  raising  it,  by  sending  for  the  principal  citizens  of  London, 
and  telling  them,  with  a  grave  face,  that  he  was  very  much 
in  want  of  cash,  and  would  take  it  very  kind  in  them  if 
they  would  lend  him  some.  It  being  impossible  for  them 
safely  to  refuse,  they  complied,  and  the  moneys  thus  forced 
from  them  were  called — no  doubt  to  the  great  amusement 
of  the  King  and  the  Coui-t — as  if  they  were  free  gifts, 
" Benevolences."  What  with  grants  from  Parliament,  and 
what  with  Benevolences,  the  King  raised  an  army  and 
passed  over  to  Calais.  As  nobody  wanted  war,  however, 
the  French  King  made  proposals  of  peace,  which  were 
accepted,  and  a  truce  was  concluded  for  seven  long  years. 
The  proceedings  between  the  Kings  of  France  and  England 
on  this  occasion  were  very  friendly,  very  splendid,  and 
very  distrustful.  They  finished  with  a  meeting  between 
the  two  Kings,  on  a  tempoi-ary  bridge  over  the  river  Somme, 
where  they  embraced  through  two  holes  in  a  strong  wooden 
grating  like  a  lion's  cage,  and  made  several  bows  and  fine 
speeches  to  one  another. 

It  was  time,  now,  that  the  Duke  of  Clarence  should  be 
punished  for  his  treacheries ;  and  Fate  had  his  punishment 
in  store.  He  was,  probably,  not  trusted  by  the  King — for 
who  could  trust  him  who  knew  him ! — and  he  had  certainly 
a  powerful  opponent  in  his  brother  Richard,  Duke  of 
Gloucester,  who,  being  avaricious  and  ambitious,  wanted 
to  marry  that  widowed  daughter  of  the  Earl  of  Warwick's 
who  had  been  espoused  to  the  deceased  young  Prince,  at 
Calais.     Clarence,  who  wanted  all  the  family  wealth  for 


212  A  CHILD'S   HISTOEY   OF  ENGLAND. 

himself,  secreted  this  lady,  whom  Richard  found  disguised 
as  a  servant  in  the  City  of  London,  and  whom  he  married ; 
arbitrators  appointed  by  the  King  then  divided  the  prop- 
erty between  the  brothers.  This  led  to  ill-will  and  mis- 
trust between  them.  Clarence's  wife  dying,  and  he  wish- 
ing to  make  another  marriage,  which  was  obnoxious  to  the 
King,  his  ruin  was  hurried  by  that  means,  too.  At  first, 
the  Court  struck  at  his  retainers  and  dependents,  and  ac- 
cused some  of  them  of  magic  and  witchcraft,  and  similar 
nonsense.  Successful  against  this  small  game,  it  then 
mounted  to  the  duke  himself,  who  was  impeached  by  his 
brother  the  King,  in  person,  on  a  variety  of  such  charges. 
He  was  found  guilty,  and  sentenced  to  be  publicly  exe- 
cuted. He  never  was  publicly  executed,  but  he  met  his 
death  somehow,  in  the  Tower,  and,  no  doubt,  through  some 
agency  of  the  King  or  his  brother  Gloucester,  or  both.  It 
was  supposed  at  the  time  that  he  was  told  to  choose  the 
manner  of  his  death,  and  that  he  chose  to  be  drowned  in  a 
butt  of  Malmsey  wine.  I  hope  the  story  may  be  true,  for 
it  would  have  been  a  becoming  death  for  such  a  miserable 
creature. 

The  King  survived  him  some  five  years.  He  died  in  the 
forty-second  year  of  his  life,  and  the  twenty-third  of  his 
reign.  He  had  a  very  good  capacity  and  some  good  points, 
but  he  was  selfish,  careless,  sensual,  and  cruel.  He  was  a 
favourite  with  the  people  for  his  showy  manners ;  and  the 
people  were  a  good  example  to  him  in  the  constancy  of 
their  attachment.  He  was  penitent  on  his  death-bed  for 
his  "Benevolences,"  and  other  extortions,  and  ordered  res- 
titution to  be  made  to  the  people  who  had  suffered  from 
them.  He  also  called  about  his  bed  the  enriched  members 
of  the  Woodville  family,  and  the  proud  lords  whose  honours 
were  of  older  date,  and  endeavoured  to  reconcile  them,  for 
the  sake  of  the  peaceful  succession  of  his  son  and  the  tran- 
c[uillity  of  England. 


A  CHILD  S   HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  213 

CHAPTER    XXIV. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  EDWARD  THE  FIFTH. 

The  late  King's  eldest  son,  the  Prince  of  Wales,  called 
Edward  after  him,  was  only  thirteen  years  of  age  at  his 
father's  death.  He  was  at  Ludlow  Castle  with  his  uncle, 
the  Earl  of  Rivers.  The  prince's  brother,  the  Duke  of 
York,  only  eleven  years  of  age,  was  in  Loudon  with  his 
mother.  The  boldest,  most  crafty,  and  most  dreaded  no- 
bleman in  England  at  that  time  was  their  uncle  Richard, 
Duke  of  Gloucester,  and  everybody  wondered  how  the  two 
poor  boys  would  fare  with  such  an  uncle  for  a  friend  or 
a  foe. 

The  Queen,  their  mother,  being  exceedingly  uneasy  about 
this,  was  anxious  that  instructions  should  be  sent  to  Lord 
Rivers  to  raise  an  army  to  escort  the  young  King  safely  to 
London.  But,  Lord  Hastings,  who  was  of  the  Court  party 
opposed  to  the  Woodvilles,  and  who  disliked  the  thought 
of  giving  them  that  power,  argued  against  the  proposal, 
and  obliged  the  Queen  to  be  satisfied  with  an  escort  of  two 
thousand  horse.  The  Duke  of  Gloucester  did  nothing,  at 
first,  to  justify  suspicion.  He  came  from  Scotland  (where 
he  was  commanding  an  army)  to  York,  and  was  there  the 
first  to  swear  allegiance  to  his  nephew.  He  then  wrote 
a  condoling  letter  to  the  Queen-Mother,  and  set  off  to  be 
l^resent  at  the  coronation  in  London. 

Now,  the  young  King,  journeying  towards  London  too, 
with  Lord  Rivers  and  Lord  Gray,  came  to  Stony  Stratford, 
,  as  his  uncle  came  to  Northampton,  about  ten  miles  distant ; 
and  when  those  two  lords  heard  that  the  Duke  of  Glouces- 
ter was  so  near,  they  proposed  to  the  young  King  that  they 
should  go  back  and  greet  him  in  his  name.  The  boy  being 
very  willing  that  they  should  do  so,  they  rode  off  and  were 
received  with  great  friendliness,  and  asked  by  the  Duke  of 
Gloucester  to  stay  and  dine  with  him.  In  the  evening, 
while  they  were  merry  together,  up  came  the  Duke  of 
Buckingham  with  three  hundred  horsemen;  and  next 
morning  the  two  lords  and  the  two  dukes,  and  the  three 
hundred  horsemen,  rode  away  together  to  rejoin  the  King. 


214  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND. 

Just  as  they  were  entering  Stony  Stratford,  the  Duke  of 
Gloucester,  checking  his  horse,  turned  suddenly  on  the  two 
lords,  charged  them  with  alienating  from  him  the  affec- 
tions of  his  sweet  nephew,  and  caused  them  to  be  arrested 
by  the  three  hundred  horsemen  and  taken  back  Then,  he 
and  the  Duke  of  Buckingham  went  straight  to  the  King 
(whom  they  had  now  in  their  power),  to  whom  they  made 
a  show  of  kneeling  down,  and  offering  great  love  and  sub- 
mission ;  and  then  they  ordered  his  attendants  to  disperse, 
and  took  him,  alone  with  them,  to  Northampton 

A  few  days  afterwards  they  conducted  him  to  London, 
and  lodged  him  in  the  Bishop's  Palace  But,  he  did  not 
remain  there  long ;  for,  the  Duke  of  Buckingham  with  a 
tender  face  made  a  speech  expressing  how  anxious  he  was 
for  the  Royal  boy's  safety,  and  how  much  safer  he  would 
be  in  the  Tower  until  his  coronation,  than  he  could  be 
anywhere  else.  So,  to  the  Tower  he  was  taken,  very 
carefully,  and  the  Duke  of  Gloucester  was  named  Pro- 
tector of  the  State 

Although  Gloucester  had  proceeded  thus  far  with  a  very 
smooth  countenance — and  although  he  was  a  clever  man, 
fair  of  speech,  and  not  ill-looking,  in  spite  of  one  of  his 
shoulders  being  something  higher  than  the  other — and 
although  he  had  come  into  the  City  riding  bare-headed  at 
the  King's  side,  and  looking  very  fond  of  him — he  had 
made  the  King's  mother  more  uneasy  yet;  and  when  the 
Royal  boy  was  taken  to  the  Tower,  she  became  so  alarmed 
that  she  took  sanctuary  in  Westminster  with  her  five 
daughters. 

Nor  did  she  do  this  without  reason,  for,  the  Duke  of 
Gloucester,  finding  that  the  lords  who  were  opposed  to  the 
Woodville  family  were  faithful  to  the  young  King  never- 
theless, quickly  resolved  to  strike  a  blow  for  himself.  Ac- 
cordingly, while  those  lords  met  in  council  at  the  Tower, 
he  and  those  who  were  in  his  interest  met  in  separate  coun- 
cil at  his  own  residence,  Crosby  Palace,  in  Bishopsgate 
Street.  Being  at  last  quite  prepared,  he  one  day  appeared 
unexpectedly  at  the  council  in  the  Tower,  and  appeared  to 
be  very  jocular  and  merry.  He  was  particularly  gay  with 
the  Bishop  of  Sly :  praising  the  strawberries  that  grew  in 
his  garden  on  Holborn  Hill,  and  asking  him  to  have  some 
gathered  that  he  might  eat  them  at  dinner.  The  bishop, 
quite  proud  of  the  honour^  sent  one  of  his  men  to  fetch 


I 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  215 

some;  and  the  duke,  still  very  jocular  and  gay,  went  out; 
and  the  council  all  said  what  a  very  agreeable  duke  he  was ! 
In  a  little  time,  however,  he  came  back  quite  altered — not 
at  all  jocular — frowning  and  fierce — and  suddenly  said, — 

"  What  do  those  persons  deserve  who  have  compassed 
my  destruction;  I  being  the  King's  lawful,  as  well  as  nat- 
ural, protector?  " 

To  this  strange  question.  Lord  Hastings  replied,  that 
they  deserved  death,  whosoever  they  were. 

"  Then,"  said  the  duke,  "  I  tell  you  that  they  are  that 
sorceress  my  brother's  wife ;  "  meaning  the  Queen :  "  and 
that  other  sorceress,  Jane  Shore.  Who,  by  witchcraft, 
have  withered  my  body,  and  caused  my  arm  to  shrink  as  I 
now  show  you." 

He  then  pulled  up  his  sleeve  and  showed  them  his  arm, 
which  was  shrunken,  it  is  true,  but  which  had  been  so,  as 
they  all  very  well  knew,  from  the  hour  of  his  birth. 

Jane  Shore,  being  then  the  lover  of  Lord  Hastings,  as 
she  had  formerly  been  of  the  late  King,  that  lord  knew  that 
he  himself  was  attacked.  So,  he  said,  in  some  confusion, 
"Certainly,  my  Lord,  if  they  have  done  this,  they  be 
worthy  of  punishment." 

"  If?  "  said  the  Duke  of  Gloucester ;  "  do  you  talk  to  me 
of  ifs?  I  tell  you  that  they  have  so  done,  and  I  will  make 
it  good  upon  thy  body,  tliou  traitor ! " 

With  that,  he  struck  the  table  a  great  blow  with  his  fist. 
This  was  a  signal  to  some  of  his  people  outside  to  cry 
"Treason!"  They  immediately  did  so,  and  there  was  a 
rush  into  the  chamber  of  so  many  armed  men  that  it  was 
filled  in  a  moment. 

"  First, "  said  the  Duke  of  Gloucester  to  Lord  Hastings, 
"I  arrest  thee,  traitor!  And  let  him,"  he  added  to  the 
armed  men  who  took  him,  "have  a  priest  at  once,  for 
by  Saint  Paul  I  will  not  dine  until  I  have  seen  his  head 
off!" 

Lord  Hastings  was  hurried  to  the  gi'een  by  the  Tower 
chapel,  and  there  beheaded  on  a  log  of  wood  that  happened 
to  be  lying  on  the  ground.  Then,  the  duke  dined  with  a 
good  appetite,  and  after  dinner  summoning  the  principal 
citizens  to  attend  him,  told  them  that  Lord  Hastings  and 
the  rest  had  designed  to  murder  both  himself  and  the  Duke 
of  Buckingham,  who  stood  by  his  side,  if  he  had  not  provi- 
dentially discovered  their  design.     He  requested  them  to 


216  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND. 

be  so  obliging  as  to  inform  their  fellow-citizens  of  the  truth 
of  what  he  said,  and  issued  a  proclamation  (prepared  and 
neatly  copied  out  beforehand)  to  the  same  effect. 

On  the  same  day  that  the  duke  did  these  things  in  the 
Tower,  Sir  Richard  Ratcliffe,  the  boldest  and  most  un- 
daunted of  his  men,  went  down  to  Pontefract;  arrested 
Lord  Rivers,  Lord  Gray,  and  two  other  gentlemen;  and 
publicly  executed  them  on  the  scaffold,  without  any  trial, 
for  having  intended  the  duke's  death.  Three  days  after- 
wards the  duke,  not  to  lose  time,  went  down  the  river 
to  Westminster  in  his  barge,  attended  by  divers  bishops, 
lords,  and  soldiers,  and  demanded  that  the  Queen  shoula 
deliver  her  second  son,  the  Duke  of  York,  into  his  safe  keep- 
ing. The  Queen,  being  obliged  to  comply,  resigned  the  child 
after  she  had  wept  over  him ;  and  Richard  of  Gloucester 
placed  him  with  his  brother  in  the  Tower.  Then,  he 
seized  Jane  Shore,  and,  because  she  had  been  the  lover  of 
the  late  King,  confiscated  her  property,  and  got  her  sen- 
tenced to  do  public  penance  in  the  streets  by  walking  in  a 
scanty  dress,  with  bare  feet,  and  carrying  a  lighted  candle,, 
to  Saint  Paul's  Cathedral,  through  the  most  crowded  part 
of  the  City. 

Having  now  all  things  ready  for  his  own  advancement, 
he  caused  a  friar  to  preach  a  sermon  at  the  cross  which 
stood  in  front  of  Saint  Paul's  Cathedral,  in  which  he  dwelt 
upon  the  profligate  manners  of  the  late  King,  and  upon  the 
late  shame  of  Jane  Shore,  and  hinted  that  the  princes  were 
not  his  children.  "  Whereas,  good  people,"  said  the  friar, 
whose  name  was  Shaw,  "  my  Lord  the  Protector,  the  noble 
Duke  of  Gloucester,  that  sweet  prince,  the  pattern  of  all 
the  noblest  virtues,  is  the  perfect  image  and  express  like- 
ness of  his  father."  There  had  been  a  little  plot  between 
the  duke  and  the  friar,  that  the  duke  should  appear  in  the 
crowd  at  this  moment,  when  it  was  expected  that  the  people 
would  crj'^  "  Long  live  King  Richard !  "  But,  either  through 
the  frair  saying  the  words  too  soon,  or  through  the  duke's 
coming  too  late,  the  duke  and  the  words  did  not  come  to- 
gether, and  the  people  only  laughed,  and  the  friar  sneaked 
off  ashamed. 

The  Duke  of  Buckingham  was  a  better  hand  at  such  busi- 
ness than  the  friar,  so  he  went  to  the  Guildhall  the  next 
day,  and  addressed  the  citizens  in  the  Lord  Protector's  be- 
half.    A  few  dirty  men,  who  had  been  hired  and  stationed 


/ 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  217 

there  for  the  purpose,  crying  when  he  had  done,  "  God  save 
King  Richard !  "  he  made  them  a  great  bow,  and  thanked 
them  with  all  his  heart.  Next  day,  to  make  an  end  of  it, 
he  went  with  the  mayor  and  some  lords  and  citizens  to 
Bayard  Castle,  by  the  river,  where  Richard  then  was,  and 
read  an  address,  humbly  entreating  him  to  accept  the  Crown 
of  England.  Richard,  who  looked  down  upon  them  out  of 
a  window  and  pretended  to  be  in  great  uneasiness  and 
alarm,  assured  them  there  was  nothing  he  desired  less, 
and  that  his  deep  affection  for  his  nephews  forbade  him  to 
think  of  it.  To  this  the  Duke  of  Buckingham  replied, 
with  pretended  warmth,  that  the  free  people  of  England 
would  never  submit  to  his  nephew's  rule,  and  that  if 
Richard,  who  was  the  lawful  heir,  refused  the  Crown,  why 
then  they  must  find  some  one  else  to  wear  it.  The  Duke  of 
Gloucester  returned,  that  since  he  used  that  strong  language, 
it  became  his  painful  duty  to  think  no  more  of  himself,  and 
to  accept  the  Crown. 

Upon  that,  the  people  cheered  and  dispersed ;  and  the 
Duke  of  Gloucester  and  the  Duke  of  Buckingham  passed  a 
pleasant  evening,  talking  over  the  play  they  had  just  acted 
with  so  much  success,  and  every  word  of  which  they  had 
prepared  together. 


CHAPTER    XXV. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  RICHARD  THE  THIRD. 

King  Richard  the  Third  was  up  betimes  in  the  morn- 
ing, and  went  to  Westminster  Hall.  In  the  Hall  was  a 
marble  seat,  upon  which  he  sat  himself  down  between  two 
great  noblemen,  and  told  the  people  that  he  began  the  new 
reign  in  that  place,  because  the  first  duty  of  a  sovereign 
was  to  administer  the  laws  equally  to  all,  and  to  maintain 
justice.  He  then  mounted  his  horse  and  rode  back  to  the 
City,  where  he  was  received  by  the  clergy  and  the  crowd 
as  if  he  really  had  a  right  to  the  throne,  and  really  were  a 
just  man.  The  clergy  and  the  crowd  must  have  been  rather 
ashamed  of  themselves  in  secret,  I  think,  for  being  such 
poor-spirited  knaves. 

The  new  King  and  his  Queen  were  soon  crowned  with  a 


218  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

great  deal  of  sliow  and  noise,  which  the  people  liked  very 
much ;  and  then  the  King  set  forth  on  a  royal  progress 
through  his  dominions.  He  was  crowned  a  second  time  at 
York,  in  order  that  the  people  might  have  show  and  noise 
enough;  and  wherever  he  went  was  received  with  shouts  of 
rejoicing — from  a  good  many  people  of  strong  lungs,  who 
were  paid  to  strain  their  throats  in  crying,  "  God  save  King 
Bichard  I  "  The  plan  was  so  successful  that  I  am  told  it 
has  been  imitated  since,  by  other  usurpers,  in  other  prog- 
resses through  other  dominions. 

While  he  was  on  this  journey.  King  Eichard  stayed  a 
week  at  Warwick.  And  from  Warwick  he  sent  instructions 
home  for  one  of  the  wickedest  murders  that  ever  was  done 
— the  murder  of  the  two  young  princes,  his  nephews,  who 
were  shut  up  in  the  Tower  of  London. 

Sir  Robert  Brackenbury  was  at  that  time  Governor  of 
the  Tower.  To  him,  by  the  hands  of  a  messenger  named 
JoHx  Greek,  did  King  Richard  send  a  letter,  ordering  him 
by  some  means  to  put  the  two  young  princes  to  death.  But 
Sir  Robert — I  hope  because  he  had  children  of  his  own, 
and  loved  them — sent  John  Green  back  again,  riding  and 
spurring  along  the  dusty  roads,  with  the  answer  that  he 
could  not  do  so  horrible  a  piece  of  work.  The  King,  hav- 
ing frowuingly  considered  a  little,  called  to  him  Sir  James 
Tyrrel,  his  master  of  the  horse,  and  to  him  gave  authority 
to  take  command  of  the  Tower,  whenever  he  would,  for 
twenty-four  hours,  and  to  keep  all  the  keys  of  the  Tower 
during  that  space  of  time.  Tyrrel,  well  knowing  what  was 
wanted,  looked  about  him  for  two  hardened  ruffians,  and 
chose  John  Dighton,  one  of  his  own  grooms,  and  Miles 
Forest,  who  was  a  murderer  by  trade.  Having  secured 
these  two  assistants,  he  went,  upon  a  day  in  August,  to 
the  Tower,  showed  his  authority  from  the  King,  took  the 
command  for  four-and -twenty  hours,  and  obtained  posses- 
sion of  the  keys.  And  when  the  black  night  came,  he 
went  creeping,  creeping,  like  a  guilty  villain  as  he  was,  up 
the  dark  stone  winding  stairs,  and  along  the  dark  stone 
passages,  until  he  came  to  the  door  of  the  room  where  the 
two  young  princes,  having  said  their  prayers,  lay  fast 
asleep,  clasped  in  each  other's  arms.  And  while  he  watched 
and  listened  at  the  door,  he  sent  in  those  evil  demons,  John 
Dighton  and  Miles  Forest,  who  smothered  the  two  princes 
with  the  bed  and  pillows,  and  carried  their  bodies  down 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  219 

the  stairs,  and  buried  them  under  a  great  heap  of  stones  at 
the  staircase  foot.  And  when  the  day  came,  he  gave  up 
the  command  of  the  Tower,  and  restored  the  keys,  and 
hurried  away  without  once  looking  behind  him ;  and  Sir 
Robert  Brackenbury  went  with  fear  and  sadness  to  the 
princes'  room,  and  found  the  princes  gone  for  ever. 

You  know,  through  all  this  history,  how  true  it  is  that 
traitors  are  never  true,  and  you  will  not  be  surprised  to 
learn  that  the  Duke  of  Buckingham  soon  turned  against 
King  Richard,  and  joined  a  great  conspiracy  that  was 
formed  to  dethrone  him,  and  to  place  the  crown  upon  its 
rightful  owner's  head.  Richard  had  meant  to  keep  the 
murder  secret ;  but  when  he  heard  through  his  spies  that 
this  conspiracy  existed,  and  that  many  lords  and  gentlemen 
drank  in  secret  to  the  healths  of  the  two  young  princes  in 
the  Tower,  he  made  it  known  that  they  were  dead.  The 
conspirators,  though  thwarted  for  a  moment,  soon  resolved 
to  set  up  for  the  crown  against  the  murderous  Richard, 
Henry  Earl  of  Richmond,  grandson  of  Catherine:  that 
widow  of  Henry  the  Fifth  who  married  Owen  Tudor.  And 
as  Henry  was  of  the  house  of  Lancaster,  they  proposed 
that  he  should  marry  the  Princess  Elizabeth,  the  eldest 
daughter  of  the  late  King,  now  the  heiress  of  the  house  of 
York,  and  thus  by  uniting  the  rival  families  put  an  end 
to  the  fatal  wars  of  the  Red  and  White  Roses.  All  being 
settled,  a  time  was  appointed  for  Henry  to  come  over  from 
Brittany,  and  for  a  great  rising  against  Richard  to  take 
place  in  several  parts  of  England  at  the  same  hour.  On 
a  certain  day,  therefore,  in  October,  the  revolt  took  place; 
but  unsuccessfully.  Richard  was  prepared,  Henry  was 
driven  back  at  sea  by  a  storm,  his  followers  in  England 
were  dispersed,  and  the  Duke  of  Buckingham  was  taken, 
and  at  once  beheaded  in  the  market-place  at  Salisbury. 

The  time  of  his  success  was  a  good  time,  Richard  thought, 
for  summoning  a  Parliament  and  getting  some  money.  So, 
a  Parliament  was  called,  and  it  flattered  and  fawned  upon 
him  as  much  as  he  could  possibly  desire,  and  declared  him 
to  be  the  rightful  King  of  England,  and  his  only  son 
Edward,  then  eleven  years  of  age,  the  next  heir  to  the 
throne. 

Richard  knew  full  well  that,  let  the  Parliament  say  what 
it  would,  the  Princess  Elizabeth  was  remembered  by  people 
as  the  heiress  of  the  house  of  York ;  and  having  accurate 


220  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

information  besides,  of  its  being  designed  by  the  conspira- 
tors to  marry  her  to  Henry  of  Richmond,  he  felt  that  it 
would  much  strengthen  him  and  weaken  them,  to  be  before- 
hand with  them,  and  marry  her  to  his  son.  With  this 
view  he  went  to  the  Sanctuary  at  Westminster,  where  the 
late  King's  widow  and  daughter  still  were,  and  besought 
them  to  come  to  Court :  where  (he  swore  by  anything  and 
everything)  they  should  be  safely  and  honourably  enter- 
tained. They  came,  accordingly,  but  had  scarcely  been  at 
Court  a  month  when  his  son  died  suddenly — or  was  poi 
soned — and  his  plan  was  crushed  to  pieces. 

In  this  extremity.  King  Richard,  always  active,  thought, 
"I  must  make  another  plan,"  And  he  made  the  plan  of 
marrying  the  Princess  Elizabeth  himself,  although  she  was 
his  niece.  There  was  one  difficulty  in  the  way :  his  wife, 
the  Queen  Anne,  was  alive.  But,  he  knew  (remembering 
his  nephews)  how  to  remove  that  obstacle,  and  he  made 
love  to  the  Princess  Elizabeth,  telling  her  he  felt  perfectly 
confident  that  the  Queen  would  die  in  February.  The 
Princess  was  not  a  very  scrupulous  young  lady,  for,  instead 
of  rejecting  the  murderer  of  her  brothers  with .  scorn  and 
hatred,  she  openly  declared  she  loved  him  dearly;  and, 
when  February  came  and  the  Queen  did  not  die,  she 
expressed  her  impatient  opinion  that  she  was  too  long  about 
it.  However,  King  Richard  was  not  so  far  out  in  his  pre- 
diction, but  that  she  died  in  March — he  took  good  care  of 
that — and  then  this  precious  pair  hoped  to  be  married. 
But  they  were  disappointed,  for  the  idea  of  such  a  marriage 
was  so  unpopular  in  the  country,  that  the  King's  chief 
counsellors,  Ratcliffe  and  Catesby,  would  by  no  means 
undertake  to  propose  it,  and  the  King  was  even  obliged  to 
declare  in  public  that  he  had  never  thought  of  such  a  thing. 

He  was,  by  this  time,  dreaded  and  hated  by  all  classes 
of  his  subjects.  His  nobles  deserted  every  day  to  Henry's 
side ;  he  dared  not  call  another  Parliament,  lest  his  crimes 
should  be  denounced  there ;  and  for  want  of  money,  he  was 
obliged  to  get  Benevolences  from  the  citizens,  which  exas- 
perated them  all  against  him.  It  was  said  too,  that,  being 
stricken  by  his  conscience,  he  dreamed  frightful  dreams, 
and  started  up  in  the  night-time,  wild  with  terror  and  re- 
morse. Active  to  the  last,  through  all  this,  he  issued  vig- 
orous proclamations  against  Henry  of  Richmond  and  all  his 
followers,  when  he  heard  that  they  were  coming  against 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  221 

him  with  a  Fleet  from  France ;  and  took  the  field  as  fierce 
and  savage  as  a  wild  boar — the  animal  represented  on  his 
shield. 

Henry  of  Eichmond  landed  with  six  thousand  men  at 
Milford  Haven,  and  came  on  against  King  Richard,  then 
encamped  at  Leicester  with  an  army  twice  as  great,  through 
North  Wales.  On  Bosworth  Field  the  two  armies  met; 
and  Richard,  looking  along  Henry's  ranks,  and  seeing  them 
crowded  with  the  English  nobles  who  had  abandoned  him, 
turned  pale  when  he  beheld  the  powerful  Lord  Stanley  and 
his  son  (whom  he  had  tried  hard  to  retain)  among  them. 
But,  he  was  as  brave  as  he  was  wicked,  and  plunged  into 
the  thickest  of  the  tight.  He  was  riding  hither  and  thither, 
laying  about  him  in  all  directions,  when  he  observed  the 
Earl  of  Northumberland — one  of  his  few  great  allies — to 
stand  inactive,  and  the  main  body  of  his  troops  to  hesitate. 
At  the  same  moment,  his  desperate  glance  caught  Henry 
of  Richmond  among  a  little  group  of  his  knights.  Riding 
hard  at  him,  and  crying  "  Treason !  "  he  killed  his  standard- 
bearer,  fiercely  unhorsed  another  gentleman,  and  aimed  a 
powerful  stroke  at  Henry  himself,  to  cut  him  down.  But, 
Sir  William  Stanley  parried  it  as  it  fell,  and  before  Richard 
could  raise  his  arm  again,  he  was  borne  down  in  a  press  of 
numbers,  unhorsed,  and  killed.  Lord  Stanley  picked  up 
the  crown,  all  bruised  and  trampled,  and  stained  with 
blood,  and  put  it  upon  Richmond's  head,  amid  loud  and 
rejoicing  cries  of  "  Long  live  King  Henry !  " 

That  night,  a  horse  was  led  up  to  the  church  of  the  Grey 
Friars  at  Leicester ;  across  whose  back  was  tied,  like  some 
worthless  sack,  a  naked  body  brought  there  for  burial.  It 
was  the  body  of  the  last  of  the  Plantagenet  line.  King 
Richard  the  Third,  usurper  and  murderer,  slain  at  the  bat- 
tle of  Bosworth  Field  in  the  thirty-second  year  of  his  age, 
after  a  reign  of  two  years. 


222  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND. 

CHAPTER    XXVI. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  HENRY  THE  SEVENTH. 

King  Henry  the  Seventh  did  not  turn  out  to  be  as 
rine  a  fellow  as  the  nobility  and  people  hoped,  in  the  first 
joy  of  their  deliverance  from  Richard  the  Third.  He  was 
very  cold,  crafty,  and  calculating,  and  would  do  almost 
anything  for  money.  He  possessed  considerable  ability, 
but  his  chief  merit  appears  to  have  been  that  he  was  not 
cruel  when  there  was  nothing  to  be  got  by  it. 

The  new  King  had  promised  the  nobles  who  had  espoused 
his  cause  that  he  would  marry  the  Princess  Elizabeth. 
The  first  thing  he  did,  was,  to  direct  her  to  be  removed 
from  the  castle  of  Sheriff  Hutton  in  Yorkshire,  where 
Richard  had  placed  her,  and  restored  to  the  care  of  her 
mother  in  London.  The  young  Earl  of  Warwick,  Edward 
Plantagenet,  son  and  heir  of  the  late  Duke  of  Clarence,  had 
been  kept  a  prisoner  in  the  same  old  Yorkshire  Castle  with 
her.  This  boy,  who  was  now  fifteen,  the  new  King  placed 
in  the  Tower  for  safety.  Then  he  came  to  London  in  great 
state,  and  gratified  the  people  with  a  fine  procession;  on 
which  kind  of  show  he  often  very  much  relied  for  keeping 
them  in  good  humour.  The  sports  and  feasts  which  took 
place  were  followed  by  a  terrible  fever,  called  the  Sweating 
Sickness ;  of  which  great  numbers  of  people  died.  Lord 
Mayors  and  Aldermen  are  thought  to  have  suffered  most 
from  it ;  whether,  because  they  were  in  the  habit  of  over- 
eating themselves,  or  because  they  were  very  jealous  of 
preserving  filth  and  nuisances  in  the  City  (as  they  have  been 
since),  I  don't  know. 

The  King's  coronation  was  postponed  on  account  of  the 
general  ill-health,  and  he  afterwards  deferred  his  marriage, 
as  if  he  were  not  very  anxious  that  it  should  take  place : 
and,  even  after  that,  deferred  the  Queen's  coronation  so 
long  that  he  gave  offence  to  the  York  party.  However,  he 
set  these  things  right  in  the  end,  by  hanging  some  men  and 
seizing  on  the  rich  possessions  of  others ;  by  granting  more 
popular  pardons  to  the  followers  of  the  late  King  than 
could,  at  first,  be  got  from  him ;  and,  by  employing  about 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  22S 

his  Court,  some  not  very  scrupulous  persons  who  had  been 
employed  in  the  previous  reign. 

As  this  reign  was  principally  remarkable  for  two  very 
curious  impostures  which  have  become  famous  in  history, 
we  will  make  those  two  stories  its  principal  feature. 

There  was  a  priest  at  Oxford  of  the  name  of  Simons, 
who  had  for  a  pupil  a  handsome  boy  named  Lambert  Sim- 
nel,  the  son  of  a  baker.  Partly  to  gratify  his  own  ambi- 
tious ends,  and  partly  to  carry  out  the  designs  of  a  secret 
party  formed  against  the  King,  this  priest  declared  that 
his  pupil,  the  boy,  was  no  other  than  the  young  Earl 
of  Warwick ;  who  (as  everybody  might  have  known)  was 
safely  locked  up  in  the  Tower  of  London.  The  priest  and 
the  boy  went  over  to  Ireland ;  and,  at  Dublin,  enlisted  in 
their  cause  all  ranks  of  the  people :  who  seem  to  have  been 
generous  enough,  but  exceedingly  irrational.  The  Earl  of 
Kildare,  the  governor  of  Ireland,  declared  that  he  believed 
the  boy  to  be  what  the  priest  represented ;  and  the  boy, 
who  had  been  well  tutored  by  the  priest,  told  them  such 
things  of  his  childhood,  and  gave  them  so  many  descrip- 
tions of  the  Royal  Family,  that  they  were  perpetually 
shouting  and  hun-ahiug,  and  drinking  his  health,  and 
making  all  kinds  of  noisy  and  thirsty  demonstrations,  to 
express  their  belief  in  him.  Nor  was  this  feeling  confined 
to  Ireland  alone,  for  tlie  Earl  of  Lincoln — whom  the  late 
usurper  had  named  as  his  successor — went  over  to  the 
young  Pretender;  and,  after  holding  a  secret  correspond- 
ence with  the  Dowager  Duchess  of  Burgundy — the  sister  of 
Edward  the  Fourth,  who  detested  the  present  King  and  all 
his  race — sailed  to  Dublin  with  two  thousand  German  sol- 
diers of  her  providing.  In  this  promising  state  of  the 
boy's  fortunes,  he  was  crowned  there,  with  a  crown  taken 
off  the  head  of  a  statue  of  the  Virgin  Mary ;  and  was  then, 
according  to  the  Irish  custom  of  those  days,  carried  home 
on  the  shoulders  of  a  big  chieftain  possessing  a  great  deal 
more  strength  than  sense.  Father  Simons,  you  may  be 
sure,  was  mighty  busy  at  the  coronation. 

Ten  days  afterwards,  the  Germans,  and  the  Irish,  and 
the  priest,  and  the  boy,  and  the  Earl  of  Lincoln,  all  landed 
in  Lancashire  to  invade  England.  The  King,  who  had 
good  intelligence  of  their  movements,  set  up  his  standard 
at  Nottingham,  where  vast  numbers  resorted  to  him  every 
"lay ;  while  the  Earl  of  Lincoln  could  gain  but  very  few 


224  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

With  his  small  force  he  tried  to  make  for  the  town  of 
Newark;  but  the  King's  army  getting  between  him  and 
that  place,  he  had  no  choice  but  to  risk  a  battle  at  Stoke. 
It  soon  ended  in  the  complete  destruction  of  the  Pretender's 
forces,  one  half  of  whom  were  killed;  among  them,  the 
earl  himself.  The  priest  and  the  baker's  boy  were  taken 
prisoners.  The  priest,  after  confessing  the  trick,  was  shut 
up  in  prison,  where  he  afterwards  died — suddenly  perhaps. 
The  boy  was  taken  into  the  King's  kitchen  and  made  a 
turnspit.  He  was  afterwards  raised  to  the  station  of  one 
of  the  King's  falconers;  and  so  ended  this  strange  imposi- 
tion. 

There  seems  reason  to  suspect  that  the  Dowager  Queen 
— always  a  restless  and  busy  woman — had  had  some  share 
in  tutoring  the  baker's  son.  The  King  was  very  angry 
with  her,  whether  or  no.  He  seized  upon  her  property, 
and  shut  her  up  in  a  convent  at  Bermondsey. 

One  might  suppose  that  the  end  of  this  story  would  have 
put  the  Irish  people  on  their  guard ;  but  they  were  quite 
ready  to  receive  a  second  impostor,  as  they  had  received 
the  first,  and  that  same  troublesome  Duchess  of  Burgundy 
soon  gave  them  tlie  opportunity.  All  of  a  sudden  there 
appeared  at  Cork,  in  a  vessel  arriving  from  Portugal,  a 
young  man  of  excellent  abilities,  of  very  handsome  appear- 
ance and  most  winning  manners,  who  declared  himself  to 
be  Richard,  Duke  of  York,  the  second  son  of  King  Edward 
the  Fourth.  "0,"  said  some,  even  of  those  ready  Irish 
believers,  "  but  surely  that  young  Prince  was  murdered  by 
his  uncle  in  the  Tower!" — "It  is  supposed  so,"  said  the 
engaging  young  man ;  "  and  my  brother  was  killed  in  that 
gloomy  prison;  but  I  escaped — it  don't  matter  how,  at 
present — and  have  been  wandering  about  the  world  for 
seven  long  years."  This  explanation  being  quite  satisfac- 
tory to  numbers  of  the  Irish  people,  they  began  again  to 
shout  and  to  hurrah,  and  to  drink  his  health,  and  to  make 
the  noisy  and  thirsty  demonstrations  all  over  again.  And 
the  big  chieftain  in  Dublin  began  to  look  out  for  another 
coronation,  and  another  young  King  to  be  carried  home  on 
his  back. 

Now,  King  Henry  being  then  on  bad  terms  with  France, 
the  French  King,  Charles  the  Eighth,  saw  that,  by  pretend- 
ing to  believe  in  the  handsome  young  man,  he  could  trouble 
his  enemy  sorely.     So,  he  invited  him  over  to  the  French 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  225 

Court,  and  appointed  him  a  body-guard,  and  treated  him 
in  all  respects  as  if  he  really  were  the  Duke  of  York. 
Peace,  however,  being  soon  concluded  between  the  two 
Kings,  the  pretended  duke  was  turned  adrift,  and  wan- 
dered for  protection  to  the  Duchess  of  Burgundy.  She, 
after  feigning  to  inquire  into  the  reality  of  his  claims, 
declared  him  to  be  the  ;i^ery  picture  of  her  dear  departed 
brother;  gave  him  a  body-guard  at  her  Court,  of  thirty 
halberdiers ;  and  called  him  by  the  sounding  name  of  the 
White  Rose  of  England. 

The  leading  members  of  the  White  Rose  party  in  England 
sent  over  an  agent,  named  Sir  Robert  Clifford,  to  ascertain 
whether  the  White  Rose's  claims  were  good:  the  King  also 
sent  over  his  agents  to  inquire  into  the  Rose's  history. 
The  White  Roses  declared  the  young  man  to  be  really  the 
Duke  of  York ;  the  King  declared  him  to  be  Perkin  War- 
beck,  the  son  of  a  merchant  of  the  city  of  Tournay,  who 
had  acquired  his  knowledge  of  England,  its  language  and 
manners,  from  the  English  merchants  who  traded  in  Flan- 
ders; it  was  also  stated  by  the  Royal  agents  that  he  had 
been  in  the  service  of  Lady  Brompton,  the  wife  of  an  exiled 
English  nobleman,  and  that  the  Duchess  of  Burgundy  had 
caused  him  to  be  trained  and  taught,  expressly  for  this  de- 
ception. The  King  then  required  the  Archduke  Philip — 
who  was  the  sovereign  of  Burgundy — to  banish  this  new 
Pretender,  or  to  deliver  him  up ;  but,  as  the  archduke  re- 
plied that  he  could  not  control  the  duchess  in  her  own  land, 
the  King,  in  revenge,  took  the  market  of  English  cloth 
away  from  Antwerp,  and  prevented  all  commercial  inter- 
course between  the  two  countries. 

He  also,  by  arts  and  bribes,  prevailed  on  Sir  Robert 
Clifford  to  betray  his  employers ;  and  he  denouncing  sev- 
eral famous  English  noblemen  as  being  secretly  the  friends 
of  Perkin  Warbeck,  the  King  had  three  of  the  foremost 
executed  at  once.  Whether  he  pardoned  the  remainder 
because  they  were  poor,  I  do  not  know ;  but  it  is  only  too 
probable  that  he  refused  to  pardon  one  famous  nobleman 
against  whom  the  same  Clifford  soon  afterwards  informed 
separately,  because  he  was  rich.  This  was  no  other  than 
Sir  William  Stanley,  who  had  saved  the  King's  life  at  the 
battle  of  Bosworth  Field.  It  is  very  doubtful  whether  his 
treason  amounted  to  much  more  than  his  having  said,  that 
if  he  were  sure  the  young  man  was  the  Duke  of  York,  he 
15 


226  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

would  not  take  arms  against  him.  Whatever  he  had  done 
he  admitted,  like  an  honourable  spirit;  and  he  lost  his 
head  for  it,  and  the  covetous  King  gained  all  his  wealth. 

Perkin  Warbeck  kept  quiet  for  three  years ;  but,  as  the 
Flemings  began  to  complain  heavily  of  the  loss  of  their 
trade  by  the  stoppage  of  the  Antwerp  market  on  his  account, 
and  as  it  was  not  unlikely  that  tkey  might  even  go  so  far 
as  to  take  his  life,  or  give  him  up,  he  found  it  necessary 
to  do  something.  Accordingly  he  made  a  desperate  sally, 
and  landed,  with  only  a  few  hundred  men,  on  the  coast  of 
Deal.  But  he  was  soon  glad  to  get  back  to  the  place  from 
whence  he  came ;  for  the  country  people  rose  against  his 
followers,  killed  a  great  many,  and  took  a  hundred  and 
fifty  prisoners:  who  were  all  driven  to  London,  tied  to- 
gether with  ropes,  like  a  team  of  cattle.  Every  one  of 
them  was  hanged  on  some  part  or  other  of  the  sea-shore ; 
in  order,  that  if  any  more  men  should  come  over  with  Per- 
kin Warbeck,  they  might  see  the  bodies  as  a  warning  be- 
fore they  landed. 

Then  the  wary  King,  by  making  a  treaty  of  commerce 
with  the  Flemings,  drove  Perkin  Warbeck  out  of  that 
country;  and,  by  completely  gaining  over  the  Irish  to  his 
side,  deprived  him  of  that  asylum  too.  He  wandered  away 
to  Scotland,  and  told  his  story  at  that  Court.  King  James 
the  Fourth  of  Scotland,  who  was  no  friend  to  King  Henry, 
and  had  no  reason  to  be  (for  King  Henry  had  bribed  his 
Scotch  lords  to  betray  him  more  than  once ;  but  had  never 
succeeded  in  his  plots),  gave  him  a  great  reception,  called 
him  his  cousin,  and  gave  him  in  marriage  the  Lady  Cather- 
ine Gordon,  a  beautiful  and  charming  creature  related  to 
the  royal  house  of  Stuart. 

Alarmed  by  this  successful  reappearance  of  the  Pretend- 
er, the  King  still  undermined,  and  bought,  and  bribed, 
and  kept  his  doings  and  Perkin  Warbeck' s  story  in  the 
dark,  when  he  might,  one  would  imagine,  have  rendered 
the  matter  clear  to  all  England.  But,  for  all  this  bribing 
of  the  Scotch  lords  at  the  Scotch  King's  Court,  he  could 
not  procure  the  Pretender  to  be  delivered  up  to  him. 
James,  though  not  very  particular  in  many  respects,  would 
not  betray  him ;  and  the  ever-busy  Duchess  of  Burgundy 
so  provided  him  with  arms,  and  good  soldiers,  and  with" 
money  besides,  that  he  had  soon  a  little  array  of  fifteen 
hundred  men  of  various  nations.     With  these,  and  aided 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  227 

by  the  Scottish  King  in  person,  he  crossed  the  border  into 
England,  and  made  a  proclamation  to  the  people,  in  which 
he  called  the  King  "  Henry  Tudor  " ;  offered  large  rewards 
to  any  who  should  take  or  distress  him ;  and  announced 
himself  as  King  Richard  the  Fourth  come  to  receive  the 
homage  of  his  faithful  subjects.  His  faithful  subjects, 
however,  cared  nothing  for  him,  and  hated  his  faithful 
troops:  who,  being  of  different  nations,  quarrelled  also 
among  themselves.  Worse  than  this,  if  worse  were  possi- 
ble, they  began  to  plunder  the  country ;  upon  which  the 
White  Rose  said,  that  he  would  rather  lose  his  rights,  than 
gain  them  through  the  miseries  of  the  English  people. 
The  Scottish  King  made  a  jest  of  his  scruples ;  but  they  and 
their  whole  force  went  back  again  without  fighting  a  battle. 

The  worst  consequence  of  this  attempt  was,  that  a  rising 
took  place  among  the  people  of  Cornwall,  who  considered 
themselves  too  heavily  taxed  to  meet  the  charges  of  the 
expected  war.  Stimulated  by  Flammock,  a  lawyer,  and 
Joseph,  a  blacksmith,  and  joined  by  Lord  Audley  and  some 
other  country  gentlemen,  they  marched  on  all  the  way 
to  Deptford  Bridge,  where  they  fought  a  battle  with  the 
King's  army.  They  were  defeated — though  the  Cornish 
men  fought  with  great  bravery — and  the  lord  was  beheaded, 
and  the  lawyer  and  the  blacksmith  were  hanged,  drawn, 
and  quartered.  The  rest  were  pardoned.  The  King,  who 
believed  every  man  to  be  as  avaricious  as  himself,  and 
thought  that  money  could  settle  anything,  allowed  them  to 
make  bargains  for  their  liberty  with  the  soldiers  who  had 
taken  them. 

Perkin  Warbeck,  doomed  to  wander  up  and  down,  and 
never  to  find  rest  anywhere — a  sad  fate :  almost  a  sufficient 
punishment  for  an  imposture,  which  he  seems  in  time  to 
have  half  believed  himself — lost  his  Scottish  refuge  through 
a  truce  being  made  between  the  two  kings ;  and  found  him- 
self, once  more,  without  a  country  before  him  in  which  he 
could  lay  his  head.  But  James  (always  honourable  and 
true  to  him,  alike  when  he  melted  down  his  plate,  and  even 
the  great  gold  chain  he  had  been  used  to  wear,  to  pay  sol- 
diers in  his  cause ;  and  now,  when  that  cause  was  lost  and 
hopeless)  did  not  conclude  the  treaty,  until  he  had  safely 
departed  out  of  the  Scottish  dominions.  He,  and  his  beau- 
tiful wife,  who  was  faithful  to  him  under  all  reverses,  and 
left  her  state  and  home  to  follow  his  poor  fortunes,  were 


228  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

put  aboard  ship  with  everything  necessary  for  their  com- 
fort and  protection,  and  sailed  for  Ireland.  ' 

But,  the  Irish  people  had  had  enough  of  counterfeit 
Earls  of  Warwick  and  Dukes  of  York,  for  one  while ;  and 
would  give  the  White  Rose  no  aid.  So,  the  White  Rose — 
encircled  by  thorns  indeed — resolved  to  go  with  his  beauti- 
ful wife  to  Cornwall  as  a  forlorn  resource,  and  see  what 
might  be  made  of  the  Cornish  men,  who  had  risen  so 
valiantly  a  little  while  before,  and  who  had  fought  so 
bravely  at  Deptford  Bridge. 

To  Whitsand  Bay,  in  Cornwall,  accordingly,  came  Perkin 
Warbeck  and  his  wife ;  and  the  lovely  lady  he  shut  up  for 
safety  in  the  Castle  of  Saint  Michael's  Mount,  and  then 
marched  into  Devonshire  at  the  head  of  three  thousand 
Cornish  men.  These  were  increased  to  six  thousand  by 
the  time  of  his  arrival  in  Exeter;  but,  there  the  people 
made  a  stout  resistance,  and  he  went  on  to  Taunton,  where 
he  came  in  sight  of  the  King's  army.  The  stout  Cornish 
i^ien,  although  they  were  few  in  number,  and  badly  aimed, 
were  so  bold,  that  they  never  thought  of  retreating ;  but 
bravely  looked  forward  to  a  battle  on  the  morrow.  Un- 
happily for  them,  the  man  who  was  possessed  of  so  many 
engaging  qualities,  and  who  attracted  so  many  people  to  his 
side  when  he  had  nothing  else  with  which  to  tempt  them, 
was  not  as  brave  as  they.  In  the  night,  when  the  two 
armies  lay  opposite  to  each  other,  he  mounted  a  swift  horse 
and  fled.  When  morning  dawned,  the  poor  confiding  Cor- 
nish men,  discovering  that  they  had  no  leader,  surrendered 
to  the  King's  power.  Some  of  them  were  hanged,  and  the 
rest  were  pardoned  and  went  miserably  home. 

Before  the  King  pursued  Perkin  Warbeck  to  the  sanc- 
tuary of  Beaulieu  in  the  New  Forest,  where  it  was  soon 
known  that  he  had  taken  refuge,  he  sent  a  body  of  horse- 
men to  Saint  Michael's  Mount,  to  seize  his  wife.  She  was 
soon  taken  and  brought  as  a  captive  before  the  King.  But 
she  was  so  beautiful,  and  so  good,  and  so  devoted  to  the 
man  in  whom  she  believed,  that  the  King  regarded  her 
with  compassion,  treated  her  with  great  respect,  and  placed 
her  at  Court,  near  the  Queen's  person.  And  many  years 
after  Perkin  Warbeck  was  no  more,  and  when  his  strange 
story  had  become  like  a  nursery  tale,  she  was  called  the 
White  Rose,  by  the  people,  in  remembrance  of  her  beauty. 

The  sanctuary  at  Beaulieu  was  soon  surrounded  by  the 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  229 

King's  men ;  and  the  King,  pursuing  his  usual  dark  artful 
ways,  sent  pretended  friends  to  Perkin  Warbeck  to  per- 
suade him  to  come  out  and  surrender  himself.  This  he 
soon  did ;  the  King  having  taken  a  good  look  at  the  man 
of  whom  he  had  heard  so  much — from  behind  a  screen — 
directed  him  to  be  well  mounted,  and  to  ride  behind  him 
at  a  little  distance,  guarded,  but  not  bound  in  any  way. 
So  they  entered  London  with  the  King's  favourite  show — 
a  procession ;  and  some  of  the  people  hooted  as  the  Pre- 
tender rode  slowly  through  the  streets  to  the  Tower;  but 
the  greater  part  were  quiet,  and  very  curious  to  see  him. 
From  the  Tower,  he  was  taken  to  the  Palace  at  Westmin- 
ster, and  there  lodged  like  a  gentleman,  though  closely 
watched.  He  was  examined  every  now  and  then  as  to  his 
imposture ;  but  the  King  was  so  secret  in  all  he  did,  that 
even  then  lie  gave  it  a  consequence,  which  it  cannot  be 
supposed  to  have  in  itself  deserved. 

At  last  Perkin  Warbeck  ran  away,  and  took  refuge  in 
another  sanctuary  near  Richmond  in  Surrey.  From  this 
he  was  again  persuaded  to  deliver  himself  up ;  and,  being 
conveyed  to  London,  he  stood  in  the  stocks  for  a  whole 
day,  outside  Westminster  Hall,  and  there  read  a  paper 
purporting  to  be  his  full  confession,  and  relating  his  his- 
tory as  the  King's  agents  had  originally  described  it.  He 
was  then  shut  up  in  the  Tower  again,  in  the  company  of 
the  Earl  of  Warwick,  who  had  now  been  there  for  fourteen 
years :  ever  since  his  removal  out  of  Yorkshire,  except 
when  the  King  had  had  him  at  Court,  and  had  shown  him 
to  the  people,  to  prove  the  imposture  of  the  Baker's  boy.  It 
is  but  too  probable,  when  Ave  consider  the  crafty  character 
of  Henry  the  Seventh,  that  these  two  were  brought  together 
for  a  cruel  purpose.  A  plot  was  soon  discovered  between 
them  and  the  keepers,  to  murder  the  Governor,  get  posses- 
sion of  the  keys,  and  proclaim  Perkin  Warbeck  as  King 
Eichard  the  Fourth.  That  there  was  some  such  plot,  is 
likely ;  that  they  were  tempted  into  it,  is  at  least  as  likely ; 
that  the  unfortunate  Earl  of  Warwick — last  male  of  the 
Plantagenet  line — was  too  unused  to  the  world,  and  too 
ignorant  and  simple  to  know  miich  about  it,  whatever  it 
was,  is  perfectly  certain;  and  that  it  was  the  King's  inter- 
est to  get  rid  of  him,  is  no  less  so.  He  was  beheaded  on 
Tower  Hill,  and  Perkin  Warbeck  was  hanged  at  Tyburn. 

Such  was  the  end  of  the  pretended  Duke  of  York,  whose 


S^O  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

shadowy  history  was  made  more  shadowy — and  ever  will 
be — by  the  mystery  and  craft  of  the  King.  If  he  had 
turned  his  great  natural  advantages  to  a  more  honest 
account,  he  might  have  lived  a  happy  and  respected  life, 
even  in  those  days.  But  he  died  upon  a  gallows  at  Tyburn, 
leaving  the  Scottish  lady,  who  had  loved  him  so  well, 
kindly  protected  at  the  Queen's  Court.  After  some  time 
she  forgot  her  old  loves  and  troubles,  as  many  people  do 
with  Time's  merciful  assistance,  and  married  a  Welsh  gen- 
tleman. Her  second  husband,  Sir  Matthew  Cradoc, 
more  honest  and  more  happy  than  her  first,  lies  beside  her 
in  a  tomb  in  the  old  church  of  Swansea, 

The  ill-blood  between  France  and  England  in  this  reign, 
arose  out  of  the  continued  plotting  of  the  Duchess  of  Bur- 
gundy, and  disputes  respecting  the  affairs  of  Brittany. 
The  King  feigned  to  be  very  patriotic,  indignant,  and  war- 
like ;  but  he  always  contrived  so  as  never  to  make  war  in 
reality,  and  always  to  make  money.  His  taxation  of  the 
people,  on  pretence  of  war  with  France,  involved,  at  one 
time,  a  very  dangerous  insurrection,  headed  by  Sir  John 
Egremont,  and  a  common  man  called  John  a  Chambre. 
But  it  was  subdued  by  the  royal  forces,  under  the  command 
of  the  Earl  of  Surrey.  The  knighted  John  escaped  to  the 
Duchess  of  Burgundy,  who  was  ever  ready  to  receive  any 
one  who  gave  the  King  trouble ;  and  the  plain  John  was 
hanged  at  York,  in  the  midst  of  a  number  of  his  men,  but 
on  a  much  higher  gibbet,  as  being  a  greater  traitor.  Hung 
high  or  hung  low,  however,  hanging  is  much  the  same  to 
the  person  hung. 

Within  a  year  after  her  marriage,  the  Queen  had  given 
birth  to  a  son,  who  was  called  Prince  Arthur,  in  remem- 
brance of  the  old  British  prince  of  romance  and  story; 
and  who,  when  all  these  events  had  happened,  being  then 
in  his  fifteenth  year,  was  married  to  Catherine,  the 
daughter  of  the  Spanish  monarch,  with  great  rejoicings  and 
bright  prospects;  but  in  a  very  few  months  he  sickened 
and  died.  As  soon  as  the  King  had  recovered  from  his 
grief,  he  thought  it  a  pity  that  the  fortune  of  the  Spanish 
Princess,  amounting  to  two  hundred  thousand  crowns, 
should  go  out  of  the  family ;  and  therefore  arranged  that 
the  young  widow  should  marry  his  second  son  Henry,  then 
twelve  years  of  age,  when  he  too  should  be  fifteen.  There 
were  objections  to  this  marriage  on  the  part  of  the  clergy ; 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  231 

but,  as  the  infallible  Pope  was  gained  over,  and,  as  he 
must  be  right,  that  settled  the  business  for  the  time.  The 
King's  eldest  daughter  was  provided  for,  and  a  long  course 
of  disturbance  was  considered  to  be  set  at  rest,  by  her  being 
married  to  the  Scottish  King. 

And  now  the  Queen  died.  When  the  King  got  over 
that  grief  too,  his  mind  once  more  reverted  to  his  darling 
money  for  consolation,  and  he  thought  of  marrying  the 
Dowager  Queen  of  Naples,  who  was  immensely  rich  :  but, 
as  it  turned  out  not  to  be  practicable  to  gain  the  money, 
however  practicable  it  might  have  been  to  gain  the  lady, 
he  gave  up  the  idea.  He  was  not  so  fond  of  her  but  that 
he  soon  proposed  to  marry  the  Dowager  Duchess  of  Savoy ; 
and,  soon  afterwards,  the  widow  of  the  King  of  Castile, 
who  was  raving  mad.  But  he  made  a  money-bargain  in- 
stead, and  married  neither. 

The  Duchess  of  Burgundy,  among  the  other  discontented 
people  to  whom  she  had  given  refuge,  had  sheltered  Edmund 
DE  LA  Pole  (younger  brother  of  that  Earl  of  Lincoln  who 
was  killed  at  Stoke),  now  Earl  of  Suffolk.  The  King  had 
prevailed  upon  him  to  return  to  the  marriage  of  Prince 
Arthur;  but,  he  soon  afterwards  went  away  again;  and 
then  the  King,  suspecting  a  conspiracy,  resorted  to  his 
favourite  plan  of  sending  him  some  treacherous  friends,  and 
buying  of  those  scoundrels  the  secrets  they  disclosed  or 
invented.  Some  arrests  arid  executions  took  place  in  con- 
sequence. In  the  end,  the  King,  on  a  promise  of  not  taking 
his  life,  obtained  possession  of  the  person  of  Edmund  de 
la  Pole,  and  shut  him  up  in  the  Tower. 

This  was  his  last  enemy.  If  he  had  lived  much  longer 
he  would  have  made  many  more  among  the  people,  by  the 
grinding  exaction  to  which  he  constantly  exposed  them, 
and  by  the  tyrannical  acts  of  his  two  prime  favourites  in 
all  money-raising  matters,  Edmund  Dudley  and  Richard 
Empson.  But  Death — the  enemy  who  is  not  to  be  bought 
off  or  deceived,  and  on  whom  no  money,  and  no  treachery, 
has  any  effect — presented  himself  at  this  juncture,  and 
ended  the  King's  reign.  He  died  of  the  gout,  on  the 
twenty-second  of  April,  one  thousand  five  hundred  and 
nine,  and  in  the  fifty-third  year  of  his  age,  after  reigning 
twenty-four  years ;  he  was  buried  in  the  beautiful  Chapel 
of  Westminster  Abbey,  which  he  had  himself  founded, 
and  which  still  bears  his  name- 


232  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

It  was  in  this  reign  that  the  great  Christopher  Colum- 
bus, on  behalf  of  Spain,  discovered  what  was  then  called 
The  New  World.  Great  wonder,  interest,  and  hope  of 
wealth  being  awakened  in  England  thereby,  the  King  and 
the  merchants  of  London  and  Bristol  fitted  out  an  English 
expedition  for  further  discoveries  in  the  New  World,  and 
entrusted  it  to  Sebastian  Cabot,  of  Bristol,  the  son  of  a 
Venetian  pilot  there.  He  was  very  successful  in  his  voyage, 
and  gained  high  reputation,  both  for  himself  and  England. 


CHAPTER    XXVII. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  HENRY  THE  EIGHTH,   CALLED 
BLUFF  KING  HAL  AND  BURLY  KING  HARRY. 

PART    THE    FIRST. 

We  now  come  to  King  Henry  the  Eighth,  whom  it  has 
been  too  much  the  fashion  to  call  "  Bluff  King  Hal,"  and 
"Burly  King  Harry,"  and  other  fine  names;  but  whom  I 
shall  take  the  liberty  to  call,  plainly,  one  of  the  most 
detestable  villains  that  ever  drew  breath.  You  will  be 
able  to  judge,  long  before  we  come  to  the  end  of  his  life, 
whether  he  deserves  the  character. 

He  was  just  eighteen  years  of  age  when  he  came  to  the 
throne.  People  said  he  was  handsome  then;  but  I  don't 
believe  it.  He  was  a  big,  burly,  noisy,  small-eyed,  large- 
faced,  double-chinned,  swinish-looking  fellow  in  later  life 
(as  we  know  from  the  likenesses  of  him,  painted  by  the 
famous  Hans  Holbein),  and  it  is  not  easy  to  believe  that 
so  bad  a  character  can  ever  have  been  veiled  under  a  pre- 
possessing appearance. 

He  was  anxious  to  make  himself  popular ;  and  the  peo- 
ple, who  had  long  disliked  the  late  King,  were  very  will- 
ing to  believe  that  he  deserved  to  be  so.  He  was  extremely 
fond  of  show  and  display,  and  so  were  they.  Therefore 
there  was  great  rejoicing  when  he  married  the  Princess 
Catherine,  and  when  they  were  both  crowned.  And  the 
King  fouglit  at  tournaments  and  always  came  off  viafcorious 
—for  the  courtiers  took  care  of  that — and  there  was  a  gen- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  233 

eral  outcry  that  he  was  a  wonderful  man.  Empson,  Dud- 
ley, and  their  supporters  were  accused  of  a  variety  of  crimes 
they  had  never  committed,  instead  of  the  offences  of  which 
they  really  had  been  guilty ;  and  they  were  pilloried,  and 
set  upon  horses  with  their  faces  to  the  tails,  and  knocked 
about  and  beheaded,  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  people,  and 
the  enrichment  of  the  King. 

The  Pope,  so  indefatigable  in  getting  the  world  into 
trouble,  had  mixed  himself  up  in  a  war  on  the  continent  of 
Europe,  occasioned  by  the  reigning  Princes  of  little  quar- 
relling states  in  Italy  having  at  various  times  married  into 
other  Eoyal  families,  and  so  led  to  their  claiming  a  share  in 
those  petty  Governments.  The  King,  who  discovered  that 
he  was  very  fond  of  the  Pope,  sent  a  herald  to  the  King 
of  France,  to  say  that  he  must  not  make  war  upon  that 
holy  personage,  because  he  was  the  father  of  all  Christians. 
As  the  French  King  did  not  mind  this  relationship  in  the 
least,  and  also  refused  to  admit  a  claim  King  Henry  made 
to  certain  lands  in  France,  war  was  declared  between  the 
two  countries.  Not  to  perplex  this  story  with  an  account 
of  the  tricks  and  designs  of  all  the  sovereigns  who  were 
engaged  in  it,  it  is  enough  to  say  that  England  made  a 
blundering  alliance  with  Spain,  and  got  stupidly  taken  in 
by  that  country ;  which  made  its  own  terms  with  France 
when  it  could,  and  left  England  in  the  lurch.  Sir  Edward 
Howard,  a  bold  admiral,  son  of  the  Earl  of  Surrey,  dis- 
tinguished himself  by  his  bravery  against  the  French  in 
this  business ;  but,  unfortunately,  he  was  more  brave  than 
wise,  for,  skimming  into  the  French  harbour  of  Brest  with 
only  a  few  row-boats,  he  attempted  (in  revenge  for  the  de- 
feat and  death  of  Sir  Thomas  Knyvett,  another  bold 
English  admiral)  to  take  some  strong  French  ships,  well 
defended  with  batteries  of  cannon.  The  upshot  was,  that 
he  was  left  on  board  of  one  of  them  (in  consequence  of  it 
shooting  away  from  his  own  boat),  with  not  more  than 
about  a  dozen  men,  and  was  thrown  into  the  sea  and 
drowned :  though  not  until  he  had  taken  from  his  breast 
his  gold  chain  and  gold  whistle,  which  were  the  signs  of 
his  office,  and  had  cast  them  into  the  sea  to  prevent  their 
being  made  a  boast  of  by  the  enemy.  After  this  defeat — 
which  was  a  great  one,  for  Sir  Edward  Howard  was  a  man 
of  valour  and  fame — the  King  took  it  into  his  head  to  in- 
vade France  in  person ;  first  executing  that  dangerous  Earl 


234  A   CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

of  Suffolk  whom  his  father  had  left  in  the  Tower,  and  ap- 
pointing Queen  Catherine  to  the  charge  of  his  kingdom  in 
his  absence.  He  sailed  to  Calais,  where  he  was  joined  1  y 
Maximilian,  Emperor  of  Germany,  who  pretended  to  be 
his  soldier,  and  who  took  pay  in  his  service :  with  a  good 
deal  of  nonsense  of  that  sort,  flatterhig  enough  to  the 
vanity  of  a  vain  blusterer.  The  King  miglit  be  successful 
enough  in  sham  fights ;  but  his  idea  of  real  battles  chiefly 
consisted  in  pitching  silken  tents  of  bright  colours  that 
were  ignominiously  blown  down  by  the  wind,  and  in  mak- 
ing a  vast  display  of  gaudy  flags  aud  golden  curtains. 
Fortune,  however,  favoured  him  better  than  he  deserved; 
for,  after  much  waste  of  time  in  tent  pitching,  flag  flying, 
gold  curtaining,  and  other  such  masquerading,  he  gave  the 
French  battle  at  a  place  called  Guinegate :  Avhere  they  took 
such  an  unaccountable  panic,  and  fled  with  such  swiftness, 
that  it  was  ever  afterwards  called  by  the  English  the  Bat- 
tle of  Spurs.  Instead  of  following  up  his  advantage,  the 
King,  finding  that  he  had  had  enough  of  real  fighting, 
came  home  again. 

The  Scottish  King,  though  nearly  related  to  Henry  by 
marriage,  had  taken  part  against  him  in  this  war.  The 
Earl  of  Surrey,  as  the  English  general,  advanced  to  meet 
him  when  he  came  out  of  his  own  dominions  and  crossed 
the  river  Tweed.  The  two  armies  came  up  with  one 
another  when  the  Scottish  King  had  also  crossed  the  river 
Till,  and  was  encamped  upon  the  last  of  the  Cheviot  Hills, 
called  the  Hill  of  Flodden.  Along  the  plain  below  it,  the 
English,  when  the  hour  of  battle  came,  advanced.  The 
Scottish  army,  which  had  been  drawn  up  in  five  great 
bodies,  then  came  steadily  down  in  perfect  silence.  So 
they,  in  their  turn,  advanced  to  meet  the  English  army, 
which  came  on  in  one  long  line ;  and  they  attacked  it  with 
a  body  of  spearmen,  under  Lord  Home.  At  first  they  had 
the  best  of  it;  but  the  English  recovered  themselves  so 
bravely,  and  fought  with  such  valour,  that,  when  the  Scot- 
tish King  had  almost  made  his  way  up  to  the  Royal  stand- 
ard, he  was  slain,  and  the  whole  Scottish  power  routed. 
Ten  thousand  Scottish  men  lay  dead  that  day  on  Flodden 
Field;  and  among  them,  numbers  of  the  nobility  and  gen- 
try. For  a  long  time  afterwards,  the  Scottish  jjeasantry 
used  to  believe  that  their  King  had  not  been  really  killed 
in  this  battle,  because  no  Englishman  had  found  an  iron 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  236 

belt  he  wore  about  his  body  as  a  penance  for  having  been 
an  unnatural  and  undutiful  son.  But,  whatever  became  of 
his  belt,  the  English  had  his  sword  and  dagger,  and  the 
ring  from  his  finger,  and  his  body  too,  covered  with  wounds. 
There  is  no  doubt  of  it ;  for  it  was  seen  and  recognised  by 
English  gentlemen  who  had  known  the  Scottish  King  well. 

When  King  Henry  was  making  ready  to  renew  the  war 
in  France,  the  French  King  was  contemplating  peace.  His 
queen,  dying  at  this  time,  he  proposed,  though  he  was  up- 
wards of  fifty  years  old,  to  marrj'-  King  Henry's  sister,  the 
Princess  Mary,  who,  besides  being  only  sixteen,  was  be- 
trothed to  the  Duke  of  Suffolk.  As  the  inclinations  of 
young  Princesses  were  not  much  considered  in  such  mat- 
ters, the  marriage  was  concluded,  and  the  poor  girl  was  es- 
corted to  France,  where  she  was  immediately  left  as  the 
French  King's  bride,  with  only  one  of  all  her  English 
attendants.  That  one  was  a  pretty  young  girl  named  Anne 
BoLEYN,  niece  of  the  Earl  of  Surrey,  who  had  been  made 
Duke  of  Norfolk,  after  the  victory  of  Flodden  Field. 
Anne  Boleyn's  is  a  name  to  be  remembered,  as  you  will 
presently  find. 

And  now  the  French  King,  who  was  very  proud  of  his 
young  wife,  was  preparing  for  many  years  of  happiness, 
and  she  was  looking  forward,  I  dare  say,  to  many  years  of 
misery,  when  he  died  within  three  months,  and  left  her  a 
young  widow.  The  new  French  monarch,  Francis  the 
First,  seeing  how  important  it  was  to  his  interests  that  she 
should  take  for  her  second  husband  no  one  but  an  English- 
man, advised  her  first  lover,  the  Duke  of  Suffolk,  when 
King  Henry  sent  him  over  to  France  to  fetch  her  home,  to 
marry  her.  The  Princess  being  herself  so  fond  of  that 
Duke,  as  to  tell  him  that  he  must  either  do  so  then,  or  for 
ever  lose  her,  they  were  wedded;  and  Henry  afterwards 
forgave  them.  In  making  interest  with  the  King,  the 
Duke  of  Suffolk  had  addressed  his  most  powerful  favourite 
and  adviser,  Thomas  Wolset — a  name  very  famous  in 
history  for  its  rise  and  downfall. 

Wolsey  was  the  son  of  a  respectable  butcher  at  Ipswich, 
in  Suffolk,  and  received  so  excellent  an  education  that  he 
became  a  tutor  to  the  family  of  the  Marquis  of  Dorset,  who 
afterwards  got  him  appointed  one  of  the  late  King's  chap- 
lains. On  the  accession  of  Henry  the  Eighth,  he  was 
promoted  and  taken  into  great  favour-     He  was  now  Arch* 


236  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

bishop  of  York;  the  Pope  had  made  him  a  Cardinal  be- 
sides; and  whoever  wanted  influence  in  England  or  favour 
with  the  King — whether  he  were  a  foreign  monarch  or  an 
English  nobleman — was  obliged  to  make  a  friend  of  the 
great  Cardinal  Wolsey. 

He  was  a  gay  man,  who  could  dance  and  jest,  and  sing 
and  drink ;  and  those  were  the  roads  to  so  much,  or  rather 
so  little,  of  a  heai't  as  King  Henry  had.  He  was  wonder- 
fully fond  of  pomp  and  glitter,  and  so  was  the  King.  He 
knew  a  good  deal  of  the  Church  learning  of  that  time ; 
much  of  which  consisted  in  finding  artful  excuses  and  pre- 
tences for  almost  any  wrong  thing,  and  in  arguing  that 
black  was  white,  or  any  other  colour.  This  kind  of  learn- 
ing pleased  the  King  too.  For  many  such  reasons,  the 
Cardinal  was  high  in  estimation  with  the  King ;  and,  being 
a  man  of  far  greater  ability,  knew  as  well  how  to  manage 
him,  as  a  clever  keeper  may  know  how  to  manage  a  wolf  or 
a  tiger,  or  any  other  cruel  and  uncertain  beast,  that  may 
turn  upon  him  and  tear  him  any  day.  Never  had  there 
been  seen  in  England  such  state  as  my  Lord  Cardinal  kept. 
His  wealth  was  enormous;  eqiuil,  it  was  reckoned,  to  the 
riches  of  the  Crown.  His  palaces  were  as  splendid  as  the 
King's,  and  his  retinue  was  eight  hundred  strong.  He 
held  his  Court,  dressed  out  from  top  to  toe  in  flaming  scar- 
let; and  his  very  shoes  were  golden,  set  with  precious 
stones.  His  followers  rode  on  blood  horses;  while  he, 
with  a  wonderful  affectation  of  humility  in  the  midst  of 
his  great  splendour,  ambled  on  a  mule  with  a  red  velvet 
saddle  and  bridle  and  golden  stirrups. 

Through  the  influence  of  this  stately  priest,  a  grand 
meeting  was  arranged  to  take  place  between  the  French 
and  Englisli  Kings  in  France;  but  on  ground  belonging  to 
England.  A  prodigious  show  of  friendship  and  rejoicing 
was  to  be  made  on  the  occasion;  and  heralds  were  sent  to 
proclaim  with  brazen  trumpets  through  all  the  principal 
cities  of  Europe,  that,  on  a  certain  day,  the  Kings  of  France 
and  Eiigland,  as  companions  and  brothers  in  arms,  each 
attended  by  eighteen  followers,  would  hold  a  tournament 
against  all  knights  who  might  choose  to  come. 

Charles,  the  new  Emperor  of  Germany  (the  old  one 
being  dead),  wanted  to  prevent  too  cordial  an  alliance  be- 
tween these  sovereigns,  and  came  over  to  England  before 
the  King  could  repair  to  the  place  of  meeting ;  and,  besides 


WOLSKY  SEUVED  BY  NOBLEMEN. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  237 

making  an  agreeable  impression  upon  him,  secured  Wol- 
sey's  interest  by  promising  that  his  influence  should  make 
him  Pope  Avhen  the  next  vacancy  occurred.  On  the  day 
when  the  Emperor  left  England,  the  King  and  all  the  Court 
went  over  to  Calais,  and  thence  to  the  place  of  meeting, 
between  Ardres  and  Guisues,  commonly  called  the  Field  of 
the  Cloth  of  Gold.  Here,  all  manner  of  expense  and  prodi- 
gality was  lavished  on  the  decorations  of  the  show ;  many 
of  the  knights  and  gentlemen  being  so  superbly  dressed 
that  it  was  said  they  carried  their  whole  estates  upon  their 
shoulders. 

There  were  sham  castles,  temporary  chapels,  fountains 
running  wine,  great  cellars  full  of  wine  free  as  water  to  all 
comers,  silk  tents,  gold  lace  and  foil,  gilt  lions,  and  such 
things  without  end ;  and,  in  the  midst  of  all,  the  rich  Car- 
dinal out-shone  and  out-glittered  all  the  noblemen  and  gen- 
tlemen assembled.  After  a  treaty  made  between  the  two 
Kings  with  as  much  solemnity  as  if  they  had  intended  to 
keep  it,  the  lists — nine  hundred  feet  long,  and  three  hun- 
dred and  twenty  broad — were  opened  for  the  tournament ; 
the  Queens  of  France  and  England  looking  on  with  great 
array  of  lords  and  ladies.  Then,  for  ten  days,  the  two 
sovereigns  fought  five  combats  every  day,  and  always  beat 
their  polite  adversaries;  though  they  do  write  that  the 
King  of  England,  being  thrown  in  a  wrestle  one  day  by  the 
King  of  France,  lost  his  kingly  temper  with  his  brother  in 
arms,  and  wanted  to  make  a  quarrel  of  it.  Then,  there  is 
a  great  story  belonging  to  this  Field  of  the  Cloth  of  Gold, 
showing  how  the  English  were  distrustful  of  the  French, 
and  the  French  of  the  English,  until  Francis  rode  alone 
one  morning  to  Henry's  tent;  and,  going  in  before  he  was 
out  of  bed,  told  him  in  joke  that  he  was  his  prisoner;  and 
how  Henry  jumped  out  of  bed  and  embraced  Francis;  and 
how  Francis  helped  Henry  to  dress,  and  warmed  his  linen 
for  him ;  and  how  Henry  gave  Francis  a  splendid  jewelled 
collar,  and  how  Francis  gave  Henry,  in  return,  a  costly 
bracelet.  All  this  and  a  great  deal  more  was  so  written 
about^  and  sung  about,  and  talked  about  at  that  time  (and, 
indeed,  since  that  time  too),  that  the  world  has  had  good 
cause  to  be  sick  of  it,  for  ever. 

Of  course,  nothing  came  of  all  these  fine  doings  but  a 
speedy  renewal  of  the  war  between  England  and  France, 
in  which  the  two  Royal  companions  and  brothers  in  arms 


238  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

longed  very  earnestly  to  damage  one  another.  But,  before 
it  broke  out  again,  the  Duke  of  Buckingham  was  shamefully 
executed  on  Tower  Hill,  on  the  evidence  of  a  discharged 
servant — really  for  nothing,  except  the  folly  of  having 
believed  in  a  friar  of  the  name  of  Hopkins,  who  had  pre- 
tended to  be  a  prophet,  and  who  had  mumbled  and  jum- 
bled out,some  nonsense  about  the  Duke's  son  being  destined 
to  be  very  great  in  the  land.  It  was  believed  that  the  un- 
fortunate Duke  had  given  offence  to  the  great  Cardinal  by 
expressing  his  mind  freely  about  the  expense  and  absurdity 
of  the  whole  business  of  the  Field  of  the  Cloth  of  Gold. 
At  any  rate,  he  was  beheaded,  as  I  have  said,  for  nothing. 
And  the  people  who  saw  it  done  were  very  angry,  and  cried 
out  that  it  was  the  w^ork  of  "  the  butcher's  son ! " 

The  new  war  was  a  short  one,  though  the  Earl  of  Surrey 
invaded  France  again,  and  did  some  injury  to  that  country. 
It  ended  in  another  treaty  of  peace  between  the  two  king- 
doms, and  in  the  discovery  that  the  Emperor  of  Germany 
was  not  such  a  good  friend  to  England  in  reality,  as  he  pre- 
tended to  be.  Neither  did  he  keep  his  promise  to  Wolsey 
to  make  him  Pope,  tliough  the  King  urged  him.  Two 
Popes  died  in  pretty  quick  succession;  but  the  foreign 
priests  were  too  much  for  the  Cardinal,  and  kept  him  out 
of  the  post.  So  the  Cardinal  and  King  together  found  out 
that  tjie  Emperor  of  Germany  was  not  a  man  to  keep  faith 
with ;  broke  off  a  projected  marriage  between  the  King's 
daughter  Mary,  Princess  of  Wales,  and  that  sovereign; 
and  began  to  consider  whether  it  might  not  be  well  to 
marry  the  young  lady,  either  to  Francis  himself,  or  to  his 
eldest  son. 

There  now  arose  at  Wittemberg,  in  Germany,  the  great 
leader  of  the  mighty  change  in  England  which  is  called 
The  Reformation,  and  which  set  the  people  free  from  their 
slavei-y  to  the  priests.  This  was  a  learned  doctor,  named 
Martin  Luther,  who  knew  all  about  them,  for  he  had 
been  a  priest,  and  even  a  monk,  himself.  The  preaching 
and  writing  of  Wickliffe  had  set  a  number  of  men  thinking 
on  this  subject;  and  Luther,  finding  one  day  to  his.  great 
surprise,  that  there  really  was  a  book  called  the  New  Tes- 
tament which  the  priests  did  not  allow  to  be  read,  and 
which  contained  truths  that  they  suppressed,  began  to  be 
very  vigorous  against  the  whole  body,  from  tlie  Pope  down- 
ward.    It  happened,  while  he  was  yet  only  beginning  his 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  239 

vast  work  of  awakeniag  the  nation,  that  an  impudent  fel- 
low named  Tetzbl,  a  friar  of  very  bad  character,  came  into 
his  neighborhood  selling  what  were  called  Indulgences,  by 
wholesale,  to  raise  money  for  beautifying  the  great  Cathe- 
dral of  Saint  Peter's,  at  Rome.  Whoever  bought  an  In- 
dulgence of  the  Pope  was  supposed  to  buy  himself  off  from 
the  punishment  of  Heaven  for  his  offences.  Luther  told 
the  people  that  these  Indulgences  were  worthless  bits  of 
paper,  before  God,  and  that  Tetzel  and  his  masters  were  a 
crew  of  impostors  in  selling  them. 

The  King  and  the  Cardinal  were  mightily  indignant  at 
this  presumption;  and  the  King  (with  the  help  of  Sir 
Thomas  More,  a  wise  man,  whom  he  afterwards  repaid 
by  striking  off  his  head)  even  wrote  a  book  about  it,  with 
which  the  Pope  was  so  well  pleased  that  he  gave  the  King 
the  title  of  Defender  of  the  Faith.  The  King  and  the  Car- 
dinal also  issued  flaming  warnings  to  the  people  not  to  read 
Luther's  books,  on  pain  of  excommunication.  But  they 
did  read  them  for  all  that ;  and  the  rumour  of  what  was  in 
them  spread  far  and  wide. 

When  this  great  change  was  thus  going  on,  the  King 
began  to  show  himself  in  his  truest  and  worst  colours. 
Anne  Boleyn,  the  pretty  little  girl  who  had  gone  abroad  to 
France  with  his  sister,  was  by  this  time  grown  up  to  be 
very  beautiful,  and  was  one  of  the  ladies  in  attendance  on 
Queen  Catherine.  Now,  Queen  Catherine  was  no  longer 
young  or  handsome,  and  it  is  likely  that  she  was  not 
particularly  good-tempered;  having  been  always  rather 
melancholy,  and  having  been  made  more  so  by  the  deaths 
of  four  of  her  children  when  they  were  very  young.  So, 
the  King  fell  in  love  with  the  fair  Anne  Boleyn,  and  said 
to  himself,  "  How  can  I  be  best  rid  of  my  own  troublesome 
wife  whom  I  am  tired  of,  and  marry  Anne?" 

You  recollect  that  Queen  Catherine  had  been  the  wife  of 
Henry's  brother.  What  does  the  King  do,  after  thinking 
it  over,  but  calls  his  favourite  priests  about  him,  and  says, 
0 !  his  mind  is  in  such  a  dreadful  state,  and  he  is  so  fright- 
fully uneasy  because  he  is  afraid  it  was  not  lawful  for  him  to 
marry  the  Queen!  Not  one  of  those  priests  had  the  cour- 
age to  hint  that  it  was  rather  curious  he  had  never  tiiought 
of  that  before,  and  that  his  mind  seemed  to  have  been  in 
a  tolerably  jolly  condition  during  a  great  many  years,  in 
which  he  certainly  had  not  fretted  himself  thin ;  but,  they 


240  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

all  said,  Ah !  that  was  very  true,  and  it  was  a  serious  busi 
ness ;  and  perhaps  the  best  way  to  make  it  right,  would  be 
for  his  Majesty  to  be  divorced!     The  King  replied.  Yes, 
he  thought  that  would  be  the  best  way,  certainly ;  so  they 
all  went  to  work. 

If  I  were  to  relate  to  you  the  intrigues  and  plots  that 
took  place  in  the  endeavour  to  get  this  divorce,  you  would 
think  the  History  of  England  the  most  tiresome  book  in  the 
world.  So  I  shall  say  uo  more,  than  that  after  a  vast  deal 
of  negotiation  and  evasion,  the  Pope  issued  a  commission 
to  Cardinal  Wolsey  and  Cakdixal  Campeggio  (whom  he 
sent  over  from  Italy  for  the  purpose),  to  try  the  whole  case 
in  England.  It  is  supposed — and  I  think  with  reason — 
that  Wolsey  was  the  Queen's  enemy,  because  she  had  re- 
proved him  for  his  proud  and  gorgeous  manner  of  life. 
But  he  did  not  at  first  know  that  the  King  wanted  to  marry 
Anne  Boleyn ;  and  when  he  did  know  it,  he  even  went 
down  on  his  knees,  in  the  endeavour  to  dissuade  him. 

The  Cardinals  opened  their  court  in  the  Convent  of  the 
Black  Friars,  near  to  where  the  bridge  of  that  name  in  Lon- 
don now  stands;  and  the  King  and  Queen,  that  they  might 
be  near  it,  took  up  their  lodgings  at  the  adjoining  palace 
of  Bridewell,  of  which  nothing  now  remains  but  a  bad 
prison.  On  the  opening  of  the  court,  when  the  King  and 
Queen  were  called  on  to  appear,  that  poor  ill-used  lady, 
with  a  dignity  and  firmness  and  yet  with  a  womanly  affec- 
tion worthy  to  be  always  admired,  went  and  kneeled  at  the 
King's  feet,  and  said  that  she  had  come,  a  stranger,  to  his 
dominions ;  that  she  had  been  a  good  and  true  wife  to  him 
for  twenty  years ;  and  that  she  could  acknowledge  no  power 
in  those  Cardinals  to  try  whether  she  should  be  considered 
his  wife  after  all  that  time,  or  should  be  put  away.  With 
that,  she  got  up  and  left  the  court,  and  would  never  after- 
wards come  back  to  it. 

The  King  pretended  to  be  very  much  overcome,  and  said, 
0 !  my  lords  and  gentlemen,  what  a  good  woman  she  was 
to  be  sure,  and  how  delighted  he  would  be  to  live  with  her 
unto  death,  but  for  that  terrible  uneasiness  in  his  mind 
which  was  quite  wearing  him  away!  So,  the  case  went  on, 
and  there  was  nothing  but  talk  for  two  months.  Then 
Cardinal  Campeggio,  who,  on  behalf  of  the  Pope,  wanted 
nothing  so  much  as  delay,  adjourned  it  for  two  more 
months  j  and  before  that  time  was  elapsed,  the  Pope  him- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  241 

self  adjourned  it  indefinitely,  by  requiring  the  King  and 
Queen  to  come  to  Rome  and  have  it  tried  there.  But  by 
good  luck  for  the  King,  word  was  brought  to  him  by  some 
of  his  people,  that  they  had  happened  to  meet  at  supper, 
Thomas  Cranmer,  a  learned  Doctor  of  Cambridge,  who 
had  proposed  to  urge  the  Pope  on,  by  referring'the  case  to 
all  the  learned  doctors  and  bishops,  here  and  there  and 
everywhere,  and  getting  their  opinions  that  the  King's  mar- 
riage was  unlawful.  The  King,  who  was  now  in  a  hurry 
to  marry  Anne  Boleyn,  thought  this  such  a  good  idea, 
that  he  sent  for  Cranmer,  post  haste,  and  said  to  Lord 
RocHFORT,  Anne  Boleyn' s  father,  "Take  this  learned  Doc- 
tor down  to  your  country-house,  and  there  let  him  have  a 
good  room  for  a  study,  and  no  end  of  books  out  of  which  to 
prove  that  I  may  marry  your  daughter."  Lord  Rochfort, 
not  at  all  reluctant,  made  the  learned  Doctor  as  comfortable 
as  he  could ;  and  the  learned  Doctor  went  to  work  to  prove 
his  case.  All  this  time,  the  King  and  Anne  Boleyn  were 
writing  letters  to  one  another  almost  daily,  full  of  im- 
patience to  have  the  case  settled ;  and  Anne  Boleyn  was 
showing  herself  (as  I  think)  very  worthy  of  the  fate 
which  afterwards  befell  her. 

It  was  bad  for  Cardinal  Wolsey  that  he  had  left  Cran- 
mer to  render  this  help.  It  was  worse  for  him  that  he  had 
tried  to  dissuade  the  King  from  marrying  Anne  Boleyn. 
Such  a  servant  as  he,  to  such  a  master  as  Henry,  would 
probably  have  fallen  in  any  case ;  but,  between  the  hatred 
of  the  party  of  the  Queen  that  was,  and  the  hatred  of  the 
party  of  the  Queen  that  was  to  be,  he  fell  suddenly  and 
heavily.  Going  down  one  day  to  the  Court  of  Chancery, 
where  he  now  presided,  he  was  waited  upon  by  the  Dukes 
of  Norfolk  and  Suffolk,  who  told  him  that  they  brought  an 
order  to  him  to  resign  that  office,  and  to  withdraw  quietly 
to  a  house  he  had  at  Esher,  in  Surrey.  The  Cardinal  re- 
fusing, they  rode  off  to  the  King ;  and  next  day  came  back 
with  a  letter  from  him,  on  reading  which,  the  Cardinal  sub- 
mitted. An  inventory  was  made  out  of  all  the  riches  in  his 
palace  at  York  Place  (now  Whitehall),  and  he  went  sorrow- 
fully up  the  river,  in  his  barge,  to  Putney,  An  abject  man 
he  was,  in  spite  of  his  pride ;  for  being  overtaken,  riding  out 
of  that  place  towards  Esher,  by  one  of  the  King's  cham- 
berlains who  brought  him  a  kind  message  and  a  ring,  he 
alighted  from  his  mule,  took  off  his  cap,  and  kneeled  down 
16 


242  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND. 

in  the  dirt.  His  poor  Fool,  whom  in  his  prosperous  days 
he  had  always  kept  in  his  palace  to  entertain  him,  cut  a 
far  better  figure  than  he ;  for,  when  the  Cardinal  said  to 
the  chamberlain  that  he  had  nothing  to  send  to  his  lord  the 
King  as  a  present,  but  that  jester  who  was  a  most  excellent 
one,  it  took  six  strong  yeomen  to  remove  the  faithful  fool 
from  his  master. 

The  once  proud  Cardinal  was  soon  further  disgraced,  and 
wrote  the  most  abject  letters  to  his  vile  sovereign ;  who 
humbled  him  one  day  and  encouraged  him  the  next,  accord- 
ing to  his  humour,  until  he  was  at  last  ordered  to  go  and 
reside  in  his  diocese  of  York.  He  said  he  was  too  poor ; 
but  I  don't  know  how  he  made  that  out,  for  he  took  a  hun- 
dred and  sixty  servants  with  him,  and  seventy-two  cart- 
loads of  furniture,  food,  and  wine.  He  remained  in  that 
part  of  the  country  for  the  best  part  of  a  year,  and  showed 
himself  so  improved  by  his  misfortunes,  and  was  so  mild 
and  so  conciliating,  that  he  won  all  hearts.  And  indeed, 
even  in  his  proud  days,  he  had  done  some  magnificent  things 
for  learning  and  education.  At  last,  he  was  arrested  for 
high  treason;  and,  coming  slowly  on  his  journey  towards 
London,  got  as  far  as  Leicester,  Arriving  at  Leicester 
Abbey  after  dark,  and  very  ill,  he  said — when  the  monks 
came  out  at  the  gate  with  lighted  torches  to  perceive  him — • 
that  he  had  come  to  lay  his  bones  among  them.  He  had 
indeed;  for  he  was  taken  to  a  bed,  from  which  he  never 
rose  again.  His  last  words  were,  "  Had  I  but  served  God 
as  diligently  as  I  have  served  the  King,  He  would  not  have 
given  me  over,  in  my  grey  hairs.  Howbeit,  this  is  my 
just  reward  for  my  pains  and  diligence,  not  regarding  my 
service  to  God,  but  only  my  duty  to  my  prince."  The 
news  of  his  death  was  quickly  carried  to  the  King,  who 
was  amusing  himself  with  archery  in  the  garden  of  the 
magnificent  Palace  at  Hampton  Court,  which  that  very 
Wolsey  had  presented  to  him.  The  greatest  emotion  his 
royal  mind  displayed  at  the  loss  of  a  servant  so  faithful 
and  so  ruined,  was  a  particular  desire  to  lay  hold  of  fifteen 
hundred  pounds  which  the  Cardinal  was  reported  to  have 
hidden  somewhere. 

The  opinions  concerning  the  divorce,  of  the  learned  doc- 
tors and  bishops  and  others,  being  at  last  collected,  and 
being  generally  in  the  King's  favour,  were  forwarded  to 
the  Pope,  with  an  entreaty  that  he  would  now  grant  it. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  243 

The  unfortunate  Pope,  who  was  a  timid  man,  was  half  dis- 
tracted between  his  fear  of  his  authority  being  set  aside  in 
England  if  he  did  not  do  as  he  was  asked,  and  his  dread  of 
offending  the  Emperor  of  Germany,  who  was  Queen  Cather- 
ine's nephew.  In  this  state  of  mind  he  still  evaded  and 
did  nothing.  Then,  Thomas  Cromwell,  who  had  been  one 
of  Wolsey's  faithful  attendants,  and  had  remained  so  even 
in  his  decline,  advised  the  King  to  take  the  matter  into 
his  own  hands,  and  make  himself  the  head  of  the  whole 
Church.  This,  the  King  by  various  artful  means,  began  to 
do ;  but  he  recompensed  the  clergy  by  allowing  them  to 
burn  as  many  people  as  they  jjleased,  for  holding  Luther's 
opinions.  You  must  understand  that  Sir  Thomas  More, 
the  wise  man  who  had  helped  the  King  with  his  book,  had 
been  made  Chancellor  in  Wolsey's  place.  But,  as  he  was 
truly  attached  to  the  Churcli  as  it  was  even  in  its  abuses, 
he,  in  this  state  of  things,  resigned. 

Being  now  quite  resolved  to  get  rid  of  Queen  Catherine, 
and  to  marry  Anne  Boleyn  without  more  ado,  the  King 
made  Cranmer  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  and  directed 
Queen  Catherine  to  leave  the  Court.  She  obeyed ;  but  re- 
plied that  wherever  she  went,  she  was  Queen  of  England 
still,  and  would  remain  so,  to  the  last.  The  King  then 
married  Anne  Boleyn  privately;  and  the  new  Archbishop 
of  Canterbury,  within  half  a  year,  declared  his  marriage 
with  Queen  Catherine  void,  and  crowned  Anne  Boleyn 
Queen. 

She  might  have  known  that  no  good  could  ever  come 
from  such  wrong,  and  that  the  corpulent  brute  who  had 
been  so  faithless  and  so  cruel  to  his  first  wife,  could  be 
more  faithless  and  more  cruel  to  his  second.  She  might 
have  known  that,  even  when  he  was  in  love  with  her,  he 
had  been  a  mean  and  selfish  coward,  running  away,  like  a 
frightened  cur,  from  her  society  and  her  house,  when  a 
dangerous  sickness  broke  out  in  it,  and  when  she  might 
easily  have  taken  it  and  died,  as  several  of  the  household 
did.  But,  Anne  Boleyn  arrived  at  all  this  knowledge  too 
late,  and  bought  it  at  a  dear  price.  Her  bad  marriage  with 
a  worse  man  came  to  its  natural  end.  Its  natural  end  was 
not,  as  we  shall  too  soon  see,  a  natural  death  for  her. 


244  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

CHAPTER    XXVIII. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  HENPtY  THE  EIGHTH. 

PABT    THE    SECOND. 

The  Pope  was  thrown  into  a  very  angry  state  of  mind 
when  he  heard  of  the  King's  marriage,  and  fumed  exceed- 
ingly. Many  of  the  English  monks  and  friars,  seeing  that 
their  order  was  in  danger,  did  the  same ;  some  even  declaimed 
against  the  King  in  church  before  his  face,  and  were  not  to 
be  stopped  until  he  himself  roared  out  "  Silence !  "  The 
King,  not  much  the  worse  for  this,  took  it  pretty  quietly ; 
and  was  very  glad  when  his  Queen  gave  birth  to  a  daughter, 
who  was  christened  Elizabeth,  and  declared  Princess  of 
Wales  as  her  sister  Mary  had  already  been. 

One  of  the  most  atrocious  features  of  this  reign  was  that 
Henry  the  Eighth  was  always  trimming  between  the  re- 
formed religion  and  the  unreformed  one ;  so  that  the  more 
he  quarrelled  with  the  Pope,  the  more  of  his  own  subjects 
he  roasted  alive  for  not  holding  the  Pope's  opinions.  Thus, 
an  unfortunate  student  named  John  Frith,  and  a  poor 
simple  tailor  named  Andrew  Hewet  who  loved  him  very 
much,  and  said  that  whatever  John  Frith  believed  he  be- 
lieved, were  burnt  in  Smithfield — to  show  what  a  capital 
Christian  the  King  was. 

But,  these  were  speedily  followed  by  two  much  greater 
victims,  Sir  Thomas  More,  and  John  Fisher,  the  Bishop  of 
Rochester.  The  latter,  who  was  a  good  and  amiable  old 
man,  had  committed  no  greater  offence  than  believing 
in  Elizabeth  Barton,  called  the  Maid  of  Kent — another  of 
those  ridiculous  women  who  pretended  to  be  inspired,  and 
to  make  all  sorts  of  heavenly  revelations,  though  they  in- 
deed uttered  nothing  but  evil  nonsense.  For  this  offence — 
as  it  was  pretended,  but  really  for  denying  the  King  to  be 
the  supreme  Head  of  the  Church — he  got  into  trouble,  and 
was  put  in  prison ;  but,  even  then,  he  might  have  been 
suffered  to  die  naturally  (short  work  having  been  made  of 
executing  the  Kentish  Maid  and  her  principal  followers), 
but  that  the  Pope,  to  spite  the  King,  resolved  to  make  him 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  245 

a  cardinal.  Upon  that  the  King  made  a  ferocious  joke 
to  the  effect  that  the  Pope  might  send  Fisher  a  red  hat — ■ 
which  is  the  way  they  make  a  cardinal — but  he  should  have 
no  head  on  which  to  wear  it;  and  he  was  tried  with  all 
unfairness  and  injustice,  and  sentenced  to  death.  He  died 
like  a  noble  and  virtuous  old  man,  and  left  a  worthy  name 
behind  him.  The  King  supposed,  I  dare  say,  that  Sir 
Thomas  More  would  be  frightened  by  this  example ;  but,  as 
he  was  not  to  be  easily  terrified,  and,  thoroughly  believ- 
ing in  the  Pope,  had  made  up  his  mind  that  the  King  was 
not  the  rightful  Head  of  the  Church,  he  positively  refused 
to  say  that  he  was.  For  this  crime  he  too  was  tried  and 
sentenced,  after  having  been  in  prison  a  whole  year. 
When  he  was  doomed  to  death,  and  came  away  from  his 
trial  with  the  edge  of  the  executioner's  axe  turned  towards 
him — as  was  always  done  in  those  times  when  a  state  pris- 
oner came  to  that  hopeless  pass — he  bore  it  quite  serenely, 
and  gave  his  blessing  to  his  son,  who  pressed  through  the 
crowd  in  Westminster  Hall  and  kneeled  down  to  receive  it. 
But,  when  he  got  to  the  Tower  Wharf  on  his  way  back  to 
his  prison,  and  his  favorite  daughter,  Margaret  Roper, 
a  very  good  woman,  rushed  through  the  guards  again  and 
again,  to  kiss  him  and  to  weep  upon  his  neck,  he  was  over- 
come at  last.  He  soon  recovered,  and  never  more  showed 
any  feeling  but  cheerfulness  and  courage.  When  he  was 
going  up  the  steps  of  the  scaffold  to  his  death,  he  said  jok- 
ingly to  the  Lieutenant  of  the  Tower,  observing  that  they 
were  weak  and  shook  beneath  his  tread,  "  I  pray  you,  mas- 
ter Lieutenant,  see  me  safe  up ;  and,  for  my  coming  down, 
I  can  shift  for  myself. "  Also  he  said  to  the  executioner, 
after  he  had  laid  his  head  upon  the  block,  "  Let  me  put  my 
beard  out  of  the  way ;  for  that,  at  least,  has  never  com- 
mitted any  treason."  Then  his  head  was  struck  off  at  a 
blow.  These  two  executions  were  worthy  of  King  Henry 
the  Eighth.  Sir  Thomas  More  was  one  of  the  most  virtu- 
ous men  in  his  dominions,  and  the  Bishop  was  one  of  his 
oldest  and  truest  friends.  But  to  be  a  friend  of  that  fel- 
low was  almost  as  dangerous  as  to  be  his  wife. 

When  the  news  of  these  two  murders  got  to  Eome, 
the  Pope  raged  against  the  murderer  more  than  ever  Pope 
raged  since  the  world  began,  and  prepared  a  Bull,  ordering 
his  subjects  to  take  arms  against  him  and  dethrone  him. 
The  King  took  all  possible  precautions  to  keep  that  docu- 


246  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

ment  out  of  his  dominions,  and.  set  to  work  in  return  to 
suppress  a  great  number  of  the  English  monasteries  and 
abbeys. 

This  destruction  was  begun  by  a  body  of  commissioners, 
of  whom  Cromwell  (whom  the  King  had  taken  into  great 
favour)  was  the  head ;  and  was  carried  on  through  some 
few  years  to  its  entire  completion.  There  is  no  doubt  that 
many  of  these  religious  establishments  were  religious  in 
nothing  but  in  name,  and  were  crammed  with  lazy,  indo- 
lent, and  sensual  monks.  There  is  no  doubt  that  they  im- 
posed upon  the  people  in  every  possible  way ;  that  they  had 
images  moved  by  wires,  which  they  pretended  were  mirac- 
ulously moved  by  Heaven ;  that  they  had  among  them 
a  whole  tun  measure  full  of  teeth,  all  purporting  to  have 
come  out  of  the  head  of  one  saint,  who  must  indeed  have 
been  a  very  extraordinary  person  with  that  enormous  allow- 
ance of  grinders ;  that  they  had  bits  of  coal  which  they 
said  had  fried  Saint  Lawrence,  and  bits  of  toe-nails  which 
they  said  belonged  to  other  famous  saints ;  penknives,  and 
boots,  and  girdles,  which  they  said  belonged  to  others ;  and 
that  all  these  bits  of  rubbish  were  called  Relics,  and  adored 
by  the  ignorant  people.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  there  is 
no  doubt  either,  tliat  the  King's  officers  and  men  punished 
the  good  monks  with  the  bad;  did  great  injustice;  demol- 
ished many  beautiful  things  and  many  valuable  libraries; 
destroyed  numbers  of  paintings,  stained  glass  windows,  fine 
pavements,  and  carvings;  and  that  the  whole  court  were 
ravenously  greedy  and  rapacious  for  the  division  of  this 
great  spoil  among  them.  The  King  seems  to  have  grown 
almost  mad  in  the  ardour  of  this  pursuit ;  for  he  declared 
Thomas  a  Becket  a  traitor,  though  he  had  been  dead  so 
many  years,  and  had  his  body  dug  up  out  of  his  grave.  He 
must  have  been  as  miraculous  as  the  monks  pretended,  if 
they  had  told  the  truth,  for  he  was  found  Avith  one  head  on 
his  shoulders,  and  they  had  shown  another  as  his  undoubted 
and  genuine  head  ever  since  his  death ;  it  had  brought  them 
vast  sums  of  money,  too.  The  gold  and  jewels  on  his  shrine 
filled  two  great  chests,  and  eight  men  tottered  as  they  car- 
ried them  away.  How  rich  the  monasteries  were  you  may 
infer  from  the  fact  that,  when  they  were  all  suppressed, 
one  hundred  and  thirty  thousand  pounds  a  year — in  those 
days  an  immense  sum — came  to  the  Crown. 

These  things  were  not  done  without  c^vusing  great  dis- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  24T 

content  among  the  people.  The  monks  had  been  good  land- 
lords and  hospitable  entertainers  of  all  travellers,  and  had 
been  accustomed  to  give  away  a  great  deal  of  corn,  and 
fruit,  and  meat,  and  other  things.  In  those  days  it  was 
difficult  to  change  goods  into  money,  in  consequence  of  the 
roads  being  very  few  and  very  bad,  and  the  carts  and  wag- 
gons of  the  worst  description;  and  they  must  either  have 
given  away  some  of  the  good  things  they  possessed  in  enor- 
mous quantities,  or  have  suffered  them  to  spoil  and  moul- 
der. So,  many  of  the  people  missed  what  it  was  more 
agreeable  to  get  idly  than  to  work  for ;  and  the  monks  who 
were  driven  out  of  their  homes  and  wandered  about  encour- 
aged their  discontent ;  and  there  were,  consequently,  great 
risings  in  Lincolnshire  and  Yorkshire.  These  were  put 
down  by  terrific  executions,  from  which  the  monks  them- 
selves did  not  escape,  and  the  King  went  on  grunting  and 
growling  in  his  own  fat  way,  like  a  Royal  pig. 

I  have  told  all  this  story  of  the  religious  houses  at  one 
time,  to  make  it  plainer,  and  to  get  back  to  the  King's 
domestic  affairs. 

The  unfortunate  Queen  Catherine  was  by  this  time  dead ; 
and  the  King  was  by  this  time  as  tired  of  his  second  Queen 
as  he  had  been  of  his  first.  As  he  had  fallen  in  love  with 
Anne  when  she  was  in  the  service  of  Catherine,  so  he  now 
fell  in  love  with  another  lady  in  the  service  of  Anne.  See 
how  wicked  deeds  are  punished,  and  how  bitterly  and  self- 
reproachfully  the  Queen  must  now  have  thought  of  her  own 
rise  to  the  throne !  The  new  fancy  was  a  Lady  Jane  Sey- 
mour ;  and  the  King  no  sooner  set  his  mind  on  her,  than 
he  resolved  to  have  Anne  Boleyn's  head.  So,  he  brought 
a  number  of  charges  against  Anne,  accusing  her  of  dreadful 
crimes  which  she  had  never  committed,  and  implicating  in 
them  her  own  brother  and  certain  gentlemen  in  her  service : 
among  whom  one  Norris,  and  Mark  Smeaton  a  musician, 
are  best  remembered.  As  the  lords  and  councillors  were 
as  afraid  of  the  King  and  as  subservient  to  him  as  the 
meanest  peasant  in  England  was,  they  brought  in  Anne 
Boleyn  guilty,  and  the  other  unfortunate  persons  accused 
with  her,  guilty  too.  Those  gentlemen  died  like  men,  with 
the  exception  of  Smeaton,  who  had  been  tempted  by  the 
King  into  telling  lies,  which  he  called  confessions,  and  who 
had  expected  to  be  pardoned ;  but  who,  I  am  very  glad  to 
say,  was  not.     There  was  then  only  the  Queen  to  dispose 


248  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

of.  She  had  been  surrounded  in  the  Tower  with  women 
spies;  had  been  monstrously  persecuted  and  foully  slan- 
dered; and  had  received  no  justice.  But  her  spirit  rose 
with  her  afflictions ;  and,  after  having  in  vain  tried  to  soften 
the  King  by  writing  an  aifecting  letter  to  him  which  still 
exists,  "  from  her  doleful  prison  in  the  Tower,"  she  resigned 
herself  to  death.  She  said  to  those  about  her,  very  cheer- 
fully, that  she  had  heard  say  the  executioner  was  a  good 
one,  and  that  she  had  a  little  neck  (she  laughed  and  clasped 
It  with  her  hands  as  she  said  that),  and  would  soon  be  out  of 
her  pain.  And  she  was  soon  out  of  her  pain,  poor  creature, 
on  the  Green  inside  the  Tower,  and  her  body  was  flung  into 
an  old  box  and  put  away  in  the  ground  under  the  chapel. 

There  is  a  story  that  the  King  sat  in  his  palace  listening 
very  anxiously  for  the  sound  of  the  cannon  which  was  to 
announce  this  new  murder;  and  that,  when  he  heard  it 
come  booming  on  the  air,  he  rose  up  in  great  spirits  and 
ordered  out  his  dogs  to  go  a-hunting.  He  was  bad  enough 
to  do  it ;  but  whether  he  did  it  or  not,  it  is  certain  that  he 
married  Jane  Seymour  the  very  next  day. 

I  have  not  much  pleasure  in  recording  that  she  lived 
just  long  enough  to  give  birth  to  a  son  who  was  christened 
Edward,  and  then  to  die  of  a  fever:  for,  I  cannot  but 
think  that  any  woman  who  married  such  a  ruffian,  and 
knew  what  innocent  blood  was  on  his  hands,  deserved  the 
axe  that  would  assuredly  have  fallen  on  the  neck  of  Jane 
Seymour,  if  she  had  lived  much  longer. 

Cranmer  had  done  what  he  could  to  save  some  of  the 
Church  property  for  purposes  of  religion  and  education ; 
but,  the  great  families  had  been  so  hungry  to  get  hold  of 
it,  that  very  little  could  be  rescued  for  such  objects.  Even 
Miles  Coverdale,  who  did  the  people  the  inestimable  ser- 
vice of  translating  the  Bible  into  English  (which  the  unre- 
formed  religion  never  permitted  to  be  done),  was  left  in 
poverty  while  the  great  families  clutched  the  Church  lands 
and  money.  The  people  had  been  told  that  when  the 
Crown  came  into  possession  of  these  funds,  it  would  not  be 
necessary  to  tax  them;  but  they  were  taxed  afresh  directly 
afterwards.  It  was  fortunate  for  them,  indeed,  that  so 
many  nobles  were  so  greedy  for  this  wealth ;  since,  if  it 
had  remained  with  the  Crown,  there  might  have  been  no 
end  to  tyranny  for  hundreds  of  years.  One  of  the  most 
active  writers  on  the  Church's  side  against  the  King  was  a 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  249 

member  of  his  own  family — a  sort  of  distant  cousin,  Regi- 
nald Pole  by  name — who  attacked  him  in  the  most  violent 
manner  (though  he  received  a  pension  from  him  all  the 
time),  and  fought  for  the  Church  with  his  pen,  day  and 
night.  As  he  was  beyond  the  King's  reach — being  in  Italy 
— the  King  politely  invited  him  over  to  discuss  the  subject ; 
but  he,  knowing  better  than  to  come,  and  wisely  staying 
where  he  was,  the  King's  rage  fell  upon  his  brother  Lord 
Montague,  the  Marquis  of  Exeter,  and  some  other  gentle- 
men: who  were  tried  for  high  treason  in  corresponding 
with  him  and  aiding  him — which  they  probably  did — and 
were  all  executed.  The  Pope  made  Reginald  Pole  a  cardi- 
nal; but,  so  much  against  his  will,  that  it  is  thought  he 
even  aspired  in  his  own  mind  to  the  vacant  throne  of  Eng- 
land, and  had  hopes  of  marrying  the  Princess  Mary.  His 
being  made  a  high  priest,  however,  put  an  end  to  all  that. 
His  mother,  the  venerable  Countess  of  Salisbury — who 
was,  unfortunately  for  herself,  within  the  tyrant's  reach 
— was  the  last  of  his  relatives  on  whom  his  wrath  fell. 
When  she  was  told  to  lay  her  grey  head  upon  the  block, 
she  answered  the  executioner,  "  No !  My  head  never  com- 
mitted treason,  and  if  you  want  it,  you  shall  seize  it."  So, 
she  ran  round  and  round  the  scaffold  with  the  exe- 
cutioner striking  at  her,  and  her  grey  hair  bedabbled  with 
blood ;  and  even  when  they  held  her  down  upon  the  block 
she  moved  her  head  about  to  the  last,  resolved  to  be  no 
party  to  her  own  barbarous  murder.  All  this  the  people 
bore,  as  they  had  borne  everything  else. 

Indeed  they  bore  much  more ;  for  the  slow  fires  of  Smith- 
field  were  continually  burning,  and  people  were  constantly 
being  roasted  to  death — still  to  show  what  a  good  Chris- 
tian the  King  was.  He  defied  the  Pope  and  his  Bull,  which 
was  now  issued,  and  had  come  into  England ;  but  he  burned 
innumerable  people  whose  only  offence  was  that  they 
differed  from  the  Pope's  religious  opinions.  There  was  a 
wretched  man  named  Lambert,  among  others,  who  was 
tried  for  this  before  the  King,  and  with  whom  six  bishops 
argued  one  after  another.  When  he  was  quite  exhausted 
(as  well  he  might  be,  after  six  bishops),  he  threw  himself 
on  the  King's  mercy;  but  the  King  blustered  out  that  he 
had  no  mercy  for  heretics.     So,  he  too  fed  the  fire. 

All  this  the  people  bore,  and  more  than  all  this  yet. 
The  national  spirit  seems  to  have  been  banished  from  the 


250  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

kingdom  at  this  time;  The  very  people  who  were  executed 
for  treason,  the  very  wives  and  friends  of  tlie  "bluff" 
King,  spoke  of  him  on  the  scaffold  as  a  good  prince,  and  a 
gentle  prince — just  as  serfs  in  similar  circumstances  have 
been  known  to  do,  under  the  Sultan  and  Bashaws  of  the 
East,  or  under  the  fierce  old  tyrants  of  Russia,  who  poured 
boiling  and  freezing  water  on  them  alternately,  until  they 
died.  The  Parliament  were  as  bad  as  the  rest,  and  gave 
the  King  whatever  he  wanted ;  among  other  vile  accommo- 
dations, they  gave  him  new  powers  of  murdering,  at  his 
will  and  pleasure,  any  one  whom  he  might  choose  to  call  a 
traitor.  But  the  worst  measvire  they  passed  was  an  Act  of 
Six  Articles,  commonly  called  at  the  time  "  the  whip  with 
six  strings ;"  which  punished  offences  against  the  Pope's 
opinions,  without  mercy,  and  enforced  the  very  worst  parts 
of  the  monkish  religion.  Cranmer  would  have  modified 
it,  if  he  could ;  but,  being  overborne  by  the  Romish  party, 
had  not  the  power.  As  one  of  the  articles  declared  that 
priests  should  not  marry,  and  as  he  was  married  himself, 
he  sent  his  wife  and  children  into  Germany,  and  began 
to  tremble  at  his  danger ;  none  the  less  because  he  was, 
and  had  long  been,  the  King's  friend.  This  whip  of  six 
strings  was  made  under  the  King's  own  eye.  It  should 
never  be  forgotten  of  him  how  cruelly  he  supported  the 
worst  of  the  Popish  doctrines  when  there  was  nothing  to 
be  got  by  opposing  them. 

This  amiable  monarch  now  thought  of  taking  another 
wife.  He  proposed  to  the  French  King  to  have  some  of 
the  ladies  of  the  French  Court  exhibited  before  him,  that 
he  might  make  his  Royal  choice ;  but  the  French  King  an- 
swered that  he  would  rather  not  have  his  ladies  trotted  out 
to  be  shown  like  horses  at  a  fair.  He  proposed  to  the 
Dowager  Duchess  of  Milan,  who  replied  that  she  might 
have  thought  of  such  a  match  if  she  had  had  two  heads ; 
but,  that  only  owning  one,  she  must  beg  to  keep  it  safe. 
At  last  Cromwell  represented  that  there  was  a  Protestant 
Princess  in  Germany — those  who  held  the  reformed  religion 
were  called  Protestants,  because  their  leaders  had  Protested 
against  the  abuses  and  ijnpositions  of  the  unreformed 
Church — named  Anne  of  Cleves,  who  was  beautiful,  and 
would  answer  the  purpose  admirably.  The  King  said  was 
she  a  large  woman,  because  he  must  have  a  fat  wife?  "0 
yes,"  said  Cromwell ;  "  she  was  very  large,  just  the  thing." 


A  CHILD'S   HISTORY   OP  ENGLAND.  261 

On  hearing  this  the  King  sent  over  his  famous  painter, 
Hans  Holbein,  to  take  her  portrait.  Hans  made  her  out 
to  be  so  good-looking  that  the  King  was  satisfied,  and  the 
marriage  was  arranged.  But,  whether  anybody  had  paid 
Hans  to  touch  up  the  picture ;  or  whether  Hans,  like  one 
or  two  other  painters,  flattered  a  princess  in  the  ordinary 
way  of  business,  I  cainiot  say :  all  I  know  is,  that  when  Anne 
came  over  and  the  King  went  to  Rochester  to  meet  her,  and 
first  saw  her  without  her  seeing  him,  he  swore  she  was  "  a 
great  Flanders  mare,"  and  said  he  would  never  marry  her. 
Being  obliged  to  do  it  now  matters  had  gone  so  far,  he 
would  not  give  her  the  presents  he  had  prepared,  and  would 
never  notice  her.  He  never  forgave  Cromwell  his  part  in 
the  affair.     His  downfall  dates  from  that  time. 

It  was  quickened  by  his  enemies,  in  the  interests  of  the 
unreformed  religion,  putting  in  the  King's  way,  at  a  state 
dinner,  a  niece  of  the  Duke  of  Norfolk,  Catherine  How- 
ard, a  young  lady  of  fascinating  manners,  though  small  in 
stature  and  not  particularly  beautiful.  Falling  in  love 
with  her  on  the  spot,  the  King  soon  divorced  Anne  of 
Cleves  after  making  her  the  subject  of  much  brutal  talk, 
on  pretence  that  she  had  been  previously  betrothed  to  some 
one  else — which  would  never  do  for  one  of  his  dignity — 
and  married  Catherine.  It  is  probable  that  on  his  wedding 
day,  of  all  days  in  the  year,  he  sent  his  faithful  Cromwell 
to  the  scaffold,  and  had  his  head  struck  off.  He  further 
celebrated  the  occasion  by  burning  at  one  time,  and  causing 
to  be  drawn  to  the  fire  on  the  same  hurdles,  some  Protes- 
tant prisoners  for  denying  the  Pope's  doctrines,  and  some 
Roman  Catholics  prisoners  for  denying  his  own  supremacy. 
Still  the  people  bore  it,  and  not  a  gentleman  in  England 
raised  his  hand. 

But,  by  a  just  retribution,  it  soon  came  out  that  Cather- 
ine Howard,  before  her  marriage,  had  been  really  guilty  of 
such  crimes  as  the  King  had  falsely  attributed  to  his  second 
wife  Anne  Boleyn ;  so,  again  the  dreadful  axe  made  the  King 
a  widower,  and  this  Queen  passed  away  as  so  many  in  that 
reign  had  passed  away  before  her.  As  an  appropriate  pur- 
suit under  the  circumstances,  Henry  then  applied  himself 
to  superintending  the  composition  of  a  religious  book 
called  "A  necessary  doctrine  for  any  Christian  Man."  He 
must  have  been  a  little  confused  in  his  mind,  I  think,  at 
about  this  period ;  for  he  was  so  false  to  himself  as  to  be 


252  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAIH). 

true  to  some  one :  that  some  one  being  Cranmer,  whom  the 
Duke  of  Norfolk  and  others  of  his  enemies  tried  to  ruin ; 
but  to  whom  the  King  was  steadfast,  and  to  whom  he  one 
night  gave  his  ring,  charging  him  when  he  should  find  him- 
self, next  day,  accused  of  treason,  to  show  it  to  the  council 
board.  This  Cranmer  did  to  the  confusion  of  his  enemies. 
I  suppose  the  King  thought  he  might  want  him  a  little  longer. 

He  married  yet  once  more.  Yes,  strange  to  say,  he 
found  in  England  another  woman  who  would  become  his 
wife,  and  she  was  Catherine  Parr,  widow  of  Lord  Lati- 
mer. She  leaned  towards  the  reformed  religion ;  and  it  is 
some  comfort  to  know,  that  she  tormented  the  King  con- 
siderably by  arguing  a  variety  of  doctrinal  points  with  him 
on  all  possible  occasions.  She  had  very  nearly  done  this  to 
her  own  destruction.  After  one  of  these  conversations  the 
King  in  a  very  black  mood  actually  instructed  Garbiner, 
one  of  his  bishops  who  favoured  the  Popish  opinions,  to 
draw  a  bill  of  accusation  against  her,  which  would  have  in- 
evitably brought  her  to  the  scaffold  where  her  predecessors 
had  died,  but  that  one  of  her  friends  picked  up  the  paper 
of  instructions  which  had  been  dropped  in  the  palace,  and 
gave  her  timely  notice.  She  fell  ill  w'th  terror;  but  man- 
aged the  King  so  well  when  he  came  to  entrap  her  into 
further  statements — by  saying  that  she  had  only  spoken  on 
such  points  to  divert  his  mind  and  to  get  some  information 
from  his  extraordinary  wisdom — that  he  gave  her  a  kiss 
and  called  her  his  sweetheart.  And,  when  the  Chancellor 
came  next  day  actually  to  take  her  to  the  Tower,  the  King 
sent  him  about  his  business,  and  honoured  him  with  the 
epithets  of  a  beast,  a  knave,  and  a  fool.  So  near  was 
Catherine  Parr  to  the  block,  and  so  narrow  was  her  escape ! 

There  was  war  with  Scotland  in  this  reign,  and  a  short 
clumsy  war  with  France  for  favouring  Scotland ;  but,  the 
events  at  home  were  so  dreadful,  and  leave  such  an  endur- 
ing stain  on  the  country,  that  I  need  say  no  more  of  what 
happened  abroad. 

A  few  more  horrors,  and  this  reign  is  over.  There  was 
a  lady,  Anne  Askew,  in  Lincolnshire,  who  inclined  to 
the  Protestant  opinions,  and  whose  husband  being  a  fierce 
Catholic,  turned  her  out  of  his  house.  She  came  to  Lon- 
don, and  was  considered  as  offending  against  the  six  arti- 
cles, and  was  taken  to  the  Tower,  and  put  upon  the  rack — • 
probably  because  it  was  hoped  that  she  might,  in  her  agony, 


A  CHILD'S   HISTORY    OF  ENGLAND.  253 

criminate  some  obnoxious  persons ;  if  falsely,  so  much  the 
better.  She  was  tortured  without  uttering  a  cry,  until  the 
Lieutenant  of  the  Tower  would  suffer  his  men  to  torture 
her  no  more ;  and  then  two  priests  who  were  present  actu- 
ally pulled  off  their  robes,  and  turned  the  wheels  of  the 
rack  with  their  own  hands,  so  rending  and  twisting  and 
breaking  her  that  she  was  afterwards  carried  to  the  fire  in 
a  chair.  She  was  burned  with  three  others,  a  gentleman, 
a  clergyman,  and  a  tailor ;  and  so  the  world  went  on. 

Either  the  King  became  afraid  of  the  power  of  the  Duke 
of  Norfolk,  and  his  son  the  Earl  of  Surrey,  or  they  gave 
him  some  offence,  but  he  resolved  to  pull  them  down,  to 
follow  all  the  rest  who  were  gone.  The  son  was  tried  first 
— of  course  for  nothing — and  defended  himself  bravely ;  but 
of  course  he  was  found  guilty,  and  of  course  he  was  execut- 
ed.  Then  his  father  was  laid  hold  of,  and  left  for  death  too. 

But  the  King  himself  was  left  for  death  by  a  Greater 
King,  and  the  earth  was  to  be  rid  of  him  at  last.  He  was 
now  a  swollen,  hideous  spectacle,  with  a  great  hole  in  his 
leg,  and  so  odious  to  every  sense  that  it  was  dreadful  to  ap- 
proach him.  When  he  was  found  to  be  dying,  Cranmer 
was  sent  for  from  his  palace  at  Croydon,  and  came  with  all 
speed,  but  found  him  speechless.  Happily,  in  that  hour 
he  perished.  He  was  in  the  fifty-sixth  year  of  his  age, 
and  the  thirty-eighth  of  his  reign. 

Henry  the  Eighth  has  been  favoured  by  some  Protestant 
writers,  because  the  Reformation  was  achieved  in  his  time. 
But  the  mighty  merit  of  it  lies  with  other  men  and  not 
with  him ;  and  it  can  be  rendered  none  the  worse  by  this 
monster's  crimes,  and  none  the  better  by  any  defence  of 
them.  The  plain  truth  is,  that  he  was  a  most  intolerable 
ruffian,  a  disgrace  to  human  nature,  and  a  blot  of  blood 
and  grease  upon  the  History  of  England. 


264  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

CHAPTER    XXIX. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  EDWARD  THE  SIXTH. 

Henry  the  Eighth  had  made  a  will,  appointing  a  Coun- 
eil  of  sixteen  to  govern  the  kingdom  for  his  son  while  he 
was  under  age  (he  was  now  only  ten  years  old),  and  another 
Council  of  twelve  to  help  them.  The  most  powerful  of 
the  first  Council  was  the  Earl  of  Hertford,  the  young 
King's  uncle,  who  lost  no  time  in  bringing  his  nephew  with 
great  state  up  to  Enfield,  and  thence  to  the  Tower.  It  was 
considered  at  the  time  a  striking  proof  of  virtue  in  the 
young  King  that  he  was  sorry  for  his  father's  death;  but, 
as  common  subjects  have  that  virtue  too,  sometimes,  we 
will  say  no  more  about  it. 

There  was  a  curious  part  of  the  late  King's  will,  requir- 
ing his  executors  to  fulfil  whatever  promises  he  had  made. 
Some  of  the  Court  wondering  what  these  might  be,  tlie  Earl 
of  Hertford  and  the  other  noblemen  interested,  said  that 
they  were  promises  to  advance  and  enrich  them.  So,  the 
Earl  of  Hertford  made  himself  Duke  op  Somerset,  and 
made  his  brother  Edward  Seymour  a  baron;  and  there 
were  various  similar  promotions,  all  very  agreeable  to 
the  parties  concerned,  and  very  dutiful,  no  doubt,  to  the 
late  King's  memory.  To  be  more  dutiful  still,  they  made 
themselves  rich  out  of  the  Church  lands,  and  were  very 
comfortable.  The  new  Duke  of  Somerset  caused  himself 
to  be  declared  Protector  of  the  kingdom,  and  was,  indeed, 
the  King. 

As  young  Edward  the  Sixth  had  been  brought  up  in  the 
principles  of  the  Protestant  religion,  everybody  knew  that 
they  would  be  maintained.  But  Cranmer,  to  whom  they 
were  chiefly  entrusted,  advanced  them  steadily  and  tem- 
perately. Many  superstitious  and  ridiculous  practices  were 
stopped ;  but  practices  which  were  harmless  were  not  inter- 
fered with. 

The  Duke  of  Somerset,  the  Protector,  was  anxious  to 
have  the  young  King  engaged  in  marriage  to  the  young 
Queen  of  Scotland,  in  order  to  prevent  that  princess  from 
making  au  alliance  with  any  foreign  power ;  but,  as  a  larga 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  265 

party  in  Scotland  were  unfavourable  to  this  plan,  he  in- 
vaded that  country.  His  excuse  for  doing  so  was,  that  the 
Border  men — that  is,  the  Scotch  who  lived  in  that  part  of 
the  country  where  England  and  Scotland  joined — troubled 
the  English  very  much.  But  there  were  two  sides  to  this 
question ;  for  the  English  Border  men  troubled  the  Scotch 
too ;  and,  through  many  long  years,  there  were  perpetual 
border  quarrels  which  gave  rise  to  numbers  of  old  tales  and 
songs.  However,  the  Protector  invaded  Scotland;  and 
Abran,  the  Scottish  Regent,  with  an  army  twice  as  large 
as  his,  advanced  to  meet  him.  They  encountered  on  the 
banks  of  the  river  Esk,  within  a  few  miles  of  Edinburgh ; 
and  there,  after  a  little  skirmish,  the  Protector  made  such 
moderate  proposals,  in  offering  to  retire  if  the  Scotch  would 
only  engage  not  to  marry  their  princess  to  any  foreign 
prince,  that  the  Regent  thought  the  English  were  afraid. 
But  in  this  he  made  a  horrible  mistake ;  for  the  English 
soldiers  on  land,  and  the  English  sailors  on  the  water,  so 
set  upon  the  Scotch,  that  they  broke  and  fled,  and  more 
than  ten  thousand  of  them  were  killed.  It  was  a  dreadful 
battle,  for  the  fugitives  were  slain  without  mercy.  The 
ground  for  four  miles,  all  the  way  to  Edinburgh,  was 
strewn  with  dead  men,  and  with  arms,  and  legs,  and  heads. 
Some  hid  themselves  in  streams  and  were  drowned ;  some 
threw  away  their  armour  and  were  killed  running,  almost 
naked ;  but  in  this  battle  of  Pinkey  the  English  lost  only 
two  or  three  hundred  men.  They  were  much  better  clothed 
than  tlie  Scotch;  at  the  poverty  of  whose  appearance  and 
country  they  were  exceedingly  astonished. 

A  Parliament  was  called  when  Somerset  came  back,  and 
it  repealed  the  whip  with  six  strings,  and  did  one  or  two 
other  good  things ;  though  it  unhappily  retained  the  pun- 
ishment of  burning  for  those  people  who  did  not  make 
believe  to  believe,  in  all  religious  matters,  what  the  Govern- 
ment had  declared  that  they  must  and  should  believe.  It 
also  made  a  foolish  law  (meant  to  put  down  beggars),  that 
any  man  who  lived  idly  and  loitered  about  for  three  days 
together,  should  be  burned  with  a  hot  iron,  made  a  slave, 
and  wear  an  iron  fetter.  But  this  savage  absurdity  soon 
came  to  an  end,  and  went  the  way  of  a  great  many  othei 
foolish  laws. 

The  Protector  was  now  so  proud  that  he  sat  in  Parlia- 
ment before  all  the  nobles,  on  the  right  hand  of  the  throne. 


256  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

Many  other  noblemen,  who  only  wanted  to  be  as  proud  if 
they  could  get  a  chance,  became  his  enemies  of  course ;  and 
it  is  supposed  that  he  came  back  suddenly  from  Scotland 
because  he  had  received  news  that  his  brother,  Lord  Sey- 
mour, was  becoming  dangerous  to  him.  This  lord  was 
now  High  Admiral  of  England;  a  very  handsome  man, 
and  a  great  favourite  with  the  Court  ladies — even  with  the 
young  Princess  Elizabeth,  who  romped  with  him  a  little 
more  than  young  princesses  in  these  times  do  with  any  one. 
He  had  married  Catherine  Parr,  the  late  King's  widow, 
who  was  now  dead ;  and,  to  strengthen  his  power,  he  se- 
cretly supplied  the  young  King  with  money.  He  may  even 
have  engaged  with  some  of  his  brother's  enemies  in  a  plot 
to  carry  the  boy  off.  On  these  and  other  accusations,  at 
any  rate,  he  was  confined  in  the  Tower,  impeached,  and 
found  guilty;  his  own  brother's  name  being — unnatural 
and  sad  to  tell — the  first  signed  to  the  warrant  for  his  exe- 
cution. He  was  executed  on  Tower  Hill,  and  died  deny- 
ing his  treason.  One  of  his  last  proceedings  in  this  world 
was  to  write  two  letters,  one  to  the  Princess  Elizabeth, 
and  one  to  the  Princess  Mary,  which  a  servant  of  his  took 
charge  of,  and  concealed  in  his  shoe.  These  letters  are 
supposed  to  have  urged  them  against  his  brother,  and  to 
revenge  his  death.  What  they  truly  contained  is  not 
known ;  but  there  is  no  doubt  that  he  had,  at  one  time, 
obtained  great  influence  over  the  Princess  Elizabeth. 

All  this  while,  the  Protestant  religion  was  making  prog- 
ress. The  images  which  the  people  had  gradually  come 
to  worship,  were  removed  from  the  churches ;  the  people 
were  informed  that  they  need  not  confess  themselves  to 
priests  unless  they  chose;  a  common  prayer-book  was 
drawn  up  in  the  English  language,  which  all  could  under- 
stand; and  many  other  improvements  were  made;  still 
moderately.  For  Cranmer  was  a  very  moderate  man,  and 
even  restrained  the  Protestant  clergy  from  violently  abus- 
ing the  unreformed  religion — as  they  very  often  did,  and 
which  was  not  a  good  example.  But  the  people  were  at 
this  time  in  great  distress.  The  rapacious  nobility  who 
had  come  into  possession  of  the  Church  lands,  were  very 
bad  landlords.  They  enclosed  great  quantities  of  ground 
for  the  feeding  of  sheep,  which  was  then  more  profitable 
than  the  growing  of  crops ;  and  this  increased  the  general 
distress.     So  the   people,  who   still  understood  little  of 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  267 

what  was  going  on  about  them,  and  still  readily  believed 
what  the  homeless  monks  told  them — many  of  whom  had 
been  their  good  friends  in  their  better  days — took  it  Into 
their  heads  that  all  this  was  owing  to  the  reformed  religion, 
and  therefore  rose  in  many  parts  of  the  country. 

The  most  powerful  risings  were  in  Devonshire  and  Nor- 
folk. In  Devonshire,  the  rebellion  was  so  strong  that  ten 
thousand  men  united  within  a  few  days,  and  even  laid  siege 
to  Exeter.  But  Lord  Russell,  coming  to  the  assistance 
of  the  citizens  who  defended  that  town,  defeated  the  rebels ; 
and,  not  only  hanged  the  Mayor  of  one  place,  but  hanged 
the  vicar  of  another  from  his  own  church  steeple.  What 
with  hanging  and  killing  by  the  sword,  four  thousand  of 
the  rebels  are  supposed  to  have  fallen  in  that  one  county. 
In  Norfolk  (where  the  rising  was  more  against  the  enclos- 
ure of  open  lands  than  against  the  reformed  religion),  the 
popular  leader  was  a  man  named  Robert  Ket,  a  tanner  of 
Wymondham.  The  mob  were,  in  the  first  instance,  excited 
against  the  tanner  by  one  John  Flowerdew,  a  gentleman 
who  owed  him  a  grudge :  but  the  tanner  was  more  than  a 
match  for  the  gentleman,  since  he  soon  got  the  people  on 
his  side,  and  established  himself  near  Norwich  with  quite 
an  army.  There  was  a  large  oak-tree  in  that  place,  on  a 
spot  called  Moushold  Hill,  which  Ket  named  the  Tree  of 
Reformation ;  and  under  its  green  boughs,  he  and  his  men 
sat,  in  the  midsummer  weather,  holding  courts  of  justice, 
and  debating  affairs  of  state.  They  were  even  impartial 
enough  to  allow  some  rather  tiresome  public  speakers  to 
get  up  into  this  Tree  of  Reformation,  and  point  out  their 
errors  to  them,  in  long  discourses,  while  they  lay  listening 
(not  always  without  some  grumbling  and  growling)  in  the 
shade  below.  At  last,  one  sunny  July  day,  a  herald  ap- 
peared below  the  tree,  and  proclaimed  Ket  and  all  his  men 
traitors,  unless  from  that  moment  they  dispersed  and  went 
home :  in  which  case  they  were  to  receive  a  pardon.  But, 
Ket  and  his  men  made  light  of  the  herald  and  became 
stronger  than  ever,  until  the  Earl  of  Warwick  went  after 
them  with  a  sufficient  force,  and  cut  them  all  to  pieces. 
A  few  were  hanged,  drawn,  and  quartered,  as  traitors,  and 
their  limbs  were  •  sent  into  various  country  places  to  be  a 
terror  to  the  people.  Nine  of  them  were  hanged  upon  nine 
green  branches  of  the  Oak  of  Reformation ;  and  so,  for  the 
time,  that  tree  may  be  said  to  have  withered  away. 
17 


1258  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND. 

The  Protector,  thougli  a  haughty  man,  had  compassion 
for  the  real  distresses  of  the  common  people,  and  a  sincere 
desire  to  help  them.  But  he  was  too  proud  and  too  high 
in  degree  to  hold  even  their  favour  steadily;  and  many  of 
the  nobles  always  envied  and  hated  him,  because  they  were 
as  proud  and  not  as  high  as  he.  He  was  at  this  time  build- 
ing a  great  Palace  in  the  Strand :  to  get  the  stone  for  which 
he  blew  up  church  steeples  with  gunpowder,  and  pulled 
down  bisliops'  houses :  thus  making  himself  still  more. dis- 
liked. At  length,  his  principal  enemy,  the  Earl  of  War- 
wick— Dudley  by  name,  and  the  son  of  that  Dudley  who 
had  made  himself  so  odious  with  Empson,  in  the  reign  of 
Henry  the  Seventh — joined  with  seven  other  members  of 
the  Council  against  him,  formed  a  separate  Council ;  aud, 
becoming  stronger  in  a  few  days,  sent  him  to  the  Tower 
under  twenty-nine  articles  of  accusation.  After  being  sen- 
tenced by  the  Council  to  the  forfeiture  of  all  his  offices  and 
lands,  he  was  liberated  and  pardoned,  on  making  a  very 
humble  submission.  He  was  even  taken  back  into  the 
Council  again,  after  having  suffered  this  fall,  and  married 
his  daughter.  Lady  Anxe  Seymour,  to  Warwick's  eldest 
son.  But  such  a  reconciliation  was  little  likely  to  last,  and 
did  not  outlive  a  year.  Warwick,  having  got  himself  made 
Duke  of  Northumberland,  and  having  advanced  the  more 
important  of  his  friends,  then  finished  the  history  by  caus- 
ing the  Duke  of  Somerset  and  his  friend  Lord  Grey,  aud 
others,  to  be  arrested  for  treason,  in  having  conspired  to 
seize  and  dethrone  the  King.  They  were  also  accused 
of  having  intended  to  seize  the  new  Duke  of  Northumber- 
land, with  his  friends  Lord  Northampton  and  Lord  Pem- 
broke ;  to  murder  them  if  they  found  need ;  and  to  raise 
the  City  to  revolt.  All  this  the  fallen  Protector  positively 
denied ;  except  that  he  confessed  to  having  spoken  of  the 
murder  of  those  three  noblemen,  but  having  never  designed 
it.  He  was  acquitted  of  the  charge  of  treason,  and  found 
guilty  of  the  other  charges ;  so  when  the  people — who  re- 
membered his  having  been  their  friend,  now  that  he  was 
disgraced  and  in  danger,  saw  him  come  out  from  his  trial 
\vith  the  axe  turned  from  him — they  thought  he  was  alto- 
gether acquitted,  and  set  up  a  loud  shout  of  joy. 

But  the  Duke  of  Somerset  was  ordered  to  be  beheaded 
on  Tower  Hill,  at  eight  o'clock  in  the  morning,  and  proc- 
lamations were  issued  bidding  the  citizens  keep  at  home 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  EI^GLAND.  269 

until  after  ten.  They  filled  the  streets,  however,  and 
crowded  the  place  of  execution  as  soon  as  it  was  light ; 
and,  with  sad  faces  and  sad  hearts,  saw  the  once  powerful 
Protector  ascend  the  scaffold  to  lay  his  head  upon  the 
dreadful  block.  While  he  was  yet  saying  his  last  words 
to  them  with  manly  courage,  and  telling  them,  in  particu- 
lar, how  it  comforted  him,  at  that  pass,  to  have  assisted  in 
reformmg  the  national  religion,  a  member  of  the  Council 
was  seen  riding  up  on  horseback.  They  again  thought 
that  the  Duke  was  saved  by  his  bringing  a  reprieve,  and 
again  shouted  for  joy.  But  the  Duke  himself  told  them 
they  were  mistaken,  and  laid  down  his  head  and  had  it 
struck  off  at  a  blow. 

Many  of  the  bystanders  rushed  forward  and  steeped  their 
handkerchiefs  in  his  blood,  as  a  mark  of  their  affection. 
He  had,  indeed,  been  capable  of  many  good  acts,  and  one 
of  them  was  discovered  after  he  was  no  more.  The  Bishop 
of  Durham,  a  very  good  man,  had  been  informed  against 
to  the  Council,  when  the  Duke  was  in  power,  as  having 
answered  a  treacherous  letter  proposing  a  rebellion  against 
the  reformed  religion.  As  the  answer  could  not  be  found, 
he  could  not  be  declared  guilty ;  but  it  was  now  discovered, 
hidden  by  the  Duke  himself  among  some  private  papers,  in 
his  regard  for  that  good  man.  The  Bishop  lost  his  office, 
and  was  deprived  of  his  possessions. 

It  is  not  very  pleasant  to  know  that  while  his  uncle  lay 
in  prison  under  sentence  of  death,  the  young  King  was 
being  vastly  entertained  by  plays,  and  dances,  and  sham 
tights:  but  there  is  no  doubt  of  it,  for  he  kept  a  journal 
himself.  It  is  pleasanter  to  know  that  not  a  single  Roman 
Catholic  was  burnt  in  this  reign  for  holding  that  religion ; 
though  two  wretched  victims  suffered  for  heresy.  One,  a 
woman  named  Joan  Bocheb,  for  professing  some  opinions 
that  even  she  could  only  explain  in  unintelligible  jargon. 
The  other,  a  Dutchman,  named  Von  P/ibis,  who  practised 
as  a  surgeon  in  London.  Edward  was,  to  his  credit,  ex- 
ceedingly unwilling  to  sign  the  warrant  for  the  woman's 
execution:  shedding  tears  before  he  did  so,  and  telling 
Cranmer,  who  urged  him  to  do  it  (though  Cranmer  really 
would  have  spared  the  woman  at  first,  but  for  her  own 
determined  obstinacy),  that  the  guilt  was  not  his,  but  that 
of  the  man  who  so  strongly  urged  the  dreadful  act.  We 
shall  see,  too  soon,  whether  the  time  ever  came  when  Cran- 


260  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

mer  is  likely  to  have  remembered  this  with  sorrow  and 
remorse. 

Craumer  and  Ridley  (at  first  Bishop  of  Rochester,  and 
afterwards  Bishop  of  London)  were  the  most  powerful  of 
the  clergy  of  this  reign.  Others  were  imprisoned  and  de- 
prived of  tlieir  property  for  still  adhering  to  the  unreformed 
religion ;  the  most  important  among  whom  were  Gardiner 
Bishop  of  Winchester,  Heath  Bishop  of  Worcester,  Day 
Bishop  of  Chichester,  and  Bonner  that  Bishop  of  London 
who  was  superseded  by  Ridley.  The  Princess  Mary,  who 
inherited  her  mother's  gloomy  temper,  and  hated  the  re- 
formed religion  as  connected  with  her  mother's  wrongs  and 
sorrows — she  knew  nothing  else  about  it,  always  refusing 
to  read  a  single  book  in  which  it  was  truly  described — held 
by  the  unreformed  religion  too,  and  was  the  only  person  in 
the  kingdom  for  whom  the  old  Mass  was  allowed  to  be  per- 
formed ;  nor  would  the  young  King  have  made  that  excep- 
tion even  in  her  favour,  but  for  the  strong  persuasions  of 
Cranmer  and  Ridley.  He  always  viewed  it  with  horror; 
and  when  he  fell  into  a  sickly  condition,  after  having  been 
very  ill,  first  of  the  measles  and  then  of  the  small-pox, 
he  was  greatly  troubled  in  mind  to  think  that  if  he  died, 
and  she,  the  next  heir  to  the  throne,  succeeded,  the  Roman 
Catholic  religion  would  be  set  up  again. 

This  uneasiness,  the  Duke  of  Northumberland  was  not 
slow  to  encourage :  for,  if  the  Princess  Mary  came  to  the 
throne,  he,  who  had  taken  part  with  the  Protestants,  was 
sure  to  be  disgraced.  Now,  the  Duchess  of  Suffolk  was 
descended  from  King  Henry  the  Seventh;  and,  if  she  re- 
signed what  little  or  no  right  she  had,  in  favour  of  her 
daughter  Lady  Jane  Grey,  that  would  be  the  succession 
to  promote  the  Duke's  greatness;  because  Lord  Guilford 
Dudley,  one  of  his  sons,  was,  at  this  very  time,  newly 
married  to  her.  So,  he  worked  upon  the  King's  fears,  and 
persuaded  him  to  set  aside  both  the  Princess  Mary  and  the 
Princess  Elizabeth,  and  assert  his  right  to  appoint  his  suc- 
cessor. Accordingly  the  young  King  handed  to  the  Crown 
lawyers  a  writing  signed  half  a  dozen  times  over  by  him- 
self, appointing  Lady  Jane  Grey  to  succeed  to  the  Crown, 
and  requiring  them  to  have  his  will  made  out  according 
to  law.  They  were  much  against  it  at  first,  and  told  the 
King  so ;  but  the  Duke  of  Northumberland — being  so  vio- 
lent about  it  that  the  lawyers  evon  expected  him  to  beat 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  261 

them,  and  hotly  declaring  that,  stripped  to  his  shirt,  he 
would  fight  any  man  in  such  a  quarrel — they  yielded. 
Cranmer,  also,  at  first  hesitated;  pleading  that  he  had 
sworn  to  maintain  the  succession  of  the  Crown  to  the  Prin- 
cess Mary ;  but,  he  was  a  weak  man  in  his  resolutions,  and 
afterwards  signed  the  document  with  the  rest  of  the  Council. 

It  was  completed  none  too  soon;  for  Edward  was  now 
sinking  in  a  rapid  decline ;  and,  by  way  of  making  him  bet- 
ter, they  handed  him  over  to  a  woman-doctor  who  pretended 
to  be  able  to  cure  it.  He  speedily  got  worse.  On  the  sixth 
of  July,  in  the  year  one  thousand  five  hundred  and  fifty- 
three,  he  died,  very  peaceably  and  piously,  praying  God, 
with  his  last  breath,  to  protect  the  reformed  religion. 

This  King  died  in  the  sixteenth  year  of  his  age,  and  in 
the  seventh  of  his  reign.  It  is  difficult  to  judge  what  the 
character  of  one  so  young  might  afterwards  have  become 
among  so  many  bad,  ambitious,  quarrelling  nobles.  But, 
he  was  an  amiable  boy,  of  very  good  abilities,  and  had 
nothing  coarse  or  cruel  or  brutal  in  his  disposition — which 
in  the  son  of  such  a  father  is  rather  surprising. 


CHAPTER    XXX. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  MARY. 

The  Duke  of  Northumberland  was  very  anxious  to  keep 
the  young  King's  death  a  secret,  in  order  that  he  might 
get  the  two  Princesses  into  his  power.  But,  the  Princess 
Mary,  being  informed  of  that  event  as  she  was  on  her  way 
to  London  to  see  her  sick  brother,  turned  her  horse's  head, 
and  rode  away  into  Norfolk,  The  Earl  of  Arundel  was  her 
friend,  and  it  was  he  who  sent  her  warning  of  what  had 
happened. 

As  the  secret  could  not  be  kept,  the  Duke  of  Northum- 
berland and  the  Council  sent  for  the  Lord  Mayor  of  London 
and  some  of  the  aldermen,  and  made  a  merit  of  telling  it  to 
them.  Then,  they  made  it  known  to  the  people,  and  set 
oflE  to  inform  Lady  Jane  Grey  that  she  was  to  be  Queen. 

She  was  a  pretty  girl  of  only  sixteen,  and  was  amiable, 
learned,  and  clever.     When  the  lords  who  came  to  her  fell 


262  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND. 

on  their  knees  before  her,  and  told  her  what  tidings  they 
brought,  she  was  so  astonished  that  she  fainted.  On  recov- 
ering, she  expressed  her  sorrow  for  the  young  King's  death, 
and  said  that  she  knew  she  was  unfit  to  govern  the  king- 
dom ;  but  that  if  she  must  be  Queen,  she  prayed  God  to 
direct  her.  She  was  then  at  Sion  House,  near  Brentford ; 
and  the  lords  took  her  down  the  river  in  state  to  the  Tower, 
that  she  mght  remain  there  (as  the  custom  was)  until  she 
was  crowned.  But  the  people  were  not  at  all  favourable 
to  Lady  Jane,  considering  that  the  right  to  be  Queen  was 
Mary's,  and  greatly  disliking  the  Duke  of  Northumberland. 
They  were  not  put  into  a  better  humour  by  the  duke's  caus- 
ing a  vintner's  servant,  one  Gabriel  Pot,  to  be  taken  up  for 
expressing  his  dissatisfaction  among  the  crowd,  and  to  have 
his  ears  nailed  to  the  pillory,  and  cut  ofE.  Some  powerful 
men  among  the  nobility  declared  on  Mary's  side.  They 
raised  troops  to  support  her  cause,  had  her  proclaimed 
Queen  at  Norwich,  and  gathered  around  her  at  the  castle 
of  Framlingham,  which  belonged  to  the  Duke  of  Norfolk. 
For,  she  was  not  considered  so  safe  as  yet,  but  that  it  was 
best  to  keep  her  in  a  castle  on  the  sea-coast,  from  whence 
she  might  be  sent  abroad,  if  necessary. 

The  Council  would  have  despatched  Lady  Jane's  father, 
the  Duke  of  Suffolk,  as  the  general  of  the  army  against 
this  force;  but,  as  Lady  Jane  implored  that  her  father 
might  remain  with  her,  and  as  he  was  known  to  be  but  a 
weak  man,  they  told  the  Duke  of  Northumberland  that  be 
must  take  the  command  himself.  He  was  not  very  ready 
to  do  so,  as  he  mistrusted  the  Council  much ;  but  there  was 
no  help  for  it,  and  he  set  forth  with  a  heavy  heart,  observ- 
ing to  a  lord  who  rode  beside  him  through  Shoreditch  at 
the  head  of  the  troops,  that,  although  the  people  pressed 
in  great  numbers  to  look  at  them,  they  were  terribly  silent. 

And  his  fears  for  himself  turned  out  to  be  well  founded. 
While  he  was  waiting  at  Cambridge  for  further  help  from 
the  Council,  the  Council  took  it  into  their  heads  to  turn 
their  backs  on  Lady  Jane's  cause,  and  to  take  up  the  Prin- 
cess Mary's.  This  was  chiefly  owing  to  the  before-men- 
tioned Earl  of  Arundel,  who  represented  to  the  Lord  Mayor 
and  aldermen,  in  a  second  interview  with  those  sagacious 
persons,  that,  as  for  himself,  he  did  not  perceive  the  Re- 
formed religion  to  be  in  much  danger — which  Lord  Pem- 
broke backed  by  flourishing  his  sword  as  another  kind  of 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  263 

persuasion.  The  Lord  Mayor  and  aldermen,  thus  enlight- 
ened, said  there  could  be  no  doubt  that  the  Princess  Mary 
ought  to  be  Queen.  So,  she  was  proclaimed  at  the  Cross  by 
Saint  Paul's,  and  barrels  of  wine  were  given  to  the  people, 
and  they  got  very  drunk,  and  danced  round  blazing  bonfires 
— little  thinking,  poor  wretches,  what  other  bonfires  would 
soon  be  blazing  in  Queen  Mary's  name. 

After  a  ten  days'  dream  of  royalty.  Lady  Jane  Grey  re- 
signed the  Crown  with  great  willingness,  saying  that  she 
had  only  accepted  it  in  obedience  to  her  father  and  mother ; 
and  went  gladly  back  to  her  pleasant  house  by  the  river, 
and  her  books.  Mary  then  came  on  towards  London ;  and 
at  Wanstead  in  Essex,  was  joined  by  her  half-sister,  the 
Princess  Elizabeth.  They  passed  through  the  streets  of 
London  to  the^  Tower,  and  there  the  new  Queen  met  some 
eminent  prisoners  then  confined  in  it,  kissed  them,  and 
gave  them  their  liberty.  Among  these  was  that  Gardiner, 
Bishop  of  Winchester,  who  had  been  imprisoned  in  the  last 
reign  for  holding  to  the  unreformed  religion.  Him  she 
soon  made  chancellor. 

The  Duke  of  Northumberland  had  been  taken  prisoner, 
and,  together  with  his  son  and  five  others,  was  quickly 
brought  before  the  Council.  He,  not  unnaturally,  asked 
that  Council,  in  his  defence,  whether  it  was  treason  to  obey 
orders  that  had  been  issued  under  the  great  seal ;  and,  & 
it  were,  whether  they,  who"  had  obeyed  them  too,  ought  to 
be  his  judges?  But  they  made  light  of  these  points ;  and, 
being  resolved  to  have  him  out  of  the  way,  soon  sentenced 
him  to  death.  He  had  risen  into  power  upon  the  death  of 
another  man,  and  made  but  a  poor  show  (as  might  be  ex- 
pected) when  he  himself  lay  low.  He  entreated  Gardiner 
to  let  him  live,  if  it  were  only  in  a  mouse's  hole;  and, 
when  he  ascended  the  scaffold  to  be  beheaded  on  Tower 
Hill,  addressed  the  people  in  a  miserable  way,  saying  that 
he  had  been  incited  by  others,  and  exhorting  them  to  return 
to  the  unreformed  religion,  which  he  told  them  was  his 
faith.  There  seems  reason  to  suppose  that  he  expected  a 
pardon  even  then,  in  return  for  this  confession ;  but  it  mat- 
ters little  whether  he  did  or  not.     His  head  was  struck  off. 

Mary  was  now  crowned  Queen.  She  was  thirty-seven 
years  of  age,  short  and  thin,  wrinkled  in  the  face,  and 
very  unhealthy.  But  she  had  a  great  liking  for  show  and 
for  bright  colours,  and  all  the  ladies  of  her  Court  were 


264  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

magnificently  dressed.  She  had  a  great  liking  too  for  old 
customs,  without  much  sense  in  them;  and  she  was  oiled 
in  the  oldest  way,  and  blessed  in  the  oldest  way,  and  done 
all  manner  of  things  to  in  the  oldest  way,  at  her  corona- 
tion.    I  hope  they  did  her  good. 

She  soon  began  to  show  her  desire  to  put  down  the  Ee- 
formed  religion,  and  put  up  the  unreformed  one :  though  it 
was  dangerous  work  as  yet,  the  people  being  something 
wiser  than  they  used  to  be.  They  even  cast  a  shower  of 
stones — and  among  them  a  dagger — at  one  of  the  royal 
chaplains  who  attacked  the  Reformed  religion  in  a  public 
sermon.  But  the  Queen  and  her  priests  went  steadily  on. 
Ridley,  the  powerful  bishop  of  the  last  reign,  was  seized 
and  sent  to  the  Tower.  Latimer,  also  celebrated  among 
the  Clergy  of  the  last  reign,  was  likewise  sent  to  the  Tower, 
and  Cranmer  speedily  followed.  Latimer  was  an  aged 
man ;  and,  as  his  guards  took  him  through  Smithfield,  he 
looked  romid  it,  and  said,  "  This  is  a  place  that  hath  long 
groaned  for  me."  For  he  knew  well,  what  kind  of  bonfires 
would  soon  be  burning.  Nor  was  the  knowledge  confined 
to  him.  The  prisons  were  fast  filled  with  the  chief  Prot- 
estants, who  were  there  left  rotting  in  darkness,  hunger, 
dirt,  and  separation  from  their  friends;  many,  who  had 
time  left  them  for  escape,  fled  from  the  kingdom ;  and  the 
dullest  of  the  people  began,  now,  to  see  what  was  coming. 

It  came  on  fast.  A  Parliament  was  got  together ;  not 
without  strong  suspicion  of  unfairness ;  and  they  annulled 
the  divorce,  formerly  pronounced  by  Cranmer  between  the 
Queen's  mother  and  King  Henry  the  Eighth,  and  unmade 
all  the  laws  on  the  subject  of  religion  that  had  been  made 
in  the  last  King  Edward's  reign.  They  began  their  pro- 
ceedings, in  violation  of  the  law,  by  having  the  old  mass 
said  before  them  in  Latin,  and  by  turning  out  a  bishop  who 
would  not  kneel  down.  They  also  declared  guilty  of  trea- 
son, Lady  Jane  Grey  for  aspiring  to  the  Crown ;  her  hus- 
band, for  being  her  husband ;  and  Cranmer,  for  not  believ- 
ing in  the  mass  aforesaid.  They  then  prayed  the  Queen 
graciously  to  choose  a  husband  for  herself,  as  soon  as  might 
be. 

Now,  the  question  who  should  be  the  Queen's  husband 
had  given  rise  to  a  great  deal  of  discussion,  and  to  several 
contending  parties.  Some  said  Cardinal  Pole  was  the  man 
— but  the  Queen  was  of  opinion  that  he  was  not  the  man, 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  265 

he  being  too  old  and  too  mucli  of  a  student.  Others  said 
that  the  gallant  young  Coubtenay,  whom  the  Queen  had 
made  Earl  of  Devonshire,  was  the  man — and  the  Queen 
thought  so  too,  for  a  while ;  but  she  changed  her  mind. 
At  last  it  appeared  that  Philip,  Prince  of  Spain,  was 
certainly  the  man — though  certainly  not  the  people's  man; 
for  they  detested  the  idea  of  such  a  marriage  from  the  be- 
ginning to  the  end,  and  murmured  that  the  Spaniard  would 
establish  in  England,  by  the  aid  of  foreigu  soldiers,  the 
worst  abuses  of  the  Popish  religion,  and  even  the  terrible 
Inquisition  itself. 

These  discontents  gave  rise  to  a  conspiracy  for  marrying 
young  Courtenay  to  the  Princess  Elizabeth,  and  setting 
them  up,  with  popular  tumults  all  over  the  kingdom,  against 
the  Queen,  This  was  discovered  in  time  by  Gardiner ;  but 
in  Kent,  the  old  bold  county,  the  people  rose  in  their  old 
bold  way.  Sib  Thomas  Wyat>  a  man  of  great  daring,  was 
their  leader.  He  raised  his  standard  at  Maidstone,  marched 
on  to  Kochester,  established  himself  in  the  old  castle  there, 
and  prepared  to  hold  out  against  the  Duke  of  Norfolk,  who 
came  against  him  with  a  party  of  the  Queen's  guards,  and 
a  body  of  five  hundred  Loudon  men.  The  London  men, 
however,  were  all  for  Elizabeth,  and  not  at  all  for  Mary. 
They  declared,  under  the  castle  walls,  for  Wyat ;  the  duke 
retreated ;  and  Wyat  came  on  to  Deptford,  at  the  head  of 
fifteen  thousand  men. 

But  these,  in  their  turn,  fell  away.  When  he  came  to 
South wark,  there  were  only  two  thousand  left.  Not  dis- 
mayed by  finding  the  London  citizens  in  arms,  and  the 
guns  at  the  Tower  ready  to  oppose  his  crossing  the  river 
there,  Wyat  led  them  off  to  Kingston-upon-Thames,  intend- 
ing to  cross  the  bridge  that  he  knew  to  be  in  that  place, 
and  so  to  work  his  way  round  to  Ludgate,  one  of  the  old 
gates  of  the  City.  He  found  the  bridge  broken  down,  but 
mended  it,  came  across,  and  bravely  fought  his  way  up 
Fleet  Street  to  Ludgate  Hill.  Finding  the  gate  closed 
against  him,  he  fought  his  way  back  again,  sword  in  hand, 
to  Ten  pie  Bar.  Here,  being  overpowered,  he  surrendered 
himself,  and  three  or  four  hundred  of  his  men  were  taken, 
besides  a  hundred  killed.  Wyat,  in  a  moment  of  weakness 
(and  perhaps  of  torture)  was  afterwards  made  to  accuse 
the  Princess  Elizabeth  as  his  accomplice  to  some  very  small 
extent.     But  his  manhood  soon  returned  to  him,  and  he 


266  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

refused  to  save  his  life  by  making  any  more  false  confes- 
sions. He  was  quartered  and  distributed  in  the  usual  bru- 
tal way,  and  from  fifty  to  a  hundred  of  his  followers  were 
hanged.  The  rest  were  led  out,  with  halters  round  their 
necks,  to  be  pardoned,  and  to  make  a  parade  of  crying  out, 
'*  God  save  Queen  Mary !  " 

In  the  danger  of  this  rebellion,  the  Queen  showed  herself 
to  be  a  woman  of  courage  and  spirit.  She  disdained  to 
retreat  to  any  place  of  safetj^,  and  went  down  to  the  Guild- 
hall, sceptre  in  hand,  and  made  a  gallant  speech  to  the 
Lord  Mayor  and  citizens  But  on  the  day  after  Wyat's 
defeat,  she  did  the  most  cruel  act,  even  of  her  cruel  reign, 
in  signing  the  warrant  for  the  execution  of  Lady  Jane 
Grey. 

They  tried  to  persuade  Lady  Jane  to  accept  the  unre- 
formed  religion  ;  but  she  steadily  refused.  On  the  morn- 
ing when  she  was  to  diej,  she  saw  from  her  window  the 
bleeding  and  headless  body  of  her  husband  brought  back  in 
a  cart  from  the  scaffold  on  Tower  Hill  where  he  had  laid 
down  his  life.  But,  as  she  had  declined  to  see  him  before 
his  execution,  lest  she  should  be  overpowered  and  not  make 
a  good  end,  so,  she  even  now  showed  a  constancy  and  calm- 
ness that  will  never  be  forgotten.  She  came  up  to  the 
scaffold  with  a  firm  step  and  a  quiet  face,  and  addressed 
the  bystanders  in  a  steady  voice.  They  were  not  numer- 
ous ;  for  she  was  too  young,  too  innocent  and  fair,  to  be 
murdered  before  the  people  on  Tower  Hill,  as  her  husband 
had  just  been ;  so,  the  place  of  her  execution  was  within 
the  Tower  itself.  She  said  that  she  had  done  an  unlawful 
act  in  taking  what  was  Queen  Mary's  right;  but  that  she 
had  done  so  with  no  bad  intent,  and  that  she  died  a  hum- 
ble Christian.  She  begged  the  executioner  to  despatch  her 
quickly,  and  she  asked  him,  "  Will  you  take  my  head  off 
before  I  lay  me  down?"  He  answered,  "No,  Madam," 
and  then  she  was  very  quiet  Avhile  they  bandaged  her  eyes. 
Being  blinded,  and  unable  to  see  the  block  on  which  she 
was  to  lay  her  young  head,  she  was  seen  to  feel  about  for 
it  with  her  hands,  and  was  heard  to  say,  confused,  "  0  what 
shall  I  do!  Where  is  it?'*  Then  they  guided  her  to  the 
right  place,  and  the  executioner  struck  off  her  head.  You 
know  too  well,  now,  what  dreadful  deeds  the  executioner 
did  in  England,  through  many  many  years,  and  how  his 
axe  descended  on  the  hateful  block  through  the  necks  of 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  267 

some  of  the  bravest,  wisest,  and  best  in  the  land.  But  it 
never  struck  so  cruel  and  so  vile  a  blow  as  this. 

The  father  of  Lady  Jane  soon  followed,  but  was  little 
pitied.  Queen  Mary's  next  object  was  to  lay  hold  of  Eliza- 
beth, and  this  was  pursued  with  great  eagerness.  Five 
hundred  men  were  sent  to  her  retired  house  at  Ashridge, 
by  Berkliampstead,  with  orders  to  bring  her  up,  alive  or 
dead.  They  got  there  at  ten  at  night,  when  she  was  sick 
in  bed.  But,  their  leaders  followed  her  lady  into  her  bed- 
chamber, whence  she  was  brought  out  betimes  next  morn- 
ing, and  put  into  a  litter  to  be  conveyed  to  London.  She 
was  so  weak  and  ill,  that  she  was  five  days  on  the  road ; 
still,  she  was  so  resolved  to  be  seen  by  the  people  that  she 
had  the  curtains  of  the  litter  opened ;  and  so,  very  pale 
and  sickly,  passed  through  the  streets.  She  wrote  to  her 
sister,  saying  she  was  innocent  of  any  crime,  and  asking 
why  she  was  made  a  prisoner ;  but  she  got  no  answer,  and 
was  ordered  to  the  Tower.  They  took  her  in  by  the 
Traitor's  Gate,  to  which  she  objected,  but  in  vain.  One 
of  the  lords  who  conveyed  her  offered  to  cover  her  with  his 
cloak,  as  it  was  raining,  but  she  put  it  away  from  her, 
proudly  and  scornfully,  and  passed  into  the  Tower,  and 
sat  down  in  a  courtyard  on  a  stone.  They  besought  her  to 
come  in  out  of  the  wet ;  but  she  answered  that  it  was  bet- 
ter sitting  there,  than  in  a  worse  place.  At  length  she 
went  to  her  apartment,  where  she  was  kept  a  prisoner, 
though  not  so  close  a  prisoner  as  at  Woodstock,  whither 
she  was  afterwards  removed,  and  where  she  is  said  to  have 
one  day  envied  a  milkmaid  whom  she  heard  singing  in  the 
sunshine  as  she  went  through  the  green  fields.  Gardiner, 
than  whom  there  were  not  many  worse  men  among  the 
fierce  and  sullen  priests,  cared  little  to  keep  secret  his  stern 
desire  for  her  death :  being  used  to  say  that  it  was  of  little 
service  to  shake  off  the  leaves,  and  lop  the  branches  of  the 
tree  of  heresy,  if  its  root,  the  hope  of  heretics,  were  left. 
He  failed,  however,  in  his  benevolent  design.  Elizabeth 
was,  at  length,  released;  and  Hatfield  House  was  assigned 
to  her  as  a  residence,-  under  the  care  of  one  Sir  Thomas 
Pope. 

It  would  seem  that  Philip,  the  Prince  of  Spain,  was  a 
main  cause  of  this  change  in  Elizabeth's  fortunes.  He  was 
not  an  amiable  man,  being,  on  the  contrary,  proud,  over- 
bearing, and  gloomy;  but  he  and  the  Spanish  lords  who 


268  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

came  over  with  him,  assuredly  did  discountenance  the  idea 
of  doing  any  violence  to  the  Princess.  It  may  have  been 
mere  prudence,  but  we  will  hope  it  was  manhood  and 
honour.  The  Queen  had  been  expecting  her  husband  with 
great  impatience,  and  at  length  he  came,  to  her  great  joy, 
though  he  never  cared  much  for  her.  They  were  married 
by  Gardiner,  at  Winchester,  and  there  was  more  holiday- 
making  among  the  people  j  but  they  had  their  old  distrust 
of  this  Spanish  marriage,  in  which  even  the  Parliament 
shared.  Though  the  members  of  that  Parliament  were 
far  from  honest,  and  were  strongly  suspected  to  have  been 
bought  with  Spanish  money,  they  would  pass  no  bill  to 
enable  the  Queen  to  set  aside  the  Princess  Elizabeth  and 
appoint  her  own  successor. 

Although  Gardiner  failed  in  this  object,  as  well  as  in  the 
darker  one  of  bringing  the  Princess  to  the  scaffold,  he  went 
on  at  a  great  pace  in  the  revival  of  the  unreformed  religion. 
A  neAV  Parliament  was  packed,  in  which  there  were  no 
Protestants.  Preparations  were  made  to  receive  Cardinal 
Pole  in  England  as  the  Pope's  messenger,  bringing  his  holy 
declaration  that  all  the  nobility  who  had  acquired  Church 
property,  should  keep  it — which  was  done  to  enlist  their 
selfish  interest  on  the  Pope's  side.  Then  a  great  scene  was 
enacted,  which  was  the  triumph  of  the  Queen's  plans.  Car- 
dinal Pole  arrived  in  great  splendour  and  dignity,  and  was 
received  with  great  pomp.  The  Parliament  joined  in  a 
petition  expressive  of  their  sorrow  at  the  change  in  the  na- 
tional religion,  and  praying  him  to  receive  the  country 
again  into  the  Popish  Church.  With  the  Queen  sitting  on 
her  throne,  and  the  King  on  one  side  of  her,  and  the  Car- 
dinal on  the  other,  and  the  Parliament  present,  Gardiner 
read  the  petition  aloud.  The  Cardinal  then  made  a  great 
speech,  and  was  so  obliging  as  to  say  that  all  was  forgotten 
and  forgiven,  and  that  the  kingdom  was  solemnly  made 
Roman  Catholic  again. 

Everything  was  now  ready  for  the  lighting  of  the  terrible 
bonfires.  The  Queen  having  declared  to  the  Council,  in 
writing,  that  shf».  would  wish  none  of  her  subjects  to  be 
burnt  without  some  of  the  Council  being  present,  and  that 
she  would  particularly  wish  there  to  be  good  sermons  at 
all  burnings,  the  Council  knew  pretty  well  what  was  to  be 
done  next.  So,  after  the  Cardinal  had  blessed  all  the 
bishops  as  a  preface  to  the  burnings,  the  Chancellor  Gardi- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  269 

ner  opened  a  High  Court  at  Saint  Mary  Oveiy,  on  the 
Southwark  side  of  London  Bridge,  for  the  trial  of  heretics. 
Here,  two  of  the  late  Protestant  clergymen,  Hooper,  Bishop 
of  Gloucester,  and  Rogers,  a  Prebendary  of  Saint  Paul's, 
were  brought  to  be  tried.  Hooper  was  tried  first  for  being 
married,  though  a  priest,  and  for  not  believing  in  the  mass. 
He  admitted  both  of  these  accusations,  and  said  that  the 
mass  was  a  wicked  imposition.  Then  they  tried  Rogers, 
who  said  the  same.  Next  morning  the  two  were  brought 
up  to  be  sentenced ;  and  then  Rogers  said  that  his  poor 
wife,  being  a  German  woman  and  a  stranger  in  the  land, 
he  hoped  might  be  allowed  to  come  to  speak  to  him  before 
he  died.  To  this  the  inhuman  Gardiner  replied,  that  she 
was  not  his  wife.  "  Yea,  but  she  is,  my  lord,"  said  Rogers, 
"and  she  hath  been  my  wife  these  eighteen  years."  His 
request  was  still  refused,  and  they  were  both  sent  to  New- 
gate ;  all  those  who  stood  in  the  streets  to  sell  things,  being 
ordered  to  put  out  their  lights  that  the  people  might  not 
see  them.  But,  the  people  stood  at  their  doors  with  can- 
dles in  their  hands,  and  prayed  for  them  as  they  went  by. 
Soon  afterwards,  Rogers  was  taken  out  of  jail  to  be  burnt 
in  Smithfield ;  aiid,  in  the  crowd  as  he  went  along,  he  saw 
his  poor  wife  and  his  ten  children,  of  whom  the  youngest 
was  a  little  baby.      And  so  he  was  burnt  to  death. 

The  next  day.  Hooper,  who  was  to  be  burnt  at  Glouces- 
ter, was  brought  out  to  take  his  last  journey,  and  was  made 
to  wear  a  hood  over  his  face  that  he  might  not  be  known  by 
the  people.  But,  they  did  know  him  for  all  that,  down 
in  his  own  part  of  the  country ;  and,  when  he  came  near 
Gloucester,  they  lined  the  road,  making  prayers  and  lamen- 
tations. His  guards  took  him  to  a  lodging,  where  he  slept 
soundly  all  night.  At  nine  o'clock  next  morning,  he  was 
brought  forth  leaning  on  a  staff ;  for  he  had  taken  cold  in 
prison,  and  was  infirm.  The  iron  stake,  and  the  iron  chain 
which  was  to  bind  him  to  it,  were  fixed  up  near  a  great 
elm-tree  in  a  pleasant  open  place  before  the  cathedral, 
where,  on  peaceful  Sundays,  he  had  been  accustomed  to 
preach  and  to  pray,  when  he  was  bishop  of  Gloucester. 
This  tree,  which  had  no  leaves  then,  it  being  February,  was 
filled  with  people ;  and  the  priests  of  Gloucester  College 
were  looking  complacently  on  from  a  window,  and  there 
was  a  great  concourse  of  spectators  in  every  spot  from 
which  a  glimpse  of  the  dreadful  sight  could  be  beheld 


270  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

When  the  old  man  kneeled  down  on  the  small  platform  at 
the  foot  of  the  stake,  and  prayed  aloud,  the  nearest  people 
were  observed  to  be  so  attentive  to  his  prayers  that  they 
were  ordered  to  stand  farther  back;  for  it  did  not  suit 
the  Komish  Church  to  have  those  Protestant  words  heard. 
His  prayers  concluded,  he  went  up  to  the  stake  and  was 
stripped  to  his  shirt,  and  chained  ready  for  the  fire.  One 
of  his  guards  had  such  compassion  on  him  that,  to  shorten 
his  agonies,  he  tied  some  packets  of  gunpowder  about  him. 
Then  they  heaped  up  wood  and  straw  and  reeds,  and  set 
them  all  alight.  But,  unhappily,  the  wood  was  green  and 
damp,  and  there  was  a  wind  blowing  that  blew  what  flame 
there  was,  away.  Thus,  through  three-quarters  of  an  hour, 
the  good  old  man  was  scorched  and  roasted  and  smoked,  as 
the  fire  rose  and  sank ;  and  all  that  time  they  saw  him,  as 
he  burned,  moving  his  lips  in  prayer,  and  beating  his  breast 
with  one  hand,  even  after  the  other  was  burnt  away  and 
had  fallen  off. 

Cranmer,  Ridley,  and  Latimer  were  taken  to  Oxford  to 
dispute  with  a  commission  of  priests  and  doctors  about  the 
mass.  They  were  shamefully  treated ;  and  it  is  recorded 
that  the  Oxford  scholars  hissed  and  howled  and  groaned, 
and  misconducted  themselves  in  an  anything  but  a  scholarly 
way.  The  prisoners  were  taken  back  to  jail,  and  afterwards 
tried  in  Saint  Mary's  Church.  They  were  all  found  guilty. 
On  the  sixteenth  of  the  month  of  October,  Ridley  and  Lati- 
mer were  brought  out,  to  make  another  of  the  dreadful 
bonfires. 

The  scene  of  the  suffering  of  these  two  good  Protestant 
men  was  in  the  City  ditch,  near  Baliol  College.  On  coming 
to  the  dreadful  spot,  they  kissed  the  stakes,  and  then  em- 
braced each  other.  And  then  a  learned  doctor  got  up  into 
a  pulpit  which  was  placed  there,  and  preached  a  sermon 
from  the  text,  "  Though  I  give  my  body  to  be  burned,  and 
have  not  charity,  it  profiteth  me  nothing."  When  you 
think  of  the  charity  of  burning  men  alive,  you  may  imag- 
ine that  this  learned  doctor  had  a  rather  brazen  face.  Rid- 
ley would  have  answered  his  sermon  when  it  came  to  an 
end,  but  was  not  allowed.  When  Latimer  was  stripped,  it 
appeared  that  he  had  dressed  himself  under  his  other 
clothes,  in  a  new  shroud ;  and,  as  he  stood  in  it  before  all 
the  people,  it  was  noted  of  him,  and  long  remembered,  that, 
whereas  he  had  been  stooping  and  feeble  but  a  few  minutes 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  271 

'  before,  he  now  stood  upright  and  handsome,  in  the  kno\Yl- 
edge  that  he  was  dying  for  a  just  and  a  great  cause.  Rid- 
ley's brother-iu-law  was  there  with  bags  of  gunpowder; 
and  when  they  were  both  chained  up,  he  tied  them  round 
their  bodies.  Then,  a  light  was  thrown  upon  the  pile  to 
firs  it.  "Be  of  good  comfort,  Master  Ridley,"  said  Lati- 
mer, at  that  awful  moment,  "  and  play  the  man !  We  shall 
this  day  light  such  a  candle,  by  God's  grace,  in  England, 
as  I  trust  shall  never  be  put  out."  And  then  he  was  seen 
to  make  motions  with  his  hands  as  if  he  were  washing 
them  in  the  flames,  and  to  stroke  his  aged  face  with  them, 
and  was  heard  to  cry,  ''Father  of  Heaven,  receive  my 
soul!  "  He  died  quickly,  but  the  fire,  after  having  burned 
the  legs  of  Ridley,  sunk.  There  he  lingered,  chained  to 
the  iron  post,  and  crying,  "0!  I  cannot  burn!  0!  for 
Christ's  sake  let  the  fire  come  unto  me !  "  And  still,  when 
his  brother-in-law  had  heaped  on  more  wood,  he  was  heard 
through  the  blinding  smoke,  still  dismally  crying,  "O!  I 
cannot  burn,  I  cannot  burn !  "  At  last,  the  gunpowder 
caught  fire,  and  ended  his  miseries. 

Five  days  after  this  fearful  scene,  Gardiner  went  to  his 
tremendous  account  before  God,  for  the  cruelties  he  had  so 
much  assisted  in  committing. 

Cranmer  remained  still  alive  and  in  prison.  He  was 
•  brought  out  again  in  February,  for  more  examining  and 
trying,  by  Bonner,  Bishop  of  London :  another  man  of 
blood,  who  had  succeeded  to  Gardiner's  work,  even  in  his 
lifetime,  when  Gardiner  was  tired  of  it.  Cranmer  was  now 
degraded  as  a  priest,  and  left  for  death ;  but,  if  the  Queen 
.hated  any  one  on  earth,  she  hated  him,  and  it  was  resolved 
that  he  should  be  ruined  and  disgraced  to  the  utmost. 
There  is  no  doubt  that  the  Queen  and  her  husband  person- 
ally urged  on  these  deeds,  because  they  wrote  to  the  Coun- 
cil, urging  them  to  be  active  in  the  kindling  of  the  fearful 
tires.  As  Cranmer  was  known  not  to  be  a  firm  man,  a  plan 
was  laid  for  surrounding  him  with  artful  people,  and  induc- 
ing him  to  recant  to  the  unreformed  religion.  Deans  and 
friars  visited  him,  played  at  bowls  with  him,  showed  him 
various  attentions,  talked  persuasively  with  him,  gave  him 
money  for  his  prison  comforts,  and  induced  him  to  sign,  I 
fear,  as  many  as  six  recantations.  But  when,  after  all,  he 
was  taken  out  to  be  burnt,  he  was  nobly  true  to  his  better 
self,  and  made  a  glorious  end. 


272  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

After  prayers  and  a  sermon,  Dr.  Cole,  the  preacher  of  thef 
day  (who  had  been  one  of  the  artful  priests  about  Cranmer 
in  prison),  required  him  to  make  a  public  confession  of  his 
faith  before  the  people.  This,  Cole  did,  expecting  that  he 
would  declare  himself  a  Roman  Catholic.  "  I  will  make 
a  profession  of  my  faith,"  said  Cranmer,  "  and  with  a  good 
will  too. " 

Then,  he  arose  before  them  all,  and  took  from  the  sleeve 
of  his  robe  a  written  prayer  and  read  it  aloud.  That  done, 
he  kneeled  and  said  the  Lord's  Prayer,  all  the  people  join- 
ing ;  and  then  he  arose  again  and  told  them  that  he  believed 
in  the  Bible,  and  that  in  what  he  had  lately  written,  he 
had  written  what  was  not  the  truth,  and  that,  because  his 
right  hand  had  signed  those  papers,  he  would  burn  his 
right  hand  first  when  he  came  to  the  fire.  As  for  the 
Pope,  he  did  refuse  him  and  denounce  him  as  the  enemy 
of  Heaven.  Hereupon  the  pious  Dr.  Cole  cried  out  to 
the  guards  to  stop  that  heretic's  mouth  and  take  him 
away. 

So  they  took  him  away,  and  chained  him  to  the  stake, 
where  he  hastily  took  off  his  own  clothes  to  make  ready  for 
the  flames.  And  he  stood  before  the  people  with  a  bald 
head  and  a  white  and  flowing  beard.  He  was  so  firm  now, 
when  the  worst  was  come,  that  he  again  declared  against 
his  recantation,  and  was  so  impressive  and  so  undismayed,  • 
a  certain  lord,  who  was  one  of  the  directors  of  the  execu- 
tion, called  out  to  the  men  to  make  haste !  When  the  fire 
was  lighted,  Cranmer,  true  to  his  latest  word,  stretched 
out  his  right  hand,  and  crying  out,  "This  hand  hath 
offended ! "  held  it  among  the  flames,  until  it  blazed  and 
burned  away.  His  heart  was  found  entire  among  his  ashes, 
and  he  left  at  last  a  memorable  name  in  English  history. 
Cardinal  Pole  celebrated  the  day  by  saying  his  first  mass, 
and  next  day  he  was  made  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  in 
Cranmer' s  place. 

The  Queen's  husband,  who  was  now  mostly  abroad  in  his 
own  dominions,  and  generally  made  a  coarse  jest  of  her  to 
his  more  familiar  courtiers,  was  at  war  with  France,  and 
came  over  to  seek  the  assistance  of  England.  England  was 
very  unwilling  to  engage  in  a  French  war  for  his  sake ;  but 
it  happened  that  the  King  of  France,  at  this  very  time, 
aided  a  descent  upon  the  English  coast.  Hence,  war  was 
declared,  greatly  to  Philip's  satisfaction;  and  the  Queen 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  273 

raised  a  sum  of  money  with  which  to  carry  it  on,  by  every 
unjustifiable  means  in  her  power.  It  met  with  no  profit- 
able return,  for  the  French  Duke  of  Guise  surprised  Calais, 
and  the  English  sustained  a  complete  defeat.  The  losses 
they  met  with  in  France  greatly  mortified  the  national 
pride,  and  the  Queen  never  recovered  the  blow. 

There  was  a  bad  fever  raging  in  England  at  this  time, 
and  I  am  glad  to  write  that  the  Queen  took  it,  and  the  hour 
of  her  death  came.  "  When  I  am  dead  and  my  body  is 
opened,"  she  said  to  those  around  her,  "ye  shall  find 
Calais  written  on  my  heart."  I  should  have  thought,  if 
anything  were  written  on  it,  they  would  have  found  the 
words — Jane  Grey,  Hooper,  Eogers,  Ridley,  Latimer, 
Cranmer,    and   three   hundred    people    burnt   alive 

WITHIN  four  years  OF  MY  WICKED  REIGN,  INCLUDING 
sixty    women    and    forty    LITTLE    CHILDREN.        But    it    is 

enough  that  their  deaths  were  written  in  Heaven. 

The  Queen  died  on  the  seventeenth  of  November,  fifteen 
hundred  and  fifty-eight,  after  reigning  not  quite  five  years 
and  a  half,  and  in  the  forty-fourth  year  of  her  age.  Car- 
dinal Pole  died  of  the  same  fever  next  day. 

As  Bloody  Qiteen  Mary,  this  woman  has  become  fa- 
mous, and  as  Bloody  Queen  Mary,  she  will  ever  be  justly 
remembered  with  horror  and  detestation  in  Great  Britain. 
Her  memory  has  been  held  in  such  abhorrence  that  some 
writers  have  arisen  in  later  years  to  take  her  part,  and  to 
show  that  she  was,  upon  the  whole,  quite  an  amiable  and 
cheerful  sovereign !  "  By  their  fruits  ye  shall  know  them," 
said  Our  Saviour.  The  stake  and  the  fire  were  the  fruits 
of  this  reign,  and  you  will  judge  this  Queen  by  nothing 
else. 


CHAPTER   XXXI. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  ELIZABETH. 

There  was  great  rejoicing  all  over  the  land  when  the 
Lords  of  the  Council  went  down  to  Hatfield,  to  hail  the 
Princess  Elizabeth  as  the  new  Queen  of  England.  Weary 
of  the  barbarities  of  Mary's  reign,  the  people  looked  with 
hope  and  gladness  to  the  new  Sovereign.  The  nation 
seemed  to  wake  from  a  horrible  dream ;  and  Heaven,  so 
18 


274  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

long  hidden  by  the  smoke  of  the  fires  that  roasted  men  and 
women  to  death,  appeared  to  brighten  once  more. 

Queen  Elizabeth  was  five-and-twenty  years  of  age  when 
she  rode  through  the  streets  of  London,  from  the  Tower  to. 
Westminster  Abbey,  to  be  crowned.  Her  countenance  was 
strongly  marked,  but  on  the  whole,  commanding  and  digni- 
fied ;  her  hair  was  red,  and  her  nose  something  too  long 
and  sharp  for  a  woman's.  She  was  not  the  beautiful  creat- 
ure her  courtiers  made  out ;  but  she  was  well  enough,  and 
no  doubt  looked  all  the  better  for  coming  after  the  dark 
and  gloomy  Mary.  She  was  well  educated,  but  a  round- 
about writer,  and  rather  a  hard  swearer  and  coarse  talker. 
She  was  clever,  but  cunning  and  deceitful,  and  inherited 
much  of  her  father's  violent  temper.  I  mention  this  now, 
because  she  has  been  so  over-praised  by  one  party,  and  so 
over-abused  by  another,  that  it  is  hardly  possible  to  under- 
stand the  greater  part  of  her  reign  without  first  understand- 
ing what  kind  of  woman  she  really  was. 

She  began  her  reign  with  the  great  advantage  of  having 
a  very  wise  and  careful  minister,  Sir  William  Cecil, 
whom  she  afterwards  made  Lord  Burleigh.  Altogether, 
the  people  had  greater  reason  for  rejoicing  than  they  usu- 
ally had,  when  there  were  processions  in  the  streets ;  and 
they  were  happy  with  some  reason.  All  kinds  of  shows 
and  images  were  set  up ;  Goo  and  Magog  were  hoisted  to 
the  top  of  Temple  Bar;  and  (which  was  more  to  the  pur- 
pose) the  Corporation  dutifully  presented  the  young  Queen 
with  the  sum  of  a  thousand  marks  in  gold — so  heavy  a 
present,  that  she  was  obliged  to  take  it  into  her  carriage 
with  both  hands.  The  coronation  was  a  great  success ;  and, 
on  the  next  day,  one  of  the  courtiers  presented  a  petition 
to  the  new  Queen,  praying  that  as  it  was  the  custom  to  re- 
lease some  prisoners  on  such  occasions,  she  would  have  the 
goodness  to  release  the  four  Evangelists,  Matthew,  Mark, 
Luke,  and  John,  and  also  the  Apostle  Saint  Paul,  who  had 
been  for  some  time  shut  up  in  a  strange  language  so  that 
the  people  could  not  get  at  them. 

To  this,  the  Queen  replied  that  it  would  be  better  first  to 
inquire  of  themselves  whether  they  desired  to  be  released 
or  not ;  and,  as  a  means  of  finding  out,  a  great  public  dis- 
cussion— a  sort  of  religious  tournament — was  appointed  to 
take  place  between  certain  champions  of  the  two  religions, 
in  Westminster  Abbey.      You  may  suppose  that  it  was 


A  CHILD'S:  iHSTORY  OF  ENGLAND  275 

soon  made  pretty  clear  to  common  sense,  that  for  people 
to  benefit  by  what  they  repeat  or  read,  it  is  rather  neces- 
sary they  should  understand  something  about  it.  Accord- 
ingly, a  Church  Service  in  plain  English  was  settled,  and 
other  laws  and  regulations  were  made,  completely  establish- 
ing the  great  work  of  the  Reformation.  The  Romish  bish- 
ops and  champions  were  not  harshly  dealt  with,  all  things 
considered;  and  the  Queen's  ministers  were  both  prudent 
and  merciful. 

The  one  great  trouble  of  this  reign,  and  the  unfortunate 
cause  of  the  greater  part  of  such  turmoil  and  bloodshed  as 
occurred  in  it,  was  Mary  Stuart,  Queen  of  Scots.  We 
will  try  to  understand,  in  as  few  words  as  possible,  who 
Mary  was,  what  she  was,  and  how  she  came  to  be  a  thorn 
in  the  royal  pillow  of  Elizabeth. 

She  was  the  daughter  of  the  Queen  Regent  of  Scotland, 
Mary  of  Guise.  She  had  been  married,  when  a  mere 
child,  to  the  Dauphin,  the  son  and  heir  of  the  King  of 
France.  The  Pope,  who  pretended  that  no  one  could 
rightfully  wear  the  crown  of  England  without  his  gracious 
permission,  was  strongly  opposed  to  Elizabeth,  who  had 
not  asked  for  the  said  gracious  permission.  And  as  Mary 
Queen  of  Scots  would  have  inherited  the  English  crown  in 
right  of  her  birth,  supposing  the  English  Parliament  not  to 
have  altered  the  succession,  the  Pope  himself,  and  most  of 
the  discontented  who  were  followers  of  his,  maintained 
that  Mary  was  the  rightful  Queen  of  England,  and  Elizabeth 
the  wrongful  Queen.  Mary  being  so  closely  connected  with 
France,  and  France  being  jealous  of  England,  there  was  far 
greater  danger  in  this  than  there  would  have  been  if  she 
had  had  no  alliance  with  that  great  power.  And  when  her 
young  husband,  on  the  death  of  his  father,  became  Francis 
the  Second,  King  of  France,  the  matter  grew  very  serious. 
For,  the  young  couple  styled  themselves  King  and  Queen, 
of  England,  and  the  Pope  was  disposed  to  help  them  by 
doing  all  the  mischief  he  could. 

Now,  the  Reformed  religion,  under  the  guidance  of  a 
stern  and  powerful  preacher,  named  John  Knox,  and  other 
such  men,  had  been  making  fierce  progress  in  Scotland.  It 
was  still  a  half  savage  country,  wliere  there  was  a  great 
deal  of  murdering  and  rioting  continually  going  on ;  and 
the  Reformers,  instead  of  reforming  those  evils  as  they 
should  have  done,  went  to  work  in  the  ferocious  old  Scot- 


276  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  El^GLAKD. 

tish  spirit,  laying  churches  and  chapels  waste,  pulling 
down  pictures  and  altars,  and  knocking  about  the  Grey 
Friars,  and  the  Black  Friars,  and  the  White  Friars,  and 
the  friars  of  all  sorts  of  colours,  in  all  directions.  This 
obdurate  and  harsh  spirit  of  the  Scottish  Reformers  (the 
Scotch  have  always  been  rather  a  sullen  and  frowning  peo- 
ple in  religious  matters)  put  up  the  blood  of  the  Komish 
French  court,  and  caused  France  to  send  troops  over  to 
Scotland,  with  the  hope  of  setting  the  friars  of  all  sorts  of 
colours  on  their  legs  again;  of  conquering  that  country 
first,  and  England  afterwards ;  and  so  crushing  the  Refor- 
mation all  to  pieces.  The  Scottish  Reformers,  who  had 
formed  a  great  league  which  they  called  The  Congregation 
of  the  Lord,  secretly  represented  to  Elizabeth  that,  if  the 
Reformed  religion  got  the  worst  of  it  with  them,  it  would 
be  likely  to  get  the  worst  of  it  in  England  too;  and  thus, 
Elizabeth,  though  she  had  a  high  notion  of  the  rights  of 
Kings  and  Queens  to  do  anything  they  liked, -sent  an  army 
to  Scotland  to  support  the  Reformers,  who  were  in  arms 
against  their  sovereign.  All  these  proceedings  led  to  a 
treaty  of  peace  at  Edinburgh,  under  which  the  French  con- 
sented to  depart  from  the  kingdom.  By  a  separate  treaty, 
Mary  and  her  young  husband  engaged  to  renounce  their 
assumed  title  of  King  and  Queen  of  England.  But  this 
treaty  they  never  fullilled. 

It  happened,  soon  after  matters  had  got  to  this  state, 
that  the  young  French  King  died,  leaving  Mary  a  young 
widow.  She  was  then  invited  by  her  Scottish  subjects  to 
return  home  and  reign  over  them;  and  as  she  was  not  now 
happy  where  she  was,  she,  after  a  little  time,  complied. 

Elizabeth  had  been  Queen  three  years,  when  Mary  Queen 
of  Scots  embarked  at  Calais  for  her  own  rough  quarrelling 
country.  As  she  came  out  of  the  harbour,  a  vessel  was 
lost  before  her  eyes,  and  she  said,  "  0 !  good  God !  what 
an  omen  this  is  for  such  a  voyage !  "  She  was  very  fond  of 
France,  and  sat  on  the  deck,  looking  back  at  it  and  weep- 
ing, until  it  was  quite  dark.  When  she  went  to  bed,  she 
directed  to  be  called  at  daybreak,  if  the  French  coast  were 
still  visible,  that  she  might  behold  it  for  the  last  time.  As 
it  proved  to  be  a  clear  morning,  this  was  done,  and  she 
again  wept  for  the  country  she  was  leaving,  and  said  many 
times,  "  Farewell,  France !  Farewell,  France !  I  shall  never 
see  thee  again ! "     All  this  was  long  remem^bered   after- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  277 

wards,  as  sorrowful  and  interesting  in  a  fair  young  prin- 
cess of  nineteen.  Indeed,  I  am  afraid  it  gradually  came, 
together  with  her  other  distresses,  to  surround  her  with 
greater  sympathy  than  she  deserved. 

When  she  came  to  Scotland,  and  took  up  her  abode  at 
the  palace  of  Holyrood  in  Edinburgh,  she  found  herself 
among  uncouth  strangers  and  wild  uncomfortable  customs 
very  different  from  her  experiences  in  the  court  of  France. 
The  very  people  who  were  disposed  to  love  her,  made  her 
head  ache  when  she  was  tired  out  by  her  voyage,  with  a 
serenade  of  discordant  music — a  fearful  concert  of  bag- 
pipes, I  suppose — and  brought  her  and  her  train  home  to 
her  palace  on  miserable  little  Scotch  horses  that  appeared 
to  be  half  starved.  Among  the  people  who  were  not  dis- 
posed to  love  her,  she  found  the  powerful  leaders  of  the 
Reformed  Church,  who  were  bitter  upon  her  amusements, 
however  innocent,  and  denounced  music  and  dancing  as 
works  of  the  devil.  John  Knox  himself  often  lectured  her, 
violently  and  angrily,  and  did  much  to  make  her  life  un- 
happy. All  these  reasons  confirmed  her  old  attachment  to 
the  Romish  religion,  and  caused  her,  there  is  no  doubt, 
most  imprudently  and  dangerously  both  for  herself  and  for 
England  too,  to  give  a  solemn  pledge  to  the  heads  of  the 
Romish  Church  that  if  she  ever  succeeded  to  the  English 
crown,  she  would  set  up  that  religion  again.  In  reading 
her  unhappy  history,  you  must  always  remember  this ;  and 
also  that  during  her  whole  life  she  was  constantly  put  for- 
ward against  the  Queen,  in  some  form  or  other,  by  the 
Romish  party. 

That  Elizabeth,  on  the  other  hand,  was  not  inclined  to 
like  her,  is  pretty  certain.  Elizabeth  was  very  vain  and 
jealous,  and  had  an  extraordinary  dislike  to  people  being 
married.  She  treated  Lady  Catherine  Grey,  sister  of  the 
beheaded  Lady  Jane,  with  such  shameful  severity,  for  no 
other  reason  than  her  being  secretly  married,  that  she  died 
and  her  husband  was  ruined ;  so,  when  a  second  marriage 
for  Mary  began  to  be  talked  about,  probably  Elizabeth  dis- 
liked her  more.  Not  that  Elizabeth  wanted  suitors  of  her 
own,  for  they  started  up  from  Spain,  Austria,  Sweden,  and 
England.  Her  English  lover  at  this  time,  and  one  whom  she 
much  favoured  too,  was  Lord  Robert  Dudley,  Earl  of 
Leicester — himself  secretly  married  to  Amy  Robsart,  the 
daughter  of  an  English  gentleman,  whom  he  was  strongly 


278  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

suspected  of  causing  to  be  murdered,  down  at  his  country 
seat,  Cumnor  Hall  in  Berkshire,  that  he  might  be  free  to 
marry  the  Queen.  Upon  this  story,  the  great  writer,  Sib 
Walter  Scott,  has  founded  one  of  his  best  romances. 
But  if  Elizabeth  knew  how  to  lead  her  handsome  favourite 
on,  for  her  own  vanity  and  pleasure,  she  knew  how  to  stop 
him  for  her  own  pride ;  and  his  love,  and  all  the  other  pro- 
posals, came  to  nothing.  The  Queen  always  declared  in 
good  set  speeches,  that  she  would  never  be  married  at  all, 
but  would  live  and  die  a  Maiden  Queen.  It  was  a  very 
pleasant  and  meritorious  declaration  I  suppose ;  but  it  has 
been  puffed  and  trumpeted  so  much,  that  I  am  rather  tired 
of  it  myself. 

Divers  princes  proposed  to  marry  Mary,  but  the  English 
court  had  reasons  for  being  jealous  of  them  all,  and  even 
proposed  as  a  matter  of  policy  that  she  should  marry  that 
very  Earl  of  Leicester  who  had  aspired  to  be  the  husband 
of  Elizabeth.  At  last,  Lord  Darnley,  son  of  the  Earl 
of  Lennox,  and  himself  descended  from  the  Eoyal  Family 
of  Scotland,  went  over  with  Elizabeth's  consent  to  try  his 
fortune  at  Holyrood. .  ,  He  was  a  tall  simpleton ;  and  could 
dance  and  play  the  guitar ;  but  I  know  of  nothing  else  he 
could  do,  unless  it  were  to  get  very  drunk,  and  eat  glut- 
tonously, and  make  a  contemptible  spectacle  of  himself  in 
many  mean  and  vain  ways.  However,  he  gained  Mary's 
heart,  not  disdaining  in  the  pursuit  of  his  object  to  ally 
himself  with  one  of  her  secretaries,  David  Kizzio,  who 
had  great  influence  with  her.  He  soon  married  the  Queen. 
This  marriage  does  not  say  much  for  her,  but  what  fol- 
lowed will  presently  say  less. 

Mary's  brother,  the  Earl  of  Murray,  and  head  of  the 
Protestant  party  in  Scotland,  had  opposed  this  marriage, 
partly  on  religious  grounds,  and  partly  perhaps  from  per- 
sonal dislike  of  the  very  contemptible  bridegroom.  When 
it  had  taken  place,  through  Mary's  gaining  over  to  it  the 
more  powerful  of  the  lords  about  her,  she  banished  Murray 
for  his  pains;  and,  when  he  and  some  other  nobles  rose  in 
arms  to  support  the  Reformed  religion,  she  herself,  within 
a  month  of  her  wedding  day,  rode  against  them  in  armour 
with  loaded  pistols  in  her  saddle.  Driven  out  of  Scotland, 
they  presented  themselves  before  Elizabeth — who  called 
them  traitors  in  public,  and  assisted  them  in  private,  ac- 
cording to  her  crafty  nature. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  279 

Mary  had  been  married  but  a  little  while,  when  she  be- 
gan to  hate  her  husband,  Avho,  in  his  turn,  began  to  hate 
that  David  Rizzio,  with  whom  he  had  leagued  to  gain  her 
favour,  and  whom  he  now  believed  to  be  her  lover.  He 
hated  Rizzio  to  that  extent,  that  he  made  a  compact  with 
Lord  Ruthven  and  three  other  lords  to  get  rid  of  him  by 
murder.  This  wicked  agreement  they  made  in  solemn 
secrecy  upon  the  first  of  March,  fifteen  hundred  and  sixty- 
six,  and  on  the  night  of  Saturday  the  ninth,  the  conspira- 
tors were  brought  by  Darnley  up  a  private  staircase,  dark 
and  steep,  into  a  range  of  rooms  where  they  knew  that 
Mary  was  sitting  at  supper  with  her  sister.  Lady  Argyle, 
and  this  doomed  man.  When  they  went  into  the  room, 
Darnley  took  the  Queen  round  the  waist,  and  Lord  Ruth- 
ven,  who  had  risen  from  a  bed  of  sickness  to  do  this  mur- 
der, came  in,  gaunt  and  ghastly,  leaning  on  two  men. 
Eizzio  ran  behind  the  Queen  for  shelter  and  protection. 
"  Let  him  come  out  of  the  room,"  said  Ruthven.  "  He 
shall  not  leave  the  room,"  replied  the  Queen ;  "  I  read  his 
danger  in  your  face,  and  it  is  my  will  that  he  remain  here." 
They  then  set  upon  him,  struggled  with  him,  overturned 
the  table,  dragged  him  out,  and  killed  him  with  fifty-six 
stabs.  When  the  Queen  heard  that  he  was  dead,  she  said, 
"  No  more  tears.     I  will  think  now  of  revenge ! " 

Within  a  day  or  two,  she  gained  her  husband  over,  and 
prevailed  on  the  tall  idiot  to  abandon  the  conspirators  and 
fly  with  her  to  Dunbar.  There,  he  issued  a  proclamation, 
audaciously  and  falsely  denying  that  he  had  any  knowledge 
of  the  late  bloody  business ;  and  there  they  were  joined  by 
the  Earl  Bothwell  and  some  other  nobles.  With  their 
help,  they  raised  eight  thousand  men,  returned  to  Edin- 
burgh, and  drove  the  assassins  into  England.  Mary  soon 
afterwards  gave  birth  to  a  son — still  thinking  of  revenge. 

That  she  should  have  had  a  greater  scorn  for  her  hus- 
band after  his  late  cowardice  and  treachery  than  she  had 
had  before,  was  natural  enough.  There  is  little  doubt  that 
she  now  began  to  love  Bothwell  instead,  and  to  plan  with 
him  means  of  getting  rid  of  Darnley.  Bothwell  had  such 
power  over  het  that  he  induced  her  even  to  pardon  the 
assassins  of  Rizzio.  The  arrangements  for  the  christening  of 
the  young  Prince  were  entrusted  to  him,  and  he  was  one  of 
the  most  important  people  at  the  ceremony,  where  the  child 
was  named  James  :  Elizabeth  being  his  godmother,  though 


280  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

not  present  on  the  occasion.  A  week  afterwards,  Damley; 
who  had  left  Mary  and  gone  to  his  father's  house  at  Glas- 
gow, being  taken  ill  with  the  small-pox,  she  sent  her  own 
physician  to  attend  him.  But  there  is  reason  to  apprehend 
that  this  was  merely  a  show  and  a  pretence,  and  that 
she  knew  what  was  doing,  when  Bothwell  within  another 
month  proposed  to  one  of  the  late  conspirators  against  Riz- 
zio,  to  murder  Darnley,  "for  that  it  was  the  Queen's  mind 
that  he  should  be  taken  away."  It  is  certain  that  on  that 
very  day  she  wrote  to  her  ambassador  in  France,  complain- 
ing of  him,  and  yet  went  immediately  to  Glasgow,  feigning 
to  be  very  anxious  about  him,  and  to  love  him  very  much. 
If  she  wanted  to  get  him  in  her  power,  she  succeeded  to 
her  heart's  content;  for  she  induced  him  to  go  back  with 
her  to  Edinburgh,  and  to  occupy,  instead  of  the  palace,  a 
lone  house  outside  the  city  called  the  Kirk  of  Field.  Here, 
he  lived  for  about  a  week.  One  Sunday  night,  she  remained 
with  him  until  ten  o'clock,  and  then  left  him,  to  go  to 
Holyrood  to  be  present  at  an  entertainment  given  in  cele- 
bration of  the  marriage  of  one  of  her  favourite  servants. 
At  two  o'clock  in  the  morning  the  city  was  shaken  by  a 
great  explosion,  and  the  Kirk  of  Field  was  blown  to 
atoms. 

Darnley' s  body  was  found  next  day  lying  under  a  tree 
at  some  distance.  How  it  came  there,  undistigured  and  un- 
scorched  by  gunpowder,  and  how  this  crime  came  to  be  so 
clumsily  and  strangely  committed,  it  is  impossible  to  dis- 
cover. The  deceitful  character  of  Mary,  and  the  deceitful 
character  of  Elizabeth,  have  rendered  almost  every  part  of 
their  joint  history  uncertain  and  obscure.  But,  I  fear  that 
Mary  was  unquestionably  a  party  to  her  husband's  murder, 
and  that  this  was  the  revenge  she  had  threatened.  The 
Scotch  people  universally  believed  it.  Voices  cried  out  in 
the  streets  of  Edinburgh  in  the  dead  of  the  night,  for  jus- 
tice on  the  murderess.  Placards  were  posted  by  unknown 
hands  in  the  public  places  denouncing  Bothwell  as  the  mur- 
derer, and  the  Queen  as  his  accomplice ;  and,  when  he  af- 
terwards married  her  (thovigh  himself  already  married), 
previously  making  a  show  of  taking  her  prisoner  by  force, 
the  indignation  of  the  people  knew  no  bounds.  The  women 
particularly  are  described  as  having  been  quite  frantic 
against  the  Queen,  and  to  have  hooted  and  cried  after  her 
in  the  streets  with  terrific  vehemence. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  281 

Such  guilty  unions  seldom  prosper.  This  husband  and 
wife  had  lived  together  but  a  month,  when  they  were  sepa- 
rated for  ever  by  the  successes  of  a  band  of  Scotch  nobles 
who  associated  against  them  for  the  protection  of  the  young 
Prince:  whom  Bothwell  had  vainly  endeavoured  to  lay 
hold  of,  and  whom  he  would  certainly  have  murdered,  if 
the  Earl  of  Mar,  in  whose  hands  the  boy  was,  had  not 
been  firmly  and  honourably  faithful  to  his  trust.  Before 
this  angry  power,  Bothwell  fled  abroad,  where  he  died,  a 
prisoner  and  mad,  nine  miserable  years  afterwards.  Mary 
being  found  by  the  associated  lords  to  deceive  them  at  every 
turn,  was  sent  a  prisoner  to  Lochleven  Castle ;  which,  as  it 
stood  in  the  midst  of  a  lake,  could  only  be  approacheed  by 
boat.  Here,  one  Lord  Lindsay,  who  was  so  much  of  a 
brute  that  the  nobles  would  have  done  better  if  they  had 
chosen  a  mere  gentleman  for  their  messenger,  made  her 
sign  her  abdication,  and  appoint  Murray,  Regent  of  Scot- 
land. Here,  too,  Murray  saw  her  in  a  sorrowing  and  hum- 
bled state. 

She  had  better  have  remained  in  the  castle  of  Lochleven, 
dull  prison  as  it  was,  with  the  rippling  of  the  lake  against 
it,  and  the  moving  shadows  of  the  water  on  the  room-walls ; 
but  she  could  not  rest  there,  and  more  than  once  tried  to 
escape.  The  first  time  she  had  nearly  succeeded,  dressed 
in  the  clothes  of  her  own  washerwoman,  but,  putting  up 
her  hand  to  prevent  one  of  the  boatmen  from  lifting  her 
veil,  the  men  suspected  her,  seeing  how  white  it  was,  and 
rowed  her  back  again.  A  short  time  afterwards,  her  fasci- 
nating manners  enlisted  in  her  cause  a  boy  in  the  castle, 
called  the  little  Douglas,  who,  while  the  family  were  at 
supper,  stole  the  keys  of  the  great  gate,  went  softly  out 
with  the  Queen,  locked  the  gate  on  the  outside,  and  rowed 
her  away  across  the  lake,  sinking  the  keys  as  they  went 
along.  On  the  opposite  shore  she  was  met  by  another 
Douglas,  and  some  few  lords;  and,  so  accompanied,  rode 
away  on  horseback  to  Hamilton,  where  they  raised  three 
thousand  men.  Here,  she  issued  a  proclamation  declaring 
that  the  abdication  she  had  signed  in  her  prison  was  ille- 
gal, and  requiruig  the  Regent  to  yield  to  his  lawful  Queen. 
Being  a  steady  soldier,  and  in  no  way  discomposed  al- 
though he  was  without  an  army,  Murray  pretended  to  treat 
with  her,  until  he  had  collected  a  force  about  half  equal  to 
her  own,  and  then  he  gave  her  battle.     In  one  quarter  of 


282  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND. 

an  hour  he  cut  down  all  her  hopes.  She  had  another  weary 
ride  on  horseback  of  sixty  long  Scotch  miles,  and  took  shel- 
ter at  Dundrennan  Abbey,  whence  she  fled  for  safety  to 
Elizabeth's  dominions. 

Mary  Queen  of  Scots  came  to  England — to  her  own  ruin, 
the  trouble  of  the  kingdom,  and  the  misery  and  death  of 
many — in  the  year  one  thousand  five  hundred  and  sixty- 
eight.  How  she  left  it  and  the  world,  nineteen  years  after- 
wards, we  have  now  to  see. 

8ECOXD   PABT. 

When  Mary  Queen  of  Scots  arrived  in  England,  without 
money  and  even  without  any  other  clothes  than  those  she 
wore,  she  wrote  to  Elizabeth,  representing  herself  as  an 
innocent  and  injured  piece  of  Royalty,  and  entreating  her 
assistance  to  oblige  her  Scottish  subjects  to  take  her  back 
again  and  obey  her.  But,  as  her  character  was  already 
known  in  England  to  be  a  very  different  one  from  what  she 
made  it  out  to  be,  she  was  told  in  answer  that  she  must  first 
clear  herself.  Made  uneasy  by  this  condition,  Mary,  rather 
than  stay  in  England,  would  have  gone  to  Spain,  or  to 
France,  or  would  even  have  gone  back  to  Scotland.  But, 
as  her  doing  either  would  have  been  likely  to  trouble  Eng- 
land afresh,  it  was  decided  that  she  should  be  detuned 
here.  She  first  came  to  Carlisle,  and,  after  that,  was 
moved  about  from  castle  to  castle,  as  was  considered  neces- 
sary; but  England  she  never  left  again. 

After  trying  very  hard  to  get  rid  of  the  necessity  of 
clearing  herself,  Mary,  advised  by  Lord  Herries,  her  best 
friend  in  England,  agreed  to  answer  the  charges  against 
her,  if  the  Scottish  noblemen  who  made  them  would  attend 
to  maintain  them  before  such  English  noblemen  as  Eliza- 
beth might  appoint  for  that  purpose.  Accordingly,  such 
an  assembly,  under  the  name  of  a  conference,  met,  first  at 
York,  and  afterwards  at  Hampton  Court.  In  its  presence 
Lord  Lennox,  Darnley's  father,  openly  charged  Mary  with 
the  murder  of  .his  son;  and  whatever  Mary's  friends  may 
now  say  or  write  in  her  behalf,  there  is  no  doubt  that, 
when  her  brother  Murray  produced  against  her  a  casket 
containing  certain  guilty  letters  and  verses  which  he  stated 
to  have  passed  between  her  and  Bothwell,  she  withdrew 
from  the  inquiry.     Consequently,  it  is  to  be  supposed  that 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  283 

she  was  then  considered  guilty  by  those  who  had  the  best 
opportunities  of  judging  of  the  truth,  and  that  the  feeling 
which  afterwards  arose  in  her  behalf  was  a  very  generous 
but  not  a  very  reasonable  one. 

However,  the  Duke  of  Norfolk,  an  honourable  but 
rather  weak  nobleman,  partly  because  Mary  was  captivat- 
ing, partly  because  he  was  ambitious,  partly  because  he  was 
over-persuaded  by  artful  plotters  against  Elizabeth,  con- 
ceived a  strong  idea  that  he  would  like  to  marry  the  Queen 
of  Scots — though  he  was  a  little  frightened,  too,  by  the 
letters  in  the  casket.  This  idea  being  secretly  encouraged 
by  some  of  the  noblemen  of  Elizabeth's  court,  and  even  by 
the  favourite  Earl  of  Leicester  (because  it  was  objected  to 
by  other  favourites  who  were  his  rivals),  Mary  expressed 
her  approval  of  it,  and  the  King  of  France  and  the  King  of 
Spain  are  supposed  to  have  done  the  same.  It  was  not  so 
quietly  planned,  though,  but  that  it  came  to  Elizabeth's 
ears,  who  warned  the  duke  "to  be  careful  what  soi-t  of 
pillow  he  was  going  to  lay  his  head  upon."  He  made  a 
humble  reply  at  the  time;  but  turned  sulky  soon  after- 
wards, and,  being  considered  dangerous,  was  sent  to  the 
Tower. 

Thus,  from  the  moment  of  Mary's  coming  to  England 
she  began  to  be  the  centre  of  plots  and  miseries. 

A  rise  of  the  Catholics  in  the  north  was  the  next  of  these, 
and  it  was  only  checked  by  many  executions  and  much 
bloodshed.  It  was  followed  by  a  great  conspiracy  of  the 
Pope  and  some  of  the  Catholic  sovereigns  of  Europe  to  de- 
pose Elizabeth,  place  Mary  on  the  throne,  and  restore  the 
unreformed  religion.  It  is  almost  impossible  to  doubt  that 
Mary  knew  and  approved  of  this;  and  the  Pope  himself 
was  so  hot  in  the  matter  that  he  issued  a  bull,  in  which  he 
openly  called  Elizabeth  the  "  pretended  Queen  "  of  England, 
excommunicated  her,  and  excommunicated  all  her  subjects 
who  should  continue  to  obey  her.  A  copy  of  this  misera- 
ble paper  got  into  London,  and  was  found  one  morning 
publicly  posted  on  the  Bishop  of  London's  gate.  A  gieat 
hue  and  cry  being  raised,  another  copy  was  found  in  the 
chamber  of  a  student  of  Lincoln's  Inn,  who  confessed,  be- 
ing put  upon  the  rack,  that  he  had  received  it  from  one 
John  Feltox,  a  rich  gentleman  who  jived  across  the 
Thames,  near  Southwark.  This  John  Felton,  being  put 
upon  the  rack  too,  confessed  that  he  had  posted  the  placard 


284  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

on  the  Bishop's  gate.  For  t]iis  offence  he  was,  within  four 
days,  taken  to  Saint  Paul's  Churchyard,  and  there  hanged 
and  quartered.  As  to  the  Pope's  bull,  the  people  by  the 
Reformation  having  thrown  off  the  Pope,  did  not  care 
much,  you  may  suppose,  for  the  Pope's  throwing  oft"  them. 
It  was  a  mere  dirty  piece  of  paper,  and  not  half  so  power- 
ful as  a  street  ballad. 

On  the  very  day  when  Felton  was  brought  to  his  trial, 
the  poor  Duke  of  Norfolk  was  released.  It  would  have 
been  well  for  him  if  he  had  kept  away  from  the  Tower 
evermore,  and  from  the  snares  that  had  taken  him  there. 
But,  even  while  he  was  in  that-  dismal  place  he  corresponded 
with  Mary,  and  as  soon  as  he  was  out  of  it,  he  began  to 
plot  again.  Being  discovered  in  correspondence  with  the 
Pope,  with  a  view  to  a  rising  in  England  which  should  force 
Elizabeth  to  consent  to  his  marriage  with  Mary  and  to  repeal 
the  laws  against  the  Catholics,  he  was  re-committed  to  the 
Tower  and  brought  to  trial.  He  was  found  guilty  by  the 
unanimous  verdict  of  the  Lords  who  tried  him,  and  was 
sentenced  to  the  block. 

It  is  very  difficult  to  make  out,  at  this  distance  of  time, 
and  between  opposite  accounts,  whether  Elizabeth  really 
was  a  humane  woman,  or  desired  to  appear  so,  or  was  fear- 
ful of  shedding  the  blood  of  people  of  great  name  who  were 
popular  in  the  country.  Twice  she  commanded  and  coun- 
termanded the  execution  of  this  duke,  and  it  did  not  take 
place  until  five  months  after  his  trial.  The  scaffold  was 
erected  on  Tower  Hill,  and  there  he  died  like  a  brave  man. 
He  refused  to  have  his  eyes  bandaged,  saying  that  he  was 
not  at  all  afraid  of  death;  and  he  admitted  the  justice  of 
his  sentence,  and  was  much  regretted  by  the  people. 

Although  Mary  had  shrunk  at  the  most  important  time 
from  disproving  her  guilt,  she  was  very  careful  never  to  do 
anything  that  would  admit  it,  All  such  proposals  as  were 
made  to  her  by  Elizabeth  for  her  release,  required  that  ad- 
mission in  some  form  or  other,  and  therefore  came  to  noth- 
ing. Moreover,  both  women  being  artful  and  treacherous, 
and  neither  ever  trusting  the  other,  it  was  not  likely  that 
they  could  ever  make  an  agreement.  So,  the  Parliament, 
aggravated  by  what  the  Pope  had  done,  made  new  and 
strong  laws  against  the  spreading  of  the  Catholic  religion 
in  England,  and  declared  it  treason  in  any  one  to  say  that 
the  Queen  and  her  successors  were  not  the  lawful  sover- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  285 

eigns  of  England.  It  would  have  done  more  than  this, 
but  for  Elizabeth's  moderation. 

Since  the  Reformation,  there  had  come  to  be  three  great 
sects  of  religious  people — or  people  who  called  themselves 
so — in  England;  that  is  to  say,  those  who  belonged  to  the 
Reformed  Church,  those  who  belonged  to  the  Unreformed 
Church,  and  those  who  were  called  the  Puritans,  because 
they  said  that  they  wanted  to  have  everything  very  pure 
and  plain  in  all  the  Church  service.  These  last  were  for 
the  most  part  an  uncomfortable  people,  who  thought 
it  highly  meritorious  to  dress  in  a  hideous  manner,  talk 
through  their  noses,  and  oppose  all  harmless  enjoyments. 
But  they  were  powerful  too,  and  very  much  in  earnest,  and 
they  were  one  and  all  the  determined  enemies  of  the  Queen 
of  Scots.  The  Protestant  feeling  in  England  was  further 
strengthened  by  the  tremendous  cruelties  to  which  Prot- 
estants were  exposed  in  France  and  in  the  Netherlands. 
Scores  of  thousands  of  them  were  put  to  death  in  those 
countiies  with  every  cruelty  that  can  be  imagined,  and  at 
last,  in  the  autumn  of  the  year  one  thousand  live  hundred 
and  seventy-two,  one  of  the  greatest  barbarities  ever  com- 
mitted in  the  world  took  place  at  Paris. 

It  is  called  in  liistory.  The  Massacre  of  Saint  Bar- 
tholomew, because  it  took  place  on  Saint  Bartholomew's 
Eve.  The  day  fell  on  Saturday  the  twenty-third  of  August. 
On  that  day  all  the  great  leaders  of  the  Protestants  (who 
were  there  called  Huguenots)  were  assembled  together,  for 
the  purpose,  as  was  represented  to  them,  of  doing  honour 
to  the  marriage  of  their  chief,  the  young  King  of  Navarre, 
with  the  sister  of  Charles  the  Ninth  :  a  miserable  young 
King  who  then  occupied  the  French  throne.  This  dull 
creature  was  made  to  believe  by  his  mother  and  other  fierce 
Catholics  about  him  that  the  Huguenots  meant  to  take  his 
life;  and  he  was  persuaded  to  give  secret  orders  that,  on 
the  tolling  of  a  great  bell,  they  should  be  fallen  upon  by 
an  overpowering  force  of  armed  men,  and  slaughtered 
wherever  they  could  be  found.  When  the  appointed  hour 
was  close  at  hand,  the  stupid  wretch,  trembling  from  head 
to  foot,  was  taken  into  a  balcony  by  his  mother  to  see  the 
atrocious  work  begun.  The  moment  the  bell  tolled,  the 
murderers  broke  forth.  During  all  that  night  and  the  two 
next  days,  they  broke  into  the  houses,  tired  the  houses, 
shot  and  stabbed  the  Protestants,  men,  women,  and  chil- 


286  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

dren,  and  flung  their  bodies  into  the  streets.  They  were 
shot  at  in  the  streets  as  they  passed  along,  and  their  blood 
ran  down  the  gutters.  Upwards  of  ten  thousand  Protes- 
tants were  killed  in  Paris  alone;  in  all  France  four  or  five 
times  that  number,  To  return  thanks  to  Heaven  for  these 
diabolical  murders,  the  Pope  and  his  train  actually  went  in 
public  procession  at  Borne,  and  as  if  this  were  not  shame 
enough  for  them,  they  had  a  medal  struck  to  commemorate 
the  event.  But,  however  comfortable  the  wholesale  mur- 
ders were  to  these  high  authorities,  they  had  not  that  sooth- 
ing effect  upon  the  doll-King.  I  am  happy  to  state  that  he 
never  knew  a  moment's  peace  afterwards;  that  he  was  con- 
tinually crying  out  that  he  saw  the  Huguenots  covered  with 
blood  and  wounds  falling  dead  before  him;  and  that  he 
died  within  a  year,  shrieking  and  yelling  and  raving  to  that 
degree,  that  if  all  the  Popes  who  had  ever  lived  had  been 
rolled  into  one,  they  would  not  have  afforded  His  guilty 
Majesty  the  slightest  consolation. 

When  the  terrible  news  of  the  massacre  arrived  in  Eng- 
land, it  made  a  powerful  impression  indeed  upon  the  peo- 
ple. If  they  began  to  run  a  little  wild  against  the  Catho- 
lics at  about  this  time,  this  fearful  reason  for  it,  coming 
so  soon  after  the  days  of  bloody  Queen  Mary,  must  be  re- 
membered in  their  excuse.  The  Court  was  not  quite  so 
honest  as  the  people — but  perhaps  it  sometimes  is  not.  It 
received  the  French  ambassador,  with  all  the  lords  and 
ladies  dressed  in  deep  mourning,  and  keeping  a  profound 
silence.  Nevertheless,  a  proposal  of  marriage  which  he  had 
made  to  Elizabeth  only  two  days  before  the  eve  of  Saint 
Bartholomew,  on  behalf  of  the  Duke  of  Alengon,  the  French 
King's  brother,  a  boy  of  seventeen,  still  went  on;  while  on 
the  other  hand,  in  her  usual  crafty  way,  the  Queen  secretly 
supplied  the  Huguenots  with  money  and  weapons. 

I  must  say  that  for  a  Queen  who  made  all  those  fine 
speeches,  of  which  I  have  confessed  myself  to  be  rather 
tired,  about  living  and  dying  a  Maiden  Queen,  Elizabeth 
was  "  going  "  to  be  married  pretty  often.  Besides  always 
having  some  English  favourite  or  other  whom  she  by  turns 
encouraged  and  swore  at  and  knocked  about — for  the  Maiden 
Queen  was  very  free  with  her  fists — she  held  this  French 
duke  off  and  on  through  several  years.  When  he  at  last 
came  over  to  England,  the  marriage  articles  were  actually 
drawn  up,  and  it  was  settled  that  the  wedding  should  take 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  287 

place  in  six  weeks.  The  Queen  was  then  so  bent  upon  it, 
that  she  prosecuted  a  poor  Puritan  named  Stubbs,  and  a 
poor  bookseller  named  Page,  for  writing  and  publishing  a 
pamphlet  against  it.  Their  right  hands  were  chopped  off 
for  this  crime ;  and  poor  Stubbs — more  loyal  than  I  should 
have  been  myself  under  the  circumstances — immediately 
pulled  off  his  hat  with  his  left  hand,  and  cried,  "  God  save 
the  Queen !  "  Stubbs  was  cruelly  treated ;  for  the  marriage 
never  took  place  after  all,  though  the  Queen  pledged  her- 
self to  the  duke  with  a  ring  from  her  own  finger.  He  went 
away,  no  better  than  he  came,  when  the  courtship  had 
lasted  some  ten  years  altogether;  and  he  died  a  couple  of 
years  afterwards,  mourned  by  Elizabeth,  who  appears  to 
have  been  really  fond  of  him.  It  is  not  much  to  her  credit, 
for  he  was  a  bad  enough  member  of  a  bad  family. 

To  return  to  the  Catholics.  There  arose  two  orders 
of  priests,  who  were  very  busy  in  England,  and  who  were 
much  dreaded.  These  were  the  Jesuits  (who  were  every- 
where in  all  sorts  of  disguises),  and  the  Seminary  Priests. 
The  people  had  a  great  horror  of  the  first,  because  they 
were  known  to  have  taught  that  murder  was  lawful  if  it 
were  done  with  an  object  of  which  they  approved ;  and  they 
had  a  great  horror  of  the  second,  because  they  came  to 
teach  the  old  religion,  and  to  be  the  successors  of  "  Queen 
Mary's  priests,"  as  those  yet  lingering  in  England  were 
called,  when  they  should  die  out.  The  severest  laws  were 
made  against  them,  and  were  most  unmercifully  executed. 
Those  who  sheltered  them  in  their  houses  often  suffered 
heavily  for  what  was  an  act  of  humanity ;  and  the  rack, 
that  cruel  torture  which  tore  men's  limbs  asunder,  was  con- 
stantly kept  going.  What  these  unhappy  men  confessed, 
or  what  was  ever  confessed  by  any  one  under  that  agony, 
must  always  be  received  with  great  doubt,  as  it  is  certain 
that  people  have  frequently  owned  to  the  most  absurd  and 
impossible  crimes  to  escape  such  dreadful  suffering.  But 
I  cannot  doubt  it  to  have  been  proved  by  papers,  that  there 
were  many  plots,  both  among  the  Jesuits,  and  with  France, 
and  with  Scotland,  and  with  Spain,  for  the  destruction  of- 
Queen  Elizabeth,  for  the  placing  of  Mary  on  the  throne, 
and  for  the  revival  of  the  old  religion. 

If  the  English  people  were  too  ready  to  believe  in  plots, 
there  were,  as  I  have  said,  good  reasons  for  it.  When  the 
massacre  of  Saint  Bartholomew  was  yet  fresh  in  their  rec- 


288  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

ollection,  a  great  Protestant  Dutch  hero,  the  Pbince  or 
Orange,  was  shot  by  an  assassin,  who  confessed  that  he 
had  been  kept  and  trained  for  the  purpose  in  a  college  of 
Jesuits.  The  Dutch,  in  this  surprise  and  distress,  offered 
to  make  Elizabeth  their  sovereign,  but  she  declined  the 
honour,  and  sent  them  a  small  army  instead,  under  the 
command  of  the  Earl  of  Leicester,  who,  although  a  capital 
Court  favourite,  was  not  much  of  a  general.  He  did  so 
little  in  Holland,  tliat  his  campaign  there  would  probably 
have  been  forgotten,  but  for  its  occasioning  the  death  of 
one  of  the  best  writers,  the  best  knights,  and  the  best  gen- 
tlemen, of  that  or  any  age.  This  was  Sib  Philip  Sidney, 
who  was  wounded  by  a  musket  ball  in  the  thigh  as  he 
mounted  a  fresh  horse,  after  having  had  his  own  killed  un- 
der him.  He  had  to  ride  back  wounded,  a  long  distance, 
and  was  very  faint  with  fatigue  and  loss  of  blood,  when 
some  water,  for  which  lie  had  eagerly  asked,  was  handed 
to  him.  But  he  was  so  good  and  gentle  even  then,  that 
seeing  a  poor  badly  wounded  common  soldier  lying  on  the 
ground,  looking  at  the  water  with  longing  eyes,  he  said, 
"  Thy  necessity  is  greater  than  mine,"  and  gave  it  up  to 
him.  This  touching  action  of  a  noble  heart  is  perhaps  as 
well  known  as  any  incident  in  history — it  is  as  famous  far 
and  wide  as  the  blood-stained  Tower  of  London,  with  its 
axe,  and  block,  and  murders  out  of  number.  So  delight- 
ful is  an  act  of  true  humanity,  and  so  glad  are  mankind  to 
remember  it. 

At  home,  intelligence  of  plots  began  to  thicken  every 
day.  I  suppose  the  people  never  did  live  under  such  con- 
tinual terrors  as  those  by  which  they  were  possessed  now, 
of  Catholic  risings,  and  burnings,  and  poisonings,  and  I 
don't  know  what.  Still,  we  must  always  remember  that 
they  lived  near  and  close  to  awful  realities  of  that  kind, 
and  that  with  their  experience  it  was  not  difficult  to  believe 
in  any  enormity.  The  government  had  the  same  fear,  and 
did  not  take  the  best  means  of  discovering  the  truth — for, 
besides  torturing  the  suspected,  it  employed  paid  spies,  who 
will  always  lie  for  their  own  profit.  It  even  made  some  of 
the  conspiracies  it  brought  to  light,  by  sending  false  letters 
to  disaffected  people,  inviting  them  to  join  in  pretended 
plots,  which  they  too  readily  did. 

But,  one  great  real  plot  was  at  length  discovered,  and 
it  ended  the  career  of  Mary  Queen  of  Scots.     A  seminary 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  289 

priest  named  Ballard,  and  a  Spanish  soldier  named  Sav- 
age, set  on  and  encouraged  by  certain  French  priests,  im- 
parted a  design  to  one  Anthony  Babington — a  gentleman 
of  fortune  in  Derbyshire,  who  had  been  for  some  time  a 
secret  agent  of  Mary's — for  murdering  the  Queen.  Babing- 
ton then  confided  the  scheme  to  some  other  Catholic  gen- 
tlemen who  were  his  friends,  and  they  joined  in  it  heartily. 
They  were  vain  weak-headed  young  men,  ridiculously  con- 
fident, and  preposterously  proud  of  their  plan ;  for  they  got 
a  gimcrack  painting  made,  of  the  six  choice  spirits  who 
were  to  murder  Elizabeth,  with  Babington  in  an  attitude 
for  the  centre  figure.  Two  of  their  number,  however,  one 
of  whom  was  a  priest,  kept  Elizabeth's  wisest  minister,  Sib 
Francis  Walsingham,  acquainted  with  the  whole  project 
from  the  first.  The  conspirators  were  completely  deceived 
to  the  final  point,  when  Babington  gave  Savage,  because  he 
was  shabby,  a  ring  from  his  finger,  and  some  money  from 
his  purse,  wherewith  to  buy  himself  new  clothes  in  which 
to  kill  the  Queen.  Walsingham,  having  then  full  evidence 
against  the  whole  band,  and  two  letters  of  Mary's  besides, 
resolved  to  seize  them.  Suspecting  something  wrong,  they 
stole  out  of  the  city,  one  by  one,  and  hid  themselves  in 
Saint  John's  Wood,  and  other  places  which  really  were 
hiding  places  then ;  but  they  were  all  taken,  and  all  executed. 
When  they  were  seized,  a  gentleman  was  sent  from  Court  to 
inform  Mary  of  the  fact,  and  of  her  being  involved  in  the 
discovery.  Her  friends  have  complained  that  she  was  kept 
in  very  hard  and  severe  custody.  It  does  not  appear 
very  likely,  for  she  was  going  out  a  hunting  that  very 
morning. 

Queen  Elizabeth  had  been  warned  long  ago,  by  one  in 
France  who  had  good  information  of  what  was  secretly  do- 
ing, that  in  holding  Mary  alive,  she  held  "  the  wolf  who 
would  devour  her,"  The  Bishop  of  London  had,  more 
lately,  given  the  Queen's  favourite  minister  the  advice  in 
writing,  "forthwith  to  cut  off  the  Scottish  Queen's  head." 
The  question  now  was,  what  to  do  with  her?  The  Earl  of 
Leicester  wrote  a  little  note  home  from  Holland,  recom- 
mending that  she  should  be  quietly  poisoned ;  that  noble 
favourite  having  accustomed  his  mind,  it  is  possible,  to 
remedies  of  that  nature.  His  black  advice,  however,  was 
disregarded,  and  she  was  brought  to  trial  at  Fotheringay 
Castle  in  Northamptonshire,  before  a  tribunal  of  forty, 
19 


290  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

composed  of  both  religions.  There,  and  in  the  Star  Cham' 
ber  at  Westminster,  the  trial  lasted  a  fortnight.  She  de- 
fended herself  with  great  ability,  but  could  only  deny  the 
confessions  that  had  been  made  by  Babington  and  others ; 
could  only  call  her  own  letters,  produced  against  her  by 
her  own  secretaries,  forgeries;  and,  in  short,  could  only 
deny  everything.  She  was  found  guilty,  and  declared  to 
have  incurred  the  penalty  of  death.  The  Parliament  met, 
approved  the  sentence,  and  prayed  the  Queen  to  have  it 
executed.  The  Queen  replied  that  she  requested  them  to 
consider  whether  no  means  could  be  found  of  saving  Mary's 
life  without  endangering  her  own.  The  Parliament  re- 
joined. No;  and  the  citizens  illuminated  their  houses  and 
lighted  bonfires,  in  token  of  their  joy  that  all  these  plots 
and  troubles  were  to  be  ended  by  the  death  of  the  Queen  of 
Scots. 

She,  feeling  sure  that  her  time  was  now  come,  wrote  a 
letter  to  the  Queen  of  England,  making  three  entreaties : 
first,  that  she  might  be  buried  in  France ;  secondly,  that 
she  might  not  be  executed  in  secret,  but  before  her  servants 
and  some  others ;  thirdly,  that  after  her  death,  her  servants 
should  not  be  molested,  but  should  be  suffered  to  go  home 
with  the  legacies  she  left  them.  It  was  an  affecting  letter, 
and  Elizabeth  shed  tears  over  it,  but  sent  no  answer.  Then 
came  a  special  ambassador  from  France,  and  another  from 
Scotland,  to  intercede  for  Mary's  life;  and  then  the  nation 
began  to  clamour,  more  and  more,  for  her  death. 

What  the  real  feelings  or  intentions  of  Elizabeth  were, 
can  never  be  known  now ;  but  I  strongly  suspect  her  of  only 
wishing  one  thing  more  than  Mary's  death,  and  that  was  to 
keep  free  of  the  blame  of  it.  On  the  first  of  February,  one 
thousand  five  hundred  and  eighty-seven,  Lord  Burleigh 
having  drawn  out  the  warrant  for  the  execution,  the  Queen 
sent  to  the  secretary  Davison  to  bring  it  to  her,  that  she 
might  sign  it :  which  she  did.  Next  day,  when  Davison 
told  her  it  was  sealed,  she  angrily  asked  him  why  such 
haste  was  necessary?  Next  day  but  one,  she  joked  about 
it,  and  swore  a  little.  Again,  next  day  but  one,  she 
seemed  to  complain  that  it  was  not  yet  done,  but  still  she 
would  not  be  plain  with  those  about  her.  So,  on  the  sev- 
enth, the  Earls  of  Kent  and  Shrewsbury,  with  the  Sheriff 
of  Northamptonshire,  came  with  the  warrant  to  Fotherin- 
gay,  to  tell  the  Queen  of  Scots  to  prepare  for  death. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  291 

Wlieii  those  messengers  of  ill  omen  were  gone,  Mary 
made  a  frugal  supper,  drank  to  her  servants,  read  over  her 
will,  went  to  bed,  slept  for  some  hours,  and  then  arose  and 
passed  the  remainder  of  the  night  saying  prayers.  In  the 
morning  she  dressed  herself  in  her  best  clothes;  and,  at 
eight  o'clock  when  the  sheriff  came  for  her  to  her  chapel, 
took  leave  of  her  servants  who  were  there  assembled  pray- 
ing with  her,  and  went  down-stairs,  carrying  a  Bible  in  one 
hand  and  a  crucifix  in  the  other.  Two  of  her  women  and 
four  of  her  men  were  allowed  to  be  present  in  the  hall; 
where  a  low  scaffold,  only  two  feet  from  the  ground,  was 
erected  and  covered  with  black ;  and  where  the  executioner 
from  the  Tower,  and  his  assistant,  stood,  dressed  in  black 
velvet.  The  hall  was  full  of  people.  Wliile  the  sentence 
was  being  read  she  sat  upon  a  stool ;  and,  when  it  was  fin- 
ished, she  again  denied  her  guilt,  as  she  had  done  before. 
The  Earl  of  Kent  and  the  Dean  of  Peterborough,  in  their 
Protestant  zeal,  made  some  very  unnecessary  speeches  to 
her ;  to  which  she  replied  that  she  died  in  the  Catholic  relig- 
ion, and  they  need  not  trouble  themselves  about  that 
matter.  When  her  head  and  neck  were  uncovered  by  the 
executioners,  she  said  that  she  had  not  been  used  to  be  un- 
dressed by  such  hands,  or  before  so  much  company. 
Finally,  one  of  her  women  fastened  a  cloth  over  her  face, 
and  she  laid  her  neck  upon  the  block,  and  repeated  more 
than  once  in  Latin,  "Into  thy  hands,  O  Lord,  I  commend 
my  spirit!"  Some  say  her  head  was  struck  off  in  two 
blows,  some  say  in  three.  However  that  be,  when  it  was 
held  up,  streaming  with  blood,  the  real  hair  beneath  the 
false  hair  she  had  long  worn  was  seen  to  be  as  grey  as  that 
of  a  woman  of  seventy,  though  she  was  at  that  time  only 
in  her  forty-sixth  year.     All  her  beauty  was  gone. 

But  she  was  beautiful  enough  to  her  little  dog,  who  cow- 
ered under  her  dress,  frightened,  when  she  went  upon  the 
scaffold,  and  who  lay  down  beside  her  headless  body  when 
all  her  earthly  sorrows  were  over. 

THIBD  PABT. 

On  its  being  formally  made  known  to  Elizabeth  that 
the  sentence  had  been  executed  on  the  Queen  of  Scots,  she 
showed  the  utmost  grief  and  rage,  drove  her  favourites 
from  her  with  violent  indignation,  and  sent  Davison  to  the 


292  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

Tower ;  from  which  place  he  was  only  released  in  the  end 
by  paying"  an  immense  fine  which  completely  ruined  him. 
Elizabeth  not  only  over-acted  her  part  in  making  these  pre- 
tences, but  most  basely  reduced  to  poverty  one  of  her  faith- 
ful servants  for  no  other  fault  than  obeying  her  commands. 

James,  King  of  Scotland,  Mary's  son,  made  a  show  like- 
wise of  being  very  angry  on  the  occasion ;  but  he  was  a 
pensioner  of  England  to  the  amount  of  five  thousand 
pounds  a  year,  and  he  had  known  very  little  of  his  mother, 
and  he  possibly  regarded  her  as  the  murderer  of  his  father, 
and  he  soon  took  it  quietly. 

Philip,  King  of  Spain,  however,  threatened  to  do  greater 
things  than  ever  had  been  done  yet,  to  set  up  the  Catholic 
religion  and  punish  Protestant  England.  Elizabeth,  hear- 
ing that  he  and  the  Prince  of  Parma  were  making  great 
preparations  for  this  purpose,  in  order  to  be  beforehand 
with  them  sent  out  Admikal  Drake  (a  famous  navigator, 
who  had  sailed  about  the  world,  and  had  already  brought 
great  plunder  from  Spain)  to  the  port  of  Cadiz,  where  he 
burnt  a  hundred  vessels  full  of  stores.  This  great  loss 
obliged  the  Spaniards  to  put  off  the  invasion  for  a  year ; 
but  it  was  none  the  less  formidable  for  that,  amounting  to 
one  hundred  and  thirty  ships,  nineteen  thousand  soldiers, 
eight  thousand  sailors,  two  thousand  slaves,  and  between 
two  and  three  thousand  great  guns.  England  was  not  idle 
in  making  ready  to  resist  this  great  force.  All  the  men 
between  sixteen  years  old  and  sixty,  were  trained  and 
drilled;  the  national  fleet  of  ships  (in  number  only  thirty- 
four  at  first)  was  enlarged  by  public  contributions  and  by 
private  ships,  fitted  out  by  noblemen ;  the  city  of  London, 
of  its  own  accord,  furnished  double  the  number  of  ships 
and  men  that  it  was  required  to  provide;  and,  if  ever  the 
national  spirit  was  up  in  England,  it  was  up  all  through 
the  country  to  resist  the  Spaniards.  Some  of  the  Queen's 
advisers  were  for  seizing  the  principal  English  Catholics, 
and  putting  them  to  death ;  but  the  Queen — who,  to  her 
honour,  used  to  say,  that  she  would  never  believe  any  ill  of 
her  subjects,  which  a  parent  would  not  believe  of  her  own 
children — rejected  the  advice,  and  only  confined  a  few  of 
those  who  were  the  most  suspected,  in  the  fens  in  Lincoln- 
shire. The  great  body  of  Catholics  deserved  this  confi- 
dence ;  for  they  behaved  most  loyally,  nobly,  and  bravely. 

So,  with  all  England  firing  up  like  one  strong  angry  man, 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENOLAND.  293 

and  with  both  sides  of  the  Thames  fortified,  and  with  the 
soldiers  under  arms,  and  with  the  sailors  in  their  ships,  the 
country  waited  for  the  coming  of  the  proud  Spanish  fleet, 
which  was  called  The  Invincible  Akmada.  The  Queen 
herself,  riding  in  armour  on  a  white  horse,  and  the  Eaii  of 
Essex  and  the  Earl  of  Leicester  holding  her  bridle  rein, 
made  a  brave  speech  to  the  troops  at  Tilbury  Fort  opposite 
Gravesend,  which  was  received  with  such  enthusiasm  as  is 
seldom  known.  Then  came  the  Spanish  Armada  into  the 
English  Channel,  sailing  along  in  the  form  of  a  half  moon, 
of  such  great  size  that  it  was  seven  miles  broad.  But  the 
English  were  quickly  upon  it,  and  woe  then  to  all  the 
Spanish  ships  that  dropped  a  little  out  of  the  half  moon, 
for  the  English  took  them  instantly !  And  it  soon  appeared 
that  the  great  Armada  was  anything  but  invincible,  for  on 
a  summer  night,  bold  Drake  sent  eight  blazing  fire-ships 
right  into  the  midst  of  it.  In  terrible  consternation  the 
Spaniards  tried  to  get  out  to  sea,  and  so  became  dispersed ; 
the  English  pursued  them  at  a  great  advantage ;  a  storm 
came  on,  and  drove  the  Spaniards  among  rocks  and  shoals; 
and  the  swift  end  of  the  invincible  fleet  was,  that  it  lost 
thirty  great  ships  and  ten  thousand  men,  and,  defeated  and 
disgraced,  sailed  home  again.  Being  afraid  to  go  by  the 
English  Channel,  it  sailed  all  round  Scotland  and  Ireland; 
some  of  the  ships  getting  cast  away  on  the  latter  coast  in 
bad  weather,  the  Irish,  who  were  a  kind  of  savages,  plun- 
dered those  vessels  and  killed  their  crews.  So  ended  this 
great  attempt  to  invade  and  conquer  England.  And  I 
think  it  will  be  a  longtime  before  any  other  invincible  fleet 
coming  to  England  with  the  same  object,  will  fare  much 
better  than  the  Spanish  Armada. 

Though  the  Spanish  King  had  had  this  bitter  taste  of 
English  bravery,  he  was  so  little  the  wiser  for  it,  as  still  to 
entertain  his  old  designs,  and  even  to  conceive  the  absurd 
idea  of  placing  his  daughter  on  the  English  throne. 

But  the  Earl  of  Essex,  Sib  Walter  Raleigh,  Sib 
Thomas  Howabd,  and  some  other  distinguished  leaders, 
put  to  sea  from  Plymouth,  entered  the  port  of  Cadiz  once 
more,  obtauied  a  complete  victory  over  the  shipping  assem- 
bled there,  and  got  possession  of  the  town.  In  obedience 
to  the  Queen's  express  instructions,  they  behaved  with 
great  humanity ;  and  the  principal  loss  of  the  Spaniards 
was  a  vast  sum  of  money  which  they  had  to  pay  for  ran- 


294  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

som.  This  was  one  of  many  gallant  achievements  on  the 
sea,  effected  in  this  reign.  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  himself, 
after  marrying  a  maid  of  honour  and  giving  offence  to  the 
Maiden  Queen  thereby,  had  already  sailed  to  South  America 
in  search  of  gold. 

The  Earl  of  Leicester  was  now  dead,  and  so  was  Sir 
Thomas  Walsingham,  whom  Lord  Burleigh  was  soon  to 
follow.  The  principal  favourite  was  the  Earl  of  Essex, 
a  spirited  and  handsome  man,  a  favourite  with  the  people 
too  as  well  as  with  the  Queen,  and  possessed  of  many  ad- 
mirable qualities.  It  was  much  debated  at  Court  whether 
there  should  be  peace  with  Spain  or  no,  and  he  was  very 
urgent  for  war.  He  also  tried  hard  to  have  his  own  way 
in  the  appointment  of  a  deputy  to  govern  in  Ireland. 
One  day,  while  this  question  was  in  dispute,  he  hastily 
took  offence,  and  turned  his  back  upon  the  Queen ;  as  a 
gentle  reminder  of  which  impropriety,  the  Queen  gave  him 
a  tremendous  box  on  the  ear,  and  told  him  to  go  to  the 
devil.  He  went  home  instead,  and  did  not  reappear  at 
Court  for  half  a  year  or  so,  when  he  and  the  Queen  were 
reconciled,  though  never  (as  some  suppose)  thoroughly. 

From  this  time  the  fate  of  the  Earl  of  Essex  and  that  of 
the  Queen  seemed  to  be  blended  together.  The  Irish  were 
still  perpetually  quarrelling  and  fighting  among  themselves, 
and  he  went  over  to  Ireland  as  Lord  Lieutenant,  to  the 
great  joy  of  his  enemies  (Sir  Walter  Ealeigh  among  the 
rest),  who  were  glad  to  have  so  dangerous  a  rival  far  off. 
Not  Ijeing  by  any  means  successful  there,  and  knowing  that 
his  enemies  would  take  advantage  of  that  circumstance  to 
injure  him  with  the  Queen,  he  came  home  again,  though 
against  her  orders.  The  Queen  being  taken  by  surprise 
when  he  appeared  before  her,  gave  him  her  hand  to  kiss, 
and  he  was  overjoyed — though  it  was  not  a  very  lovely 
hand  by  this  time — but  in  the  course  of  the  same  day  she 
ordered  him  to  confine  himself  to  his  room,  and  two  or 
three  days  afterwards  had  him  taken  into  custody.  With 
the  same  sort  of  caprice — and  as  capricious  an  old  woman 
she  now  was,  as  ever  wore  a  crown  or  a  head  either — she 
sent  him  broth  from  her  own  table  on  his  falling  ill  from 
anxiety,  and  cried  about  him. 

He  was  a  man  who  could  find  comfort  and  occupation  in 
his  books,  and  he  did  so  for  a  time ;  not  the  least  happy 
time,  I  dare  say,  of  his  life.     But  it  happened  unfortu- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  295 

nately  for  him,  that  he  held  a  monopoly  in  sweet  wines : 
which  means  that  nobody  could  sell  them  without  purchas- 
ing his  permission.  This  right,  which  was  only  for  a  term, 
expiring,  he  applied  to  have  it  renewed.  The  Queen  re- 
fused, with  the  rather  strong  observation — but  she  did 
make  strong  observations — that  an  unruly  beast  must  be 
stinted  in  his  food.  Upon  this,  the  angry  earl,  who  had 
been  already  deprived  of  many  offices,  thought  himself  in 
danger  of  complete  ruin,  and  turned  against  the  Queen, 
whom  he  called  a  vain  old  woman  who  had  grown  as 
crooked  in  her  mind  as  she  had  in  her  figure.  These  un- 
complimentary expressions  the  ladies  of  the  Court  immedi- 
ately snapped  up  and  carried  to  the  Queen,  whom  they  did 
not  put  in  a  better  temper,  you  may  believe.  The  same 
Court  ladies,  when  they  had  beautiful  dark  hair  of  their 
own,  used  to  wear  false  red  hair,  to  be  like  the  Queen.  So 
they  were  not  very  high-spirited  ladies,  however  high  in 
rank. 

The  worst  object  of  the  Earl  of  Essex,  and  some  friends 
of  his  who  used  to  meet  at  Lord  Southampton's  house, 
was  to  obtain  possession  of  the  Queen,  and  oblige  her  by 
force  to  dismiss  her  ministers  and  change  her  favourites. 
On  Saturday  the  seventh  of  February,  one  thousand  six 
hundred  and  one,  the  Council  suspecting  this,  summoned 
the  earl  to  come  before  them.  He,  pretending  to  be  ill, 
declined ;  it  was  then  settled  among  his  friends,  that  as  the 
next  day  would  be  Sunday,  when  many  of  the  citizens  usu- 
ally assembled  at  the  Cross  by  Saint  Paul's  Cathedral,  he 
should  make  one  bold  effort  to  induce  them  to  rise  and 
follow  him  to  the  Palace. 

So,  on  the  Sunday  morning,  he  and  a  small  body  of 
adherents  started  out  of  his  house — Essex  House  by  the 
Strand,  with  steps  to  the  river — having  first  shut  up  in  it, 
as  prisoners,  some  members  of  the  Council  who  came  to 
examine  him — and  hurried  into  the  City  with  the  earl  at 
their  head,  crying  out  "  For  the  Queen !  For  the  Queen ! 
A  plot  is  laid  for  my  life  I"  No  one  heeded  them,  how- 
ever, and  when  they  came  to  Saint  Paul's  there  were  no 
citizens  there.  In  the  meantime  the  prisoners  at  Essex 
House  had  been  released  by  one  of  the  earl's  own  friends; 
he  had  been  promptly  proclaimed  a  traitor  in  the  City  it- 
self ;  and  the  streets  were  barricaded  with  carts  and  guarded 
by  soldiers.     The  earl  got  back  to  his  house  by  water,  with 


296  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

difficulty,  and  after  an  attempt  to  defend  his  house  against 
the  troops  and  cannon  by  which  it  was  soon  surrounded, 
gave  himself  up  that  night.  He  was  brought  to  trial  on 
the  nineteenth,  and  found  guilty;  on  the  twenty-fifth, 
he  was  executed  on  Tower  Hill,  Avhere  he  died,  at  thirty- 
four  years  old,  both  courageously  and  penitently.  His 
step-father  suffered  with  him.  His  enemy,  Sir  Walter 
Raleigh,  stood  near  the  scaffold  all  the  time — but  not  so 
near  it  as  we  shall  see  him  stand,  before  we  finish  his 
history. 

In  this  case,  as  in  the  cases  of  the  Duke  of  Norfolk  and 
Mary  Queen  of  Scots,  the  Queen  had  commanded,  and  coun- 
termanded, and  again  commaiided,  the  execution.  It  is 
probable  that  the  death  of  her  young  and  gallant  favourite 
in  the  prime  of  his  good  qualities,  was  never  off  her  mind 
afterwards,  but  she  held  out,  the  same  vain  obstinate  aud 
capricious  woman,  for  another  year.  Then  she  danced  be- 
fore her  Court  on  a  state  occasion — and  cut,  I  should  think, 
a  mighty  ridiculous  figure,  doing  so  in  an  immense  ruff, 
stomacher  and  wig,  at  seventy  years  old.  For  another 
year  still,  she  held  out,  but,  without  any  more  dancing,  and 
as  a  moody  sorrowful  broken  creature.  At  last,  on  the 
tenth  of  March,  one  thousand  six  hundred  and  three,  hav- 
ing been  ill  of  a  very  bad  cold,  and  made  worse  by  the 
death  of  the  Countess  of  Nottingham  who  was  her  intimate 
friend,  she  fell  into  a  stupor  and  was  supposed  to  be  dead. 
She  recovered  her  consciousness,  however,  and  then  noth- 
ing would  induce  her  to  go  to  bed;  for  she  said  that  she 
knew  that  if  she  did,  she  should  never  get  up  again.  There 
she  lay  for  ten  days,  on  cushions  on  the  floor,  without  any 
food,  until  the  Lord  Admiral  got  her  into  bed  at  last,  partly 
by  persuasions  and  partly  by  main  force.  When  they  asked 
her  who  should  succeed  her,  she  replied  that  her  seat  had 
been  the  seat  of  Kings,  and  that  she  would  have  for  her 
successor,  "No  rascal's  son,  but  a  King's."  Upon  this, 
the  lords  present  stared  at  ofte  another,  and  took  the  liberty 
of  asking  whom  she  meant ;  to  which  she  replied,  "  Whom 
should  I  mean,  but  our  cousin  of  Scotland  !  "  This  was  on 
the  twenty-third  of  March.  They  asked  her  once  again 
that  day,  after  she  was  speechless,  whether  she  was  still 
in  the  same  mind?  She  struggled  up  in  bed,  and  joined 
her  hands  over  her  head  in  the  form  of  a  crown,  as  the 
only  reply  she  could  make.     At  three  o'clock  next  morn- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  297 

ing,  she  very  quietly  died,  in  the  forty-lifth  year  of  her 
reign. 

That  reign  had  been  a  glorious  one,  and  is  made  for  ever 
memorable  by  the  distinguished  men  who  flourished  in  it. 
Apart  from  the  great  voyagers,  statesmen,  and  scholars, 
whom  it  produced,  the  names  of  Bacon,  Spenser,  and 
Shakespeare,  will  always  be  remembered  with  pride  and 
veneration  by  the  civilised  world,  and  will  always  impart 
(though  with  no  great  reason,  perhaps)  some  portion  of 
their  lustre  to  the  name  of  Elizabeth  herself.  It  was  a 
great  reign  for  discovery,  for  commerce,  and  for  English 
enterprise  and  spirit  in  general.  It  was  a  great  reign  for 
the  Protestant  religion  and  for  the  Reformation  which 
made  England  free.  The  Queen  was  very  popular,  and  in 
her  progresses,  or  journeys  about  her  dominions,  was  every- 
where received  with  the  liveliest  joy  I  think  the  truth  is, 
that  she  was  not  half  so  good  as  she  has  been  made  out, 
and  not  half  so  bad  as  she  has  been  made  out.  She  had 
her  fine  qualities,  but  she  was  coarse,  capricious,  and  treach- 
erous, and  had  all  the  faults  of  an  excessively  vain  young 
woman  long  after  she  was  an  old  one.  On  the  whole,  she 
had  a  great  deal  too  much  of  her  father  in  her,  to  please 
me. 

Many  improvements  and  luxuries  were  introduced  in  the 
course  of  these  five-aud-forty  years  in  the  general  manner 
of  living;  but  cock-fighting,  bull-baiting,  and  bear-baiting, 
were  still  the  national  amusements ;  and  a  coach  was  so 
rarely  seen,  and  was  such  an  ugly  and  cumbersome  affair 
when  it  was  seen,  that  even  the  Queen  herself,  on  many 
high  occasions,  rode  on  horseback  on  a  pillion  behind  the 
Lord  Chancellor. 


CHAPTEK    XXXII. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  JAMES  THE  FIRST. 

"  OuB  cousin  of  Scotland  "  was  ugly,  awkward,  and  shuf- 
fling both  in  mind  and  person.  His  tongue  was  much  too 
large  for  his  mouth,  his  legs  were  much  too  weak  for  his 
body,  and  his  dull  goggle-eyes  stared  and  rolled  like  an 
idiot's.    He  was  cunning,  covetous,  wasteful,  idle,  drunken, 


298  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

greedy,  dirty,  cowardly,  a  great  swearer,  and  the  most  con- 
ceited man  on  earth.  His  figure — what  is  commonly  called 
rickety  from  his  birth — presented  a  most  ridiculous  appear- 
ance, dressed  in  thick  padded  clothes,  as  a  safeguard 
against  being  stabbed  (of  which  he  lived  in  continual  fear), 
of  a  grass-green  colour  from  head  to  foot,  with  a  hunting- 
horn  dangling  at  his  side  instead  of  a  sword,  and  his  hat 
and  feather  sticking  over  one  eye,  or  hanging  on  the  back 
of  his  head,  as  he  happened  to  toss  it  on.  He  used  to  loll 
on  the  necks  of  his  favourite  courtiers,  and  slobber  their 
faces,  and  kiss  and  pinch  their  cheeks ;  and  the  greatest 
favourite  he  ever  had,  used  to  sign  himself  in  his  letters  to 
his  royal  master,  His  Majesty's  "  dog  and  slave,"  and  used 
to  address  his  majesty  as  "his  Sowship."  His  majesty 
was  the  worst  rider  ever  seen,  and  thought  himself  the 
best.  He  was  one  of  the  most  impertinent  talkers  (in  the 
broadest  Scotch)  ever  heard,  and  boasted  of  being  unan- 
swerable in  all  manner  of  argument  He  wrote  some  of 
the  most  wearisome  treatises  ever  read — among  others,  a 
book  upon  witchcraft,  in  which  he  was  a  devout  believer — 
and  thought  himself  a  prodigy  of  authorship.  He  thought, 
and  wrote,  and  said,  that  a  king  had  a  right  to  make  and 
unmake  what  laws  he  pleased,  and  ought  to  be  accountable 
to  nobody  on  earth.  This  is  the  plain  true  character  of 
the  personage  whom  the  greatest  men  about  the  Court 
praised  and  flattered  to  that  degree,  that  I  doubt  if  there 
be  anything  much  more  shameful  in  the  annals  of  human 
nature. 

He  came  to  the  English  throne  with  great  ease.  The 
miseries  of  a  disputed  succession  had  been  felt  so  long,  and 
so  dreadfully,  that  he  was  proclaimed  within  a  few  hours 
of  Elizabeth's  death,  and  was  accepted  by  the  nation,  even 
without  being  asked  to  give  any  pledge  that  he  would  gov- 
ern well,  or  that  he  would  redress  crying  grievances.  He 
took  a  month  to  come  from  Edinburgh  to  Loudon  ;  and,  by 
way  of  exercising  his  new  power,  hanged  a  pickpocket  on 
the  journey  without  any  trial,  and  knighted  everybody  he 
could  lay  hold  of.  He  made  two  hundred  knights  before 
he  got  to  his  palace  in  London,  and  seven  hundred  before 
he  had  been  in  it  three  months.  He  also  shovelled  sixty- 
two  new  peers  into  the  House  of  Lords — and  there  was  \ 
pretty  large  sprinkling  of  Scotchmen  among  them,  you  may 
believe. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND'.  299 

His  Sowship's  prime  minister,  Cecil  (for  I  canuot  do 
better  than  call  his  majesty  what  his  favourite  called  him), 
was  the  enemy  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  and  also  of  Sir 
Walter's  political  friend.  Lord  Cobham;  and  his  Sow- 
ship's  first  trouble  was  a  plot  originated  by  these  two,  and 
entered  into  by  some  others,  with  the  old  object  of  seizing 
the  King  and  keeping  him  in  imprisonment  until  he  should 
change  his  ministers.  There  were  Catholic  priests  in  the 
plot,  and  there  were  Puritan  noblemen  too ;  for,  although 
the  Catholics  and  Puritans  were  strongly  opposed  to  each 
other,  they  united  at  this  time  against  his  Sowship,  because 
they  knew  that  he  had  a  design  against  both,  after  pretend- 
ing to  be  friendly  to  each;  this  design  being  to  have  only 
one  high  and  convenient  form  of  the  Protestant  religion, 
which  everybody  should  be  bound  to  belong  to,  whether 
they  liked  it  or  not.  This  plot  was  mixed  up  with  another, 
which  may  or  may  not  have  had  some  reference  to  placing 
on  the  throne,  at  some  time,  the  Lady  Arabella  Stuart  ; 
whose  misfortune  it  was,  to  be  the  daughter  of  the  younger 
brother  of  his  Sowship's  father,  but  who  was  quite  inno- 
cent of  any  part  in  the  scheme.  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  was 
accused  on  the  confession  of  Lord  Cobham — a  miserable 
creature,  who  said  one  thing  at  one  time,  and  another  thing 
at  another  time,  and  could  be  relied  upon  in  nothing. 
The  trial  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  lasted  from  eight  in  the 
morning  until  nearly  midnight ;  he  defended  himself  with 
such  eloquence,  genius,  and  spirit  against  all  accusations, 
and  against  the  insults  of  Coke,  the  Attorney-General — 
who  according  to  the  custom  of  the  time,  foully  abused  him 
— that  those  Avho  went  there  detesting  the  prisoner,  came 
away  admiring  him,  and  declaring  that  anything  so  won- 
derful and  so  captivating  was  never  heard.  He  was  found 
guilty,  nevertheless,  and  sentenced  to  death.  Execution 
was  deferred,  and  he  was  taken  to  the  Tower.  The  two 
Catholic  priests,  less  fortunate,  were  executed  with  the 
usual  atrocity ;  and  Lord  Cobham  and  two  others  were  par- 
doned on  the  scaffold.  His  Sowship  thought  it  wonder- 
fully knowing  in  him  to  surprise  the  people  by  pardoning 
these  three  at  the  very  block ;  but,  blundering,  and  bun- 
gling, as  usual,  he  had  very  nearly  overreached  himself. 
For,  the  messenger  on  horseback  who  brought  the  pardon, 
came  so  late,  that  he  was  pushed  to  the  outside  of  the 
crowd,  and  was  obliged  to  shout  and  roar  out  what  he  came 


300  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

for.  The  miserable  Cobham  did  not  gain  much  by  being 
spared  that  day.  He  lived,  both  as  a  prisoner  and  a  beg- 
gar, utterly  despised,  and  miserably  poor,  for  thirteen 
years,  and  then  died  in  an  old  outhouse  belonging  to  one  of 
his  former  servants. 

This  plot  got  rid  of,  and  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  safely  shut 
up.  in  the  Tower,  his  Sowship  held  a  great  dispute  with  the 
Puritans  on  their  presenting  a  petition  to  him,  and  had  it 
all  his  own  way — not  so  very  wonderful,  as  he  would  talk 
continually,  and  would  not  hear  anybody  else — and  filled 
the  bishops  with  admiration.  It  was  comfortably  settled 
that  there  was  to  be  only  one  form  of  religion,  and  that  all 
men  were  to  think  exactly  alike.  But,  although  this  was 
arranged  two  centuries  and  a  half  ago,  and  although  the 
arrangement  was  supported  by  much  fining  and  imprison- 
ment, I  do  not  find  that  it  is  quite  successful,  even  yet. 

His  Sowship,  having  that  uncommonly  high  opinion  of 
himself  as  a  king,  had  a  very  low  opinion  of  Parliament  as 
a  power  that  audaciously  wanted  to  control  him.  When 
he  called  his  first  Parliament  after  he  had  been  king  a  year, 
he  accordingly  thought  he  would  take  pretty  high  ground 
with  them,  and  told  them  that  he  commanded  them  "as 
an  absolute  king."  The  Parliament  thought  those  strong 
words,  and  saw  the  necessity  of  upholding  their  authority. 
His  Sowship  had  three  children :  Prince  Henry,  Prince 
Charles,  and  the  Princess  Elizabeth.  It  would  have  been 
well  for  one  of  these,  and  we  shall  soon  see  which,  if  he 
had  learnt  a  little  wisdom  concerning  Parliaments  from  his 
father's  obstinacy. 

Now,  the  people  still  labouring  under  their  old  dread  of 
the  Catholic  religion,  this  Parliament  revived  and  strength- 
ened the  severe  laws  against  it.  And  this  so  angered 
Robert  Catesbt,  a  restleac  Catholic  gentleman  of  an  old 
family,  that  he  formed  one  of  the  most  desperate  and  ter- 
rible designs  ever  conceived  in  the  mind  of  man ;  no  less  a 
scheme  than  the  Gunpowder  Plot. 

His  object  was,  when  the  King,  lords,  and  commons 
should  be  assembled  at  the  next  opening  of  Parliament,  to 
blow  them  up,  one  and  all,  with  a  great  mine  of  gunpow- 
der. The  first  person  to  whom  he  confided  this  horrible 
idea  was  Thomas  Winter,  a  Worcestershire  gentleman  who 
had  served  in  i^e  army  abi*oad,  and  had  been  secretly  em- 
ployed in  Catholic  projects.     While  Winter  was  yet  un- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  301 

decided,  and  when  he  had  gone  over  to  the  Netherlands, 
to  learn  from  the  Spanish  ambassador  there  whether  there 
was  any  hope  of  Catholics  being  relieved  through  the 
intercession  of  the  King  of  Spain  with  his  Sowship,  he 
found  at  Ostend  a  tall  dark  daring  man,  whom  he  had 
known  when  they  were  both  soldiers  abroad,  and  whose 
name  was  Guido — or  Guy — Fawkes.  Resolved  to  join 
the  plot,  he  proposed  it  to  this  man,  knowing  him  to 
be  the  man  for  any  desperate  deed,  and  they  two  came 
back  to  England  together.  Here,  they  admitted  two 
other  conspirators:  Thomas  Percy,  related  to  the  Earl 
of  Northumberland,  and  John  Wright,  his  brother- 
in-law.  All  these  met  together  in  a  solitary  house  in  the 
open  fields  which  were  then  near  Clement's  Inn,  now  a 
closely  blocked-up  part  of  London ;  and  when  they  had  all 
taken  a  great  oath  of  secrecy,  Catesby  told  the  rest  what 
his  plan  was.  They  then  went  up-stairs  into  a  garret,  and 
received  the  Sacrament  from  Father  Gerard,  a  Jesuit, 
who  is  said  not  to  have  known  actually  of  the  Gunpowder 
Plot,  but  who,  I  think,  must  have  had  his  suspicions  that 
there  was  something  desperate  afoot. 

Percy  was  a  Gentleman  Pensioner,  and  as  he  had  occa- 
sional duties  to  perform  about  the  Court,  then  kept  at 
Whitehall,  there  would  be  nothing  suspicious  in  his  living 
at  Westminster.  So,  having  looked  well  about  him,  and 
having  found  a  house  to  let,  the  back  of  which  joined  the 
Parliament  House,  he  hired  it  of  a  person  named  Ferris, 
for  the  purpose  of  undermining  the  wall.  Having  got  pos- 
session of  this  house,  the  conspirators  hired  another  on  the 
Lambeth  side  of  the  Thames,  which  they  used  as  a  store- 
house for  wood,  gunpowder,  and  other  combustible  matters. 
These  were  to  be  removed  at  night  (and  afterwards  were 
removed),  bit  by  bit,  to  the  house  at  Westminster;  and, 
that  there  might  be  some  trusty  person  to  keep  watch  over 
the  Lambeth  stores,  they  admitted  another  conspirator,  by 
name  Robert  Kay,  a  very  poor  Catholic  gentleman. 

All  these  arrangements  had  been  made  some  months,  and 
it  was  a  dark  wintry  December  night,  when  the  conspira- 
tors, who  had  been  in  the  meantime  dispersed  to  avoid 
observation,  met  in  the  house  at  Westminster,  and  began 
to  dig.  They  had  laid  in  a  good  stock  of  eatables,  to  avoid 
going  in  and  out,  and  they  dug  and  dug  with  great  ardour. 
But,  the  wall  being  tremendously  thick,  and  the  work  very 


S02  A  cmLi>'8  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

severe,  they  took  into  their  plot  Christopher  Wright,  a 
younger  brother  of  John  Wright,  that  they  might  have  a 
new  pair  of  hands  to  help.  And  Christopher  Wright  fell 
to  like  a  fresh  man,  and  they  dug  and  dug  by  night  and  by 
day,  and  Fawkes  stood  sentinel  all  the  time.  And  if  any 
man's  heart  seemed  to  fail  him  at  all,  Fawkes  said,  "Gen- 
tlemen, we  have  abundance  of  powder  and  shot  here,  and 
there  is  no  fear  of  our  being  taken  alive,  even  if  discovered." 
The  same  Fawkes,  who,  in  the  capacity  of  sentinel,  was 
always  prowling  about,  soon  picked  up  the  intelligence  that 
the  King  had  prorogued  the  Parliament  again,  from  the 
seventh  of  February,  the  day  first  fixed  upon,  until  the 
third  of  October.  When  the  conspirators  knew  this,  they 
agreed  to  separate  until  after  the  Christmas  holidays,  and 
to  take  no  notice  of  each  other  in  the  meanwhile,  and  never 
to  write  letters  to  one  another  on  any  account.  So,  the 
house  in  Westminster  was  shut  up  again,  and  I  suppose 
the  neighbours  thought  that  those  strange  looking  men  who 
lived  there  so  gloomily,  and  went  out  so  seldom,  were  gone 
away  to  have  a  merry  Christmas  somewhere. 

It  was  the  beginning  of  February,  sixteen  hundred  and 
live,  when  Catesby  met  his  fellow-conspirators  again  at 
this  Westminster  house.  He  had  now  admitted  three  more ; 
John  Grant,  a  Warwickshire  gentleman  of  a  melancholy 
temper,  who  lived  in  a  doleful  house  near  Stratford-upon- 
Avon,  with  a  frowning  wall  all  round  it,  and  a  deep  moat ; 
Robert  Winter,  eldest  brother  of  Thomas;  and  Catesby's 
own  servant,  Thomas  Bates,  who,  Catesby  thought,  had 
had  some  suspicion  of  what  his  master  was  about.  These 
three  had  all  suffered  more  or  less  for  their  religion  in 
Elizabeth's  time.  And  now,  they  all  began  to  dig- again, 
and  they  dug  and  dug  by  night  and  by  day. 

They  found  it  dismal  work  alone  there,  underground, 
with  such  a  fearful  secret  on  their  minds,  and  so  many 
murders  before  them.  They  were  filled  with  wild  fancies. 
Sometimes,  they  thought  they  heard  a  great  bell  tolling, 
deep  down  in  the  earth  under  the  Parliament  House ;  some- 
times, they  thought  they  heard  low  voices  muttering  about 
the  Gunpowder  Plot ;  once  in  the  morning,  they  really  did 
hear  a  great  rumbling  noise  over  their  heads,  as  they  dug 
and  sweated  in  their  mine.  Every  man  stopped  and  looked 
aghast  at  his  neighbour,  wondering  what  had  happened, 
when  that  bold  prowler,  Fawkes,  who  had  been  out  to  look, 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  303 

came  in  and  told  them  that  it  was  only  a  dealer  in  coals 
who  had  occupied  a  cellar  under  the  Parliament  House,  re- 
moving his  stock  in  trade  to  some  other  place.  Upon  this, 
the  conspirators,  who  with  all  their  digging  and  digging 
had  not  yet  dug  through  the  tremendously  thick  wall, 
changed  their  plan ;  hired  that  cellar,  which  was  directly 
under  the  House  of  Lords;  put  six-and-thirty  barrels  of 
gunpowder  in  it,  and  covered  them  over  with  fagots  and 
coals.  Then  they  all  dispersed  again  till  September,  when 
the  following  new  conspirators  were  admitted:  Sir  Ed- 
ward Baynham,  of  Gloucestershire ;  Sir  Everard  Digby, 
of  Rutlandshire ;  Ambrose  Rookwood,  of  Suffolk ;  Francis 
Tresham,  of  Northamptonshire.  Most  of  these  were  rich, 
and  were  to  assist  the  plot,  some  with  money  and  some 
with  horses  on  which  the  conspirators  were  to  ride  through 
the  country  aud  rouse  the  Catholics  after  the  Parliament 
should  be  blown  into  air. 

Parliament  being  again  prorogued  from  the  third  of  Oc- 
tober to  the  fifth  of  November,  and  the  conspirators  being 
uneasy  lest  their  design  should  have  been  found  out, 
Thomas  Winter  said  he  would  go  up  into  the  House  of 
Lords  on  the  day  of  the  prorogation,  and  see  how  matters 
looked.  Nothing  could  be  better.  The  unconscious  com- 
missioners were  walking  about  and  talking  to  one  another, 
just  over  the  six-and-thirty  barrels  of  gunpowder.  He 
came  back  and  told  the  rest  so,  and  they  went  on  with  their 
preparations.  They  hired  a  ship,  and  kept  it  ready  in  the 
Thames,  in  which  Fawkes  was  to  sail  for  Flanders  after 
firing  with  a  slow  match  the  train  that  was  to  explode  the 
powder.  A  number  of  Catholic  gentlemen  not  in  the  secret, 
were  invited,  on  pretence  of  a  hunting  party,  to  meet  Sir 
Everard  Digby  at  Dunchurch  on  the  fatal  day,  that  they 
might  be  ready  to  act  together.     And  now  all  was  ready. 

But,  now,  the  great  wickedness  and  danger  which  had 
been  all  along  at  the  bottom  of  this  wicked  plot,  began  to 
show  itself.  As  the  fifth  of  November  drew  near,  most  of 
the  conspirators,  remembering  that  they  had  friends  and 
relations  who  would  be  in  the  House  of  Lords  that  day, 
felt  some  natural  relenting,  and  a  wish  to  warn  them  to 
keep  away.  They  were  not  much  comforted  by  Catesby's 
declaring  that  in  such  a  cause  he  would  blow  up  his  own 
son.  Lord  Mounteagle,  Tresham' s  brother-in-law,  was 
certain  to  be  in  the  house ;  and  when  Tresham  found  that 


304  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND. 

he  could  not  prevail  upon  the  rest  to  devise  any  means  of 
sparing  their  friends,  he  wrote  a  mysterious  letter  to  this 
lord  and  left  it  at  his  lodging  in  the  dusk,  urging  him  to 
keep  away  from  the  opening  of  Parliament,  "  since  God 
and  man  had  concurred  to  punish  the  wickedness  of  the 
times."  It  contained  the  words  "that  the  Parliament 
should  receive  a  terrible  blow,  and  yet  should  not  see  who 
hurt  them."  And  it  added,  "the  danger  is  past,  as  soon 
as  you  have  burnt  the  letter." 

The  ministers  and  courtiers  made  out  that  his  Sowship, 
by  a  direct  miracle  from  Heaven,  found  out  what  this  let- 
ter meant.  The  truth  is,  that  they  were  not  long  (as  few 
men  would  be)  in  finding  out  for  themselves ;  and  it  was 
decided  to  let  the  conspirators  alone,  until  the  very  day 
before  the  opening  of  Parliament.  That  the  conspirators 
had  their  fears,  is  certain ;  for,  Tresham  himself  said  be- 
fore them  all,  that  they  were  every  one  dead  men ;  and, 
although  even  he  did  not  take  flight,  there  is  reason  to  sup- 
pose that  he  had  warned  other  persons  besides  Lord  Mount- 
eagle.  However,  they  were  all  firm;  and  Fawkes,  who 
was  a  man  of  iron,  went  down  every  day  and  night  to  keep 
watch  in  the  cellar  as  usual.  He  was  there  about  two  in 
the  afternoon  of  the  fourth,  when  the  Lord  Chamberlain 
and  Lord  Mounteagle  threw  open  the  door  and  looked  in. 
"  Who  are  you,  friend?  "  said  they.  "  Why,"  said  Fawkes, 
"  I  am  Mr.  Percy's  servant,  and  am  looking  after  his  store 
of  fuel  here."  "Your  master  has  laid  in  a  pretty  good 
store,"  they  returned,  and  shut  the  door,  and  went  away. 
Fawkes,  upon  this,  posted  off  to  the  other  conspirators  to 
tell  them  all  was  quiet,  and  went  back  and  shut  himself  up 
in  the  dark  black  cellar  again,  where  he  heard  the  bell  go 
twelve  o'clock  and  usher  in  the  fifth  of  November.  About 
two  hours  afterwards,  he  slowly  opened  the  door,  and  came 
out  to  look  about  him,  in  his  old  prowling  way.  He  was 
instantly  seized  and  bound,  by  a  party  of  soldiers  under 
Sib  Thomas  Knevett.  He  had  a  watch  upon  him,  some 
touchwood,  some  tinder,  some  slow  matches;  and  there 
was  a  dark  lantern  with  a  candle  in  it,  lighted,  behind  the 
door.  He  had  his  boots  and  spurs  on — to  ride  to  the  ship, 
I  suppose — and  it  was  well  for  the  soldiers  that  they  took 
him  so  suddenly.  If  they  had  left  him  but  a  moment's 
time  to  light  a  match,  he  certainly  would  have  tossed  it  in 
among  the  powder,  and  blown  up  himself  and  them. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  305 

They  took  him  to  the  King's  bed-chamber  first  of  all, 
and  there  the  King  (causing  him  to  be  held  very  tight,  and 
keeping  a  good  way  oif),  asked  him  how  he  could  have  the 
heart  to  intend  to  destroy  so  many  innocent  people?  "  Be- 
cause," said  Guy  Fawkes,  **  desperate  diseases  need  desper- 
ate remedies."  To  a  little  Scotch  favourite,  with  a  face 
like  a  terrier,  who  asked  him  (with  no  particular  wisdom) 
why  he  had  collected  so  much  gunpowder,  he  replied,  be- 
cause he  had  meant  to  blow  Scotchmen  back  to  Scotland, 
and  it  would  take  a  deal  of  powder  to  do  that.  Next  day 
he  was  carried  to  the  Tower,  but  would  make  no  confession. 
Even  after  being  horribly  tortured,  he  confessed  nothing 
that  the  Government  did  not  a"_3adyknow;  though  he 
must  have  been  in  a  fearful  state — as  his  signature,  still 
preserved,  in  contrast  with  his  natural  handwriting  before 
he  was  put  upon  the  dreadful  rack,  most  frightfully  shows. 
Bates,  a  very  different  man,  soon  said  the  Jesuits  had  had 
to  do  with  the  plot,  and  probably,  under  the  torture,  would 
as  readily  have  said  anything.  Tresham,  taken  and  put  in 
the  Tower  too,  made  confessions  and  unmade  them,  and 
died  of  an  illness  that  was  heavy  upon  him.  Rookwood, 
who  had  stationed  relays  of  his  own  horses  all  the  way  to 
Dunchurch,  did  not  mount  to  escape  until  the  middle  of 
the  day,  when  the  news  of  the  plot  was  all  over  London. 
On  the  road,  he  came  up  with  the  two  Wrights,  Catesby, 
and  Percy ;  and  they  all  galloped  together  into  Northamp- 
tonshire. Thence  to  Dunchurch,  where  they  found  the 
proposed  party  assembled.  Finding,  however,  that  there 
had  been  a  plot,  and  that  it  had  been  discovered,  the  party 
disappeared  in  the  course  of  the  night,  and  left  them  alone 
with  Sir  Everard  Digby.  Away  they  all  rode  again, 
through  Warwickshire  aud  Worcestershire,  to  a  house  called 
Holbeach,  on  the  borders  of  Staffordshire.  They  tried 
to  raise  the  Catholics  on  their  way,  but  were  indignantly 
driven  off  by  them.  All  this  time  they  were  hotly  pursued 
by  the  sheriff  of  Worcester,  and  a  fast  increasing  concourse 
of  riders.  At  last,  resolving  to  defend  themselves  at  Hol- 
beach, they  shut  themselves  up  in  the  house,  and  put  some 
wet  powder  before  the  fire  to  dry.  But  it  blew  up,  and 
Catesby  was  singed  and  blackened,  and  almost  killed,  and 
some  of  the  others  were  sadly  hurt.  Still,  knowing  that 
they  must  die,  they  resolved  to  die  there,  and  with  only 
their  swords  in  their  hands  appeared  at  the  windows  to  be 
20 


306  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

shot  at  by  the  sheriff  and  his  assistants.  Catesby  said  to 
Thomas  Winter,  after  Thomas  had  been  hit  in  the  right 
arm  which  dropped  powerless  by  his  side,  "  Stand  by  me, 
Tom,  and  we  will  die  together!" — which  they  did,  being 
shot  through  the  body  by  two  bullets  from  one  gun.  John 
Wright,  and  Christopher  Wright,  and  Percy,  were  also 
shot.  Rookwood  and  Digby  were  taken :  the  former  with 
a  broken  arm  and  a  wound  in  his  body  too. 

It  was  the  fifteenth  of  January,  before  the  trial  of  Guy 
Fawkes,  and  such  of  the  other  conspirators  as  were  left 
alive,  came  on.  They  were  all  found  guilty,  all  hanged, 
drawn,  and  quartered :  some,  in  Saint  Paul's  Churchyard, 
on  the  top  of  Ludgate-hill ;  some,  before  the  Parliament 
House.  A  Jesuit  priest,  named  Henry  Garnet,  to  whom 
the  dreadful  design  was  said  to  have  been  communicated, 
was  taken  and  tried ;  and  two  of  his  servants,  as  well  as  a 
poor  priest  who  was  taken  with  him,  were  tortured  with- 
out mercy.  He  himself  was  not  tortured,  but  was  sur- 
rounded in  the  Tower  by  tamperers  and  traitors,  and  so 
was  made  unfairly  to  convict  himself  out  of  his  own  mouth. 
He  said,  upon  his  trial,  that  he  had  done  all  he  could  to 
prevent  the  deed,  and  that  he  could  not  make  public  what 
had  been  told  him  in  confession — though  I  am  afraid  he 
knew  of  the  plot  in  other  ways.  He  was  found  guilty  and 
executed,  after  a  manful  defence,  and  the  Catholic  Church 
made  a  saint  of  him ;  some  rich  and  powerful  persons,  who 
had  had  nothing  to  do  with  the  project,  were  fined  and  im- 
prisoned for  it  by  the  Star  Chamber ;  the  Catholics,  in  gen- 
eral, who  had  recoiled  with  horror  from  the  idea  of  the 
infernal  contrivance,  were  unjustly  put  under  more  severe 
laws  than  before ;  and  this  was  the  end  of  the  Gunpowder 
Plot. 

SECOND    PART. 

His  Sowship  would  pretty  willingly,  I  think,  have  blown 
the  House  of  Commons  into  the  air  himself ;  for,  his  dread 
and  jealousy  of  it  knew  no  bounds  all  through  his  reign. 
When  he  was  hard  pressed  for  money  he  was  obliged  to 
order  it  to  meet,  as  he  could  get  no  money  without  it ;  and 
when  it  asked  him  first  to  abolish  some  of  the  monopolies 
in  necessaries  of  life  which  were  a  great  grievance  to  the 
people,  and  to  redress  other  public  wrongs,  he  flew  into  a 
rage  and  got  rid  of  it  again.     At  one  time  he  wanted  it  to 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  307 

consent  to  the  Union  of  England  with  Scotland,  and  quar- 
relled about  that.  At  another  time  it  wanted  him  to  put 
down  a  most  infamous  Church  abuse,  called  the  High  Com- 
mission Court,  and  he  quarrelled  with  it  about  that.  At 
another  time  it  entreated  him  not  to  be  quite  so  fond  of  his 
archbishops  and  bishops  who  made  speeches  in  his  praise 
too  awful  to  be  related,  but  to  have  some  little  considera- 
tion for  the  poor  Puritan  clergy  who  were  persecuted  for 
preaching  in  their  own  way,  and  not  according  to  the  arch- 
bishops and  bishops ;  and  they  quarrelled  about  that.  In 
short,  what  with  hating  the  House  of  Commons,  and  pre- 
tending not  to  hate  it ;  and  what  with  now  sending  some 
of  its  members  who  opposed  him,  to  Newgate  or  to  the 
Tower,  and  now  telling  the  rest  that  they  must  not  presume 
to  make  speeches  about  the  public  affairs  which  could  not 
possibly  concern  them;  and  what  with  cajoling,  and  bully- 
ing, and  frightening,  and  being  frightened ;  the  House  of 
Commons  was  the  plague  of  his  Sowship's  existence.  It 
was  pretty  firm,  however,  in  maintaining  its  rights,  and 
insisting  that  the  Parliament  should  make  the  laws,  and 
not  the  King  by  his  own  single  proclamations  (which  he 
tried  hard  to  do) ;  and  his  Sowship  was  so  often  distressed 
for  money,  in  consequence,  that  he  sold  every  sort  of  title 
and  public  office  as  if  they  were  merchandise,  and  even  in- 
vented a  new  dignity  called  a  Baronetcy,  which  anybody 
could  buy  for  a  thousand  pounds. 

These  disputes  with  his  Parliaments,  and  his  hunting, 
and  his  drinking,  and  his  lying  in  bed — for  he  was  a  great 
sluggard — occupied  his  Sowship  pretty  well.  The  rest  of 
his  time  he  chiefly  passed  in  hugging  and  slobbering  his 
favourites.  The  first  of  these  was  Sir  Philip  Herbert, 
who  had  no  knowledge  whatever,  except  of  dogs,  and 
horses,  and  hunting,  but  whom  he  soon  made  Earl  of 
MoN^TGOMERT.  The  next,  and  a  much  more  famous  one, 
was  Robert  Carr,  or  Ker  (for  it  is  not  certain  which  was 
his  right  name),  who  came  from  the  Border  country,  and 
whom  he  soon  made  Viscouxt  Rochester,  and  afterwards. 
Earl  op  Somerset.  The  way  in  which  his  Sowship  doted 
on  this  handsome  young  man,  is  even  more  odious  to  think 
of,  than  the  way  in  which  the  really  great  men  of  England 
condescended  to  bow  down  before  him.  The  favourite's 
great  friend  was  a  certain  Sir  Thomas  0 verbury,  who  wrote 
his  love-letters  for  him,  and  assisted  him  in  the  duties  of  his 


308  A  CHILD'S  HI910RY  OP  ENGLAND. 

many  high  places,  which  his  own  ignorance  prevented  him 
from  discharging.  But  this  same  Sir  Thomas  having  just 
manhood  enough  to  dissuade  the  favourite  from  a  wicked 
marriage  with  the  beautiful  Conntess  of  Essex,  who  was  to 
get  a  divorce  from  her  husband  for  the  purpose,  the  said 
Countess,  in  her  rage,  got  Sir  Thomas  put  into  the  Tower, 
and  there  poisoned  him.  Then  the  favourite  and  this  bad 
woman  were  publicly  married  by  the  King's  pet  bishop, 
with  as  much  to-do  and  rejoicing,  as  if  he  had  been  the 
best  man,  and  she  the  best  woman,  upoa  the  face  of  the 
eaith. 

But,  after  a  longer  sunshine  than  might  have  been  ex- 
pected—of seven  years  or  so,  that  is  to  say — another  hand- 
some young  man  stai'ted  up  and  eclipsed  the  Eakl  of 
Somerset.  This  was  George  Villiers,  the  youngest  son 
of  a  Leicestershire  gentleman :  who  came  to  Court  with  all 
the  Paris  fashions  on  him,  and  could  dance  as  well  as  the 
best  mountebank  that  ever  was  seen.  He  soon  danced 
himself  into  the  good  graces  of  his  Sowship,  and  danced 
the  other  favourite  out  of  favour.  Then,  it  was  all  at 
once  discovered  that  the  Earl  and  Countess  of  Somerset 
had  not  deserved  all  those  great  promotions  and  mighty 
rejoicings,  and  they  were  separately  tried  for  the  murder 
of  Sir  Thomas  Overbury,  and  for  other  crimes.  But, 
the  King  was  so  afraid  of  his  late  favourite's  publicly 
telling  some  disgraceful  things  he  knew  of  him — which  he 
darkly  threatened  to  do — that  he  was  even  examined  with 
two  men  standing,  one  on  either  side  of  him,  each  with  a 
cloak  in  his  hand,  ready  to  throw  it  over  his  head  and  stop 
his  mouth  if  he  should  break  out  with  what  he  had  it  in 
his  power  to  tell.  So,  a  very  lame  affair  was  purposely 
made  of  the  trial,  and  his  punishment  was  an  allowance  of 
four  thousand  pounds  a  year  in  retirement,  while  the  Count- 
ess was  pardoned,  and  allowed  to  pass  into  retirement  too. 
They  hated  one  another  b}^  this  time,  and  lived  to  revile 
and  torment  each  other  some  years. 

While  these  events  were  in  progress,  and  while  his  Sow- 
ship  was  making  such  an  exhibition  of  himself,  from  day 
to  day  and  from  year  to  year,  as  is  not  often  seen  in  any 
sty,  three  remarkable  deaths  ^.ook  place  in  England.  The 
first  was  that  of  the  minister,  Robert  Cecil,  Earl  of  Salis- 
bury, who  was  past  sixty,  and  had  never  been  strong,  being 
deformed  from  his  birth.     He  said  at  last  that  he  had  no 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  300 

wish  to  live ;  and  no  minister  need  have  had,  with  his  ex- 
perience of  the  meanness  and  wickedness  of  those  disgrace- 
ful times.  The  second  was  that  of  the  Lady  Arabella 
Stuart,  who  alarmed  his  Sowship  mightily,  by  privately 
marrying  William  Seymour,  son  of  Lord  Beauchamp, 
who  was  a  descendant  of  King  Henry  the  Seventh,  and 
who,  his  Sowship  thought,  might  consequently  increase 
and  strengthen  any  claim  she  might  one  day  set  up  to  the 
throne.  She  was  separated  from  her  husband  (who  was 
put  in  the  Tower)  and  thrust  into  a  boat  to  be  confined  at 
Durham.  She  escaped  in  a  man's  dress  to  get  away  in  a 
French  ship  from  Gravesend  to  France,  but  unhappily 
missed  her  husband,  who  had  escaped  too,  and  was  soon 
taken.  She  went  raving  mad  in  the  miserable  Tower,  and 
died  there  after  four  years.  The  last,  and  the  most  impor- 
tant of  these  three  deaths,  was  that  of  Prince  Henry,  the 
heir  to  the  throne,  in  the  nineteenth  year  of  his  age.  He 
was  a  promising  young  prince,  and  greatly  liked;  a  quiet 
well-conducted  youth,  of  whom  two  very  good  things  are 
known :  first,  that  his  father  was  jealous  of  him ;  secondly, 
that  he  was  the  friend  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  languishing 
through  all  those  years  in  the  Tower,  and  often  said  that 
no  man  but  his  father  would  keep  such  a  bird  in  such  a 
cage.  On  the  occasion  of  the  preparations  for  the  marriage 
of  his  sister  the  Princess  Elizabeth  with  a  foreign  prince 
(and  an  unhappy  marriage  it  turned  out),  he  came  from 
Richmond,  where  he  had  been  very  ill,  to  greet  his  new 
brother-in-law,  at  the  palace  at  Whitehall.  There  he 
played  a  great  game  at  tennis,  in  his  shirt,  though  it 
was  very  cold  weather,  and  was  seized  with  an  alarming 
illness,  and  died  within  a  fortnight  of  a  putrid  fever. 
For  this  young  prince  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  wrote,  in  his 
prison  in  the  Tower,  the  beginning  of  a  History  of  the 
World:  a  wonderful  instance  how  little  his  Sowship  could 
do  to  confine  a  great  man's  mind,  however  long  he  might 
imprison  his  body. 

And  this  mention  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  who  had  many 
faults,  biit  who  never  showed  so  many  merits  as  in  trouble 
and  adversity,  may  bring  me  at  once  to  the  end  of  his  sad 
story.  After  an  imprisonment  in  the  Tower  of  twelve  long 
years,  he  proposed  to  resume  those  old  sea  voyages  of  his, 
and  to  go  to  South  America  in  search  of  gold.  His  Sow- 
ship, divided  between  his  wish  to  be  on  good  terms  with 


310  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

the  Spaniards  through  whose  territory  Sir  Walter  must 
pass  (he  had  long  had  an  idea  of  marrying  Prince  Henry 
to  a  Spanish  Princess),  and  his  avaricious  eagerness  to  get 
hold  of  the  gold,  did  not  know  what  to  do.  But,  in  the 
end,  he  set  Sir  Walter  free,  taking  securities  for  his  return ; 
and  Sir  Walter  fitted  out  an  expedition  at  his  own  cost, 
and,  on  the  twenty-eighth  of  March,  one  thousand  six  hun- 
dred and  seventeen,  sailed  away  in  command  of  one  of  its 
ships,  which  he  ominously  called  the  Destiny.  The  expe- 
dition failed ;  the  common  men,  not  'finding  the  gold  they 
had  expected,  mutinied;  a  quarrel  broke  out  between  Sir 
Walter  and  the  Spaniards,  who  hated  him  for  old  suc- 
cesses of  his  against  them ;  and  he  took  and  burnt  a  little 
town  called  Saint  Thomas.  For  this  he  was  denounced 
to  his  Sowship  by  the  Spanish  ambassador  as  a  pirate ;  and 
returning  almost  broken-hearted,  with  his  hopes  and  for- 
tunes shattered,  his  company  of  friends  dispersed,  and  his 
brave  son  (who  had  been  one  of  them)  killed,  he  was  taken 
— through  the  treachery  of  Sir  Lewis  Stukely,  his  near 
relation,  a  scoundrel  and  a  Vice- Admiral — and  was  once 
again  immured  in  his  prison-home  of  so  many  years. 

His  Sowship  being  mightily  disappointed  in  not  getting 
any  gold.  Sir  Walter  Kaleigh  was  tried  as  unfairly,  and 
with  as  many  lies  and  evasions  as  the  judges  and  law 
officers  and  every  other  authority  in  Church  and  State 
habitually  practised  under  such  a  King.  After  a  great 
deal  of  prevarication  on  all  parts  but  his  own,  it  was  de- 
clared that  he  must  die  under  his  former  sentence,  now  fif- 
teen years  old.  So,  on  the  twenty-eighth  of  October,  one 
thousand  six  hundred  and  eighteen,  he  was  shut  up  m  the 
Gate  House  at  Westminster  to  pass  his  last  night  on  earth, 
and  there  he  took  leave  of  his  good  and  faithful  lady  who 
was  worthy  to  have  lived  in  better  days.  At  eight  o'clock 
next  morning,  after  a  cheerful  breakfast,  and  a  pipe,  and 
a  cup  of  good  wine,  he  was  taken  to  Old  Palace  Yard  in 
Westminster,  where  the  scaffold  was  set  up,  and  where  so 
many  people  of  high  degree  were  assembled  to  see  him  die, 
that  it  was  a  matter  of  some  difficulty  to  get  him  through 
the  crowd.  He  behaved  most  nobly,  but  if  anything  lay 
heavy  on  his  mind,  it  was  that  Earl  of  Essex,  whose  head 
he  had  seen  roll  olf ;  and  he  solemnly  said  that  he  had  had 
no  hand  in  bringing  him  to  the  block,  and  that  he  had  shed 
tears  for  him  when  he  died.     As  the  morning  was  very 


A  CHILDS  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  311 

cold,  the  Sheriff  said,  would  he  come  down  to  a  fire  for  a 
little  space,  and  warm  himself?  But  Sir  Walter  thanked 
him,  and  said  no,  he  would  rather  it  were  done  at  once,  for 
he  was  ill  of  fever  and  ague,  and  in  another  quarter  of  an 
hour  his  shaking  fit  would  come  upon  him  if  he  were  still 
alive,  and  his  enemies  might  then  suppose  that  he  trembled 
for  fear.  With  that,  he  kneeled  and  made  a  very  beauti- 
ful and  Christian  prayer.  Before  he  laid  his  head  upon 
the  block  he  felt  the  edge  of  the  axe,  and  said,  with  a  smile 
upon  his  face,  that  it  was  a  sharp  medicine,  but  would  cure 
the  worst  disease.  When  he  was  bent  down  ready  for 
death,  he  said  to  the  executioner,  finding  that  he  hesitated, 
"  What  dost  thou  fear?  Strike,  man !  "  So,  the  axe  came 
down  and  struck  his  head  off,  in  the  sixty-sixth  year  of  his 
age. 

The  new  favourite  got  on  fast.  He  was  made  a  viscount, 
he  was  made  Duke  of  Buckingham,  he  was  made  a  mar- 
quis, he  was  made  Master  of  the  Horse,  he  was  made  Lord 
High  Admiral — and  the  Chief  Commander  of  the  gallant 
English  forces  that  had  dispersed  the  Spanish  Armada, 
was  displaced  to  make  room  for  him.  He  had  the  whole 
kingdom  at  his  disposal,  and  his  mother  sold  all  the  profits 
and  honours  of  the  State,  as  if  she  had  kept  a  shop.  He 
blazed  all  over  with  diamonds  and  other  precious  stones, 
from  his  hatband  and  his  earrings  to  his  shoes.  Yet  he 
was  an  ignorant  presumptuous  swaggering  compound  of 
knave  and  fool,  with  nothing  but  his  beauty  and  his  dan- 
cing to  recommend  him.  This  is  the  gentleman  who  called 
himself  his  Majesty's  dog  and  slave,  and  called  his  Majesty 
Your  Sowship.  His  Sowship  called  him  Steenie;  it  is 
supposed,  because  that  was  a  nickname  for  Stephen,  and 
because  Saint  Stephen  was  generally  represented  in  pic- 
tures as  a  handsome  saint. 

His  Sowship  was  driven  sometimes  to  his  wits' -end  by 
his  trimming  between  the  general  dislike  of  the  Catholic 
religion  at  home,  and  his  desire  to  wheedle  and  flatter  it 
abroad,  as  his  only  means  of  getting  a  rich  princess  for  his 
son's  wife:  apart  of  whose  fortune  he  might  cram  into 
his  greasy  pockets.  Prince  Charles — or  as  his  Sowship 
called  him.  Baby  Charles — being  now  Prince  of  Wales, 
the  old  project  of  a  marriage  with  the  Spanish  King's 
daughter  had  been  revived  for  him ;  and  as  she  could  not 
marry  a  Protestant  without  leave  from  the  Pope,  his  Sow- 


312  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

ship  himself  secretly  and  meanly  wrote  to  his  Infallibility, 
asking  for  it.  The  negotiation  for  this  Spanish  marriage 
takes  up  a  larger  space  in  great  books,  than  you  can  imag- 
ine, but  the  upshot  of  it  all  is,  that  when  it  had  been  held 
off  by  the  Spanish  Court  for  a  long  time,  Baby  Charles  and 
Steenie  set  off  in  disguise  as  Mr.  Thomas  Smith  and  Mr. 
John  Smith,  to  see  the  Spanish  Princess ;  that  Baby  Charles 
pretended  to  be  desperately  in  love  with  her,  and  jumped 
off  walls  to  look  at  her,  and  made  a  considerable  fool  of 
himself  in  a  good  many  ways;  that  she  was  called  Prin- 
cess of  Wales,  and  that  the  whole  Spanish  Court  believed 
Baby  Charles  to  be  all  but  dying  for  her  sake,  as  he  ex- 
pressly told  them  he  was ;  that  Baby  Charles  and  Steenie 
came  back  to  England,  and  were  received  with  as  much 
rapture  as  if  they  had  been  a  blessing  to  it ;  that  Baby 
Charles  had  actually  fallen  in  love  with  Henrietta  Maria, 
the  French  King's  sister,  whom  he  had  seen  in  Paris;  that 
he  thought  it  a  wonderfully  fine  and  princely  thing  to  have 
deceived  the  Spaniards,  all  through;  and  that  he  openly 
said,  with  a  chuckle,  as  soon  as  he  was  safe  and  sound  at 
home  again,  that  the  Spaniards  were  great  fools  to  have 
believed  him. 

Like  most  dishonest  men,  the  Prince  and  the  favourite 
complained  that  the  people  whom  they  had  deluded  were 
dishonest.  Tliey  made  such  misrepresentations  of  the 
treachery  of  the  Spaniards  in  this  business  of  the  Spanish 
match,  that  the  English  nation  became  eager  for  a  war  with 
them.  Although  the  gravest  Spaniards  laughed  at  the 
idea  of  his  Sowship  in  a  warlike  attitude,  the  Parliament 
granted  money  for  the  beginning  of  hostilities,  and  the 
treaties  with  Spain  were  publicly  declared  to  be  at  an  end. 
The  Spanish  ambassador  in  London — probably  with  the 
help  of  the  fallen  favourite,  the  Earl  of  Somerset — being 
unable  to  obtain  speech  with  his  Sowship,  slipped  a  paper 
into  his  hand,  declaring  that  he  was  a  prisoner  in  his  own 
house,  and  was  entirely  governed  by  Buckingham  and  his 
creatures.  The  first  effect  of  this  letter  was  that  his  Sow- 
ship began  to  cry  and  whine,  and  took  Baby  Charles  away 
from  Steenie,  and  went  down  to  Windsor,  gabbling  all  sorts 
of  nonsense.  Tlie  end  of  it  was  that  his  Sowship  hugged 
his  dog  and  slave,  and  said  he  was  quite  satisfied 

He  had  given  the  Prince  and  the  favourite  almost  unlim- 
ited power  to  settle  anything  with  the  Pope  as  to  the  Span- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  313 

ish  marriage ;  and  he  now,  with  a  view  to  the  French  one, 
signed  a  treaty  that  all  Roman  Catholics  in  England  should 
exercise  their  religion  freely,  and  should  never  be  required 
to  take  any  oath  contrary  thereto.  In  return  for  this,  and 
for  other  concessions  much  less  to  be  defended,  Henrietta 
Maria  was  to  become  the  Prince's  wife,  and  was  to  bring 
him  a  fortune  of  eight  hundred  thousand  crowns. 

His  Sowship's  eyes  were  getting  red  with  eagerly  looking 
for  the  money,  when  the  end  of  a  gluttonous  life  came  upon 
him ;  and,  after  a  fortnight's  illness,  on  Sunday  the  twenty- 
seventh  of  March,  one  thousand  six  hundred  and  twenty- 
five,  he  died.  He  had  reigned  twenty-two  years,  and  was 
fifty-nine  years  old.  I  know  of  nothing  more  abominable 
in  history  than  the  adulation  that  was  lavished  on  this 
King,  and  the  vice  and  corruption  that  such  a  barefaced 
habit  of  lying  produced  in  .his ,  Court.  It  is  much  to  be 
doubted  whether  one  man  of  honour,  and  not  utterly  self- 
disgraced,  kept  his  place  near  James  the  First.  Lord  Ba- 
con, that  able  and  wise  philosopher,  as  the  First  Judge  in 
the  Kingdom  in  this  reign,  became  a  public  spectacle  of 
dishonesty  and  corruption ;  and  in  his  base  flattery  of  his 
Sowship,  and  in  his  crawling  servility  to  his  dog  and  slave, 
disgraced  himself  even  more.  But,  a  creature  like  his  Sow- 
ship  set  upon  a  throne  is  like  the  Plague,  and  everybody 
receives  infection  from  him. 


CHAPTER    XXXIII. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  CHARLES  THE  FIRST. 

Baby  Charles  became  King  Charles  the  First,  in  the 
twenty-fifth  year  of  his  age.  Unlike  his  father,  he  was 
usually  amiable  in  his  private  character,  and  grave  and 
dignified  in  his  bearing;  but,  like  his  father,  he  had  mon- 
strously exaggerated  notions  of  the  rights  of  a  king,  and 
was  evasive,  and  not  to  be  trusted.  If  his  word  could  have 
been  relied  upon,  his  history  might  have  had  a  different 
end. 

His  first  care  was  to  send  over  that  insolent  upstart, 
Buckingham,  to  bring  Henrietta  Maria  from  Paris  to  be  his 
Queen  ;  upon  which  occasion  Buckingham — with  his  usual 


314  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

audacity — made  love  to  the  young  Queen  of  Austria,  and 
was  very  indignant  indeed  with  Cardinal  Richelieu,  the 
French  Minister,  for  thwarting  his  intentions.  The  Eng- 
lish people  were  very  well  disposed  to  like  their  new  Queen, 
and  to  receive  her  with  great  favour  when  she  came  among 
them  as  a  stranger.  But,  she  held  the  Protestant  religion 
in  great  dislike,  and  brought  over  a  crowd  of  unpleasant 
priests,  who  made  her  do  some  very  ridiculous  things,  and 
forced  themselves  upon  the  public  notice  in  many  disagree- 
able ways.  Hence,  the  people  soon  came  to  dislike  her,  and 
she  soon  came  to  dislike  them;  and  she  did  so  much  all 
through  this  reign  in  setting  the  King  (who  was  dotingly 
fond  of  her)  against  his  subjects,  that  it  would  have  been 
better  for  him  if  she  had  never  been  born. 

Now,  you  are  to  understand  that  King  Charles  the  First 
— of  his  own  determination  to  be  a  high  and  mighty  King 
not  to  be  called  to  account  by  anybody,  and  urged  on  by 
his  Queen  besides — deliberately  set  himself  to  put  his  Par- 
liament down  and  to  put  himself  up.  You  are  also  to 
understand,  that  even  in  pursuit  of  this  wrong  idea  (enough 
in  itself  to  have  ruined  any  king)  he  never  took  a  straight 
course,  but  always  took  a  crooked  one. 

He  was  bent  upon  war  with  Spain,  though  neither  the 
House  of  Commons  nor  the  people  were  quite  clear'  as  to 
the  justice  of  that  war,  now  that  they  began  to  think  a  lit- 
tle more  about  the  story  of  the  Spanish  match.  But  the 
King  rushed  into  it  hotly,  raised  money  by  illegal  means 
to  meet  its  expenses,  and  encountered  a  miserable  failure 
at  Cadiz,  in  the  very  first  year  of  his  reign.  An  expedition 
to  Cadiz  had  been  made  in  the  hope  of  plunder,  but  as  it 
was  not  successful,  it  was  necessary  to  get  a  grant  of  money 
from  the  Parliament ;  and  when  they  met,  in  no  very  com- 
plying humour,  the  King  told  them,  "to  make  haste  to  let 
him  have  it,  or  it  would  be  the  worse  for  themselves." 

Not  put  in  a  more  complying  humour  by  this,  they  im- 
peached the  King's  favourite,  the  Duke  of  Buckingham,  as 
the  cause  (which  he  undoubtedly  was)  of  many  great  pub- 
lic grievances  and  wrongs.  The  King,  to  save  him,  dis- 
solved the  Parliament  without  getting  the  money  he  wanted ; 
and  when  the  Lords  implored  him  to  consider  and  grant  a 
little  delay,  he  replied,  "No,  not  one  minute."  He  then 
began  to  raise  money  for  himself  by  the  following  means 
among  others. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  316 

He  levied  certain  duties  called  tonnage  and  poundage 
which  had  not  been  granted  by  the  Parliament,  and  could 
lawfully  be  levied  by  no  other  power ;  he  called  upon  the 
seaport  towns  to  furnish,  and  to  pay  all  the  cost  for  three 
months  of,  a  fleet  of  armed  ships ;  and  he  required  the  peo- 
ple to  unite  in  lending  him  large  sums  of  money,  the  repay- 
ment of  which  was  very  doubtful.  If  the  poor  people  re- 
fused, they  were  pressed  as  soldiers  or  sailors ;  if  the  gentry 
refused,  they  were  sent  to  prison.  Five  gentlemen,  named 
Sir  Thomas  Darnel,  John  Corbet,  Walter  Earl,  John 
Heveningham,  and  Everard  Hampden,  for  refusing 
were  taken  up  by  a  warrant  of  the  King's  privy  council, 
and  were  sent  to  prison  without  any  cause  but  the  King's 
pleasure  being  stated  for  their  imprisonment.  Then  the 
question  came  to  be  solemnly  tried,  whether  this  was  not  a 
violation  of  Magna  Charta,  and  an  encroachment  by  the 
King  on  the  highest  rights  of  the  English  people.  His 
lawyers  contended  No,  because  to  encroach  upon  the  rights 
of  the  English  people  would  be  to  do  wrong,  and  the  King 
could  do  no  wrong.  The  accommodating  judges  decided  in 
favour  of  this  wicked  nonsense;  and  here  was  a  fatal  divi- 
sion between  the  King  and  the  people. 

For  all  this,  it  beeame  necessary  to  call  another  Parlia- 
ment. The  people,  sensible  of  the  danger  in  which  their 
liberties  were,  chose  for  it  those  who  were  best  known  for 
their  determined  opposition  to  the  King;  but  still  the 
King,  quite  blinded  by  his  determination  to  carry  every- 
thing before  him,  addressed  them  when  they  met,  in  a 
contemptuous  manner,  and  just  told  them  in  so  many  words 
that  he  had  only  called  them  together  because  he  wanted 
money.  The  Parliament,  strong  enough  and  resolute 
enough  to  know  that  they  would  lower  his  tone,  cared  little 
for  what  he  said,  and  laid  before  him  one  of  the  great  doc- 
uments of  history,  which  is  called  the  Petition  of  Right, 
requiring  that  the  free  men  of  England  should  no  longer  be 
called  upon  to  lend  the  King  money,  and  should  no  longer 
be  pressed  or  imprisoned  for  refusing  to  do  so ;  further,  that 
the  free  men  of  England  should  no  longer  be  seized  by  the 
King's  special  mandate  or  warrant,  it  being  contrary  to 
their  rights  and  liberties  and  the  laws  of  their  country. 
At  first  the  King  returned  an  answer  to  this  petition,  in 
which  he  tried  to  shirk  it  altogether;  but,  the  House  of 
Commons  then  showing  their  determination  to  go  on  with 


316  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

the  impeachment  of  Buckingham  the  King  in  alarm  returned 
an  answer,  giving  his  consent  to  all  that  was  required  of 
him.  He  not  only  afterwards  departed  from  his  word  and 
honour  on  these  points,  over  and  over  again,  but,  at  this 
very  time,  he  did  the  mean  and  dissembling  act  of  publish- 
ing his  first  answer  and  not  his  second — merely  that  the 
people  might  suppose  that  the  Parliament  had  not  got  the 
better  of  him. 

That  pestilent  Buckingham,  to  gratify  his  own  wounded 
vanity,  had  by  this  time  involved  the  country  in  war  with 
France,  as  well  as  with  Spain.  For  such  miserable  causes 
and  such  miserable  creatures  are  wars  sometimes  made ! 
But  he  was  destined  to  do  little  more  mischief  in  this 
world.  One  morning,  as  he  was  going  out  of  his  house  to 
his  carriage,  he  turned  to  speak  to  a  certain  Colokel  Fryer 
who  was  with  him  ;  and  he  was  violently  stabbed  with  a 
knife,  which  the  murderer  left  sticking  in  his  heart.  This 
happened  in  his  hall.  He  had  had  angry  words  up-stairs, 
just  before,  with  some  French  gentlemen,  who  were  imme- 
diately suspected  by  his  servants,  and  had  a  close  escape 
from  being  set  upon  and  killed.  In  the  midst  of  the  noise, 
the  real  murderer,  who  had  gone  to  the  kitchen  and  might 
easily  have  got  away,  drew  his  sword  and  cried  out,  "  I  am 
the  man! "  His  name  was  John  Felton,  a  Protestant  and 
a  retired  officer  in  the  army.  He  said  he  had  had  no  per- 
sonal ill-will  to  the  duke,  but  had  killed  him  as  a  curse  to 
the  country.  He  had  aimed  his  blow  well,  for  Bucking- 
ham had  only  had  time  to  cry  out,  "  Villain !  "  and  then  he 
drew  out  the  knife,  fell  against  a  table,  and  died. 

The  Council  made  a  mighty  business  of  examining  John 
Felton  about  this  murder,  though  it  was  a  plain  case  enough, 
one  would  think.  He  had  come  seventy  miles  to  do  it,  he 
told  them,  and  he  did  it  for  the  reason  he  had  declared ;  if 
they  put  him  upon  the  rack,  as  that  noble  Marquis  of 
Dorset  whom  he  saw  before  him,  had  the  goodness  to 
threaten,  he  gave  that  marquis  warning,  that  he  would  ac- 
cuse Jiim  as  his  accomplice !  The  King  was  unpleasantly 
anxious  to  have  him  racked,  nevertheless ;  but  as  the  judges 
now  found  out  that  torture  was  contrary  to  the  law  of  Eng- 
land— it  is  a  pity  they  did  not  make  the  discovery  a  little 
sooner — John  Felton  was  simply  executed  for  the  murder 
he  had  done.  A  murder  it  undoubtedly  was,  and  not  in 
the  least  to  be  defended:  though  he  had  freed  England 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND.  31/ 

from  one  of  the  most  profligate,  contemptible,  and  base 
court  favourites  to  whom  it  has  ever  yielded. 

A  very  different  man  now  arose.  This  was  Sir  Thomas 
Wentworth,  a  Yorkshire  gentleman,  who  had  sat  in  Par- 
liament for  a  long  time,  and  who  had  favoured  arbitrary 
and  haughty  principles,  but  who  had  gone  over  to  the  peo- 
ple's side  on  receiving  offence  from  Buckingham.  The 
King,  much  wanting  such  a  man — for,  besides  being  natu- 
rally favourable  to  the  King's  cause,  he  had  great  abilities 
— made  him  first  a  Baron,  and  then  a  Viscount,  and  gave 
him  high  employment,  and  won  him  most  completely. 

A  Parliament,  however,  was  still  in  existence,  and  was 
not  to  be  won.  On  the  twentieth  of  January,  one  thousand 
six  hundi-ed  and  twenty-nine,  Sir  John  Eliot,  a  great  man 
who  had  been  active  in  the  Petition  of  Right,  brought  for- 
•ward  other  strong  resolutions  against  the  King's  chief  in- 
struments, and  called  upon  the  Speaker  to  put  them  to  the 
vote.  To  this  the  Speaker  answered,  "he  was  commanded 
otherwise  by  the  King,"  and  got  up  to  leave  the  chair — 
which,  according  to  the  rules  of  the  House  of  Commons 
would  have  obliged  it  to  adjourn  without  doing  anything 
more — when  two  members,  named  Mr.  Hollis  and  Mr. 
Valentine,  held  him  down.  A  scene  of  great  confusion 
arose  among  the  members;  and  while  many  swords  were 
drawn  and  flashing  about,  the  King,  who  was  kept  in- 
formed of  all  that  was  going  on,  told  the  captain  of  his 
guard  to  go  down  to  the  House  and  force  the  doors.  The 
resolutions  Avere  by  that  time,  however,  voted,  and  the 
House  adjourned.  Sir  John  Eliot  and  those  two  mem- 
bers who  had  held  the  Speaker  down,  were  quickly  sum- 
moned before  the  Council.  As  they  claimed  it  to  be  their 
privilege  not  to  answer  out  of  Parliament  for  anything  they 
had  said  in  it,  they  were  committed  to  the  Tower.  The 
King  then  went  down  and  dissolved  the  Parliament,  in  a 
speech  wherein  he  made  mention  of  these  gentlemen  as 
"  Vipers  " — which  did  not  do  him  much  good  that  ever  I 
have  heard  of. 

As  they  refused  to  gain  their  liberty  by  saying  they  were 
sorry  for  what  they  had  done,  the  King,  always  remarkably 
unforgiving,  never  overlooked  their  ott'ence.  When  they 
demanded  to  be  brought  up  before  the  Court  of  King's 
Bench,  he  even  resorted  to  the  meanness  of  having  them 
moved  about  from  prison  to  prison,  so  that  the  writs  issued 


31S  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

for  that  purpose  should  not  legally  find  them.  At  last 
they  came  before  the  court  and  were  sentenced  to  heavy 
fines,  and  to  be  imprisoned  during  the  King's  pleasure. 
When  Sir  John  Eliot's  health  had  quite  given  way,  and  he 
so  longed  for  change  of  air  and  scene  as  to  petition  for  his 
release,  the  King  sent  back  the  answer  (worthy  of  his 
Sowship  himself)  that  the  petition  was  not  humble  enough. 
When  he  sent  another  petition  by  his  young  son,  in  which 
he  pathetically  offered  to  go  back  to  prison  when  his  health 
war  restored,  if  he  might  be  released  for  its  recovery,  the 
King  still  disregarded  it.  When  he  died  in  the  Tower, 
and  his  children  petitioned  to  be  allowed  to  take  his  body 
down  to  Cornwall,  there  to  lay  it  among  the  ashes  of  his 
forefathers,  the  King  returned  for  answer,  "  Let  Sir  John 
Eliot's  body  be  buried  in  the  church  of  that  parish  where 
he  died."  All  this  was  like  a  very  little  King  indeed,  I 
think. 

And  now,  for  twelve  long  years,  steadily  pursuing  his 
design  of  setting  himself  up  and  putting  the  people  down, 
the  King  called  no  Parliament;  but  ruled  without  one.  If 
twelve  thousand  volumes  were  written  in  his  praise  (as 
a  good  many  have  been)  it  would  still  remain  a  fact,  im- 
possible to  be  denied,  that  for  twelve  years  King  Chai'les 
the  First  reigned  in  England  unlawfully  and  despotically, 
seized  upon  his  subjects'  goods  and  money  at  his  pleasure, 
and  punished  according  to  his  unbridled  will  all  who  ven- 
tured to  oppose  him.  It  is  a  fashion  with  some  people  to 
think  that  this  King's  career  was  cut  short;  but  I  must 
say  myself  that  I  think  he  ran  a  pretty  long  one, 

William  Laud,  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  was  the 
King's  right-hand  man  in  the  religious  part  of  the  putting 
down  of  the  people's  liberties.  Laud,  who  was  a  sincere 
man,  of  large  learning  but  small  sense — for  the  two  things 
somtimes  go  together  in  very  different  quantities — though 
a  Protestant,  held  opinions  so  near  those  of  the  Catholics, 
that  the  Pope  wanted  to  make  a  Cardinal  of  him,  if  he 
would  have  accepted  that  favour.  He  looked  upon  vows, 
robes,  lighted  candles,  images,  and  so  forth,  as  amazingly 
important  in  religious  ceremonies;  and  he  brought  in  an 
immensity  of  bowing  and  candle-snuffing.  He  also  regard- 
ed archbishops  and  bishops  as  a  sort  of  miraculous  persons, 
and  was  inveterate  in  the  last  degree  against  any  who 
thought  otherwise.     Accordingly,  he   offered  up  thanka 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  319 

to  Heaven,  and  was  in  a  state  of  much  pious  pleasure, 
when  a  Scotch  clergyman  named  Leighton,  was  pilloried, 
whipped,  branded  in  the  cheek,  and  had  one  of  his  ears  cut 
off  and  one  of  his  nostrils  slit,  for  calling  bishops  trumpery 
and  the  inventions  of  men.  He  originated  on  a  Sunday 
morning  the  prosecution  of  William  Prynne,  a  barrister 
who  was  of  similar  opinions,  and  who  was  fined  a  thousand 
pounds;  who  was  pilloried;  who  had  his  ears  cut  off  on 
two  occasions — one  ear  at  a  time — and  who  was  imprisoned 
for  life.  He  highly  approved  of  the  punishment  of  Doctor 
Bastwick,  a  physician;  who  was  also  fined  a  thousand 
pounds ;  and  who  afterwards  had  his  ears  cut  off,  and  was 
imprisoned  for  life.  These  were  gentle  methods  of  persua- 
sion, some  will  tell  you:  I  think,  they  were  rather  calcu- 
lated to  be  alarming  to  the  people. 

In  the  money  part  of  the  putting  down  of  the  people's 
liberties,  the  King  was  equally  gentle,  as  some  will  tell 
you :  as  I  think,  equally  alarming.  He  levied  those  duties 
of  tonnage  and  poundage,  and  increased  them  as  he  thought 
fit.  He  granted  monopolies  to  companies  of  merchants  on 
their  paying  him  for  them,  notwithstanding  the  great  com- 
plaints that  had,  for  years  and  years,  been  made  on  the 
subject  of  monopolies.  He  fined  the  people  for  disobeying 
proclamations  issued  by  his  Sowship  in  direct  violation  of 
law.  He  revived  the  detested  Forest  laws,  and  took  pri- 
vate property  to  himself  as  his  forest  right.  Above  all,  he 
determined  to  have  what  was  called  Ship  Money ;  that  is 
to  say,  money  for  the  support  of  the  fleet — not  only  from 
the  seaports,  but  from  all  the  counties  of  England :  hav- 
ing found  out  that,  in  some  ancient  time  or  other,  all  the 
counties  paid  it.  The  grievance  of  this  ship  money  being 
somewhat  too  strong,  John  Chambers,  a  citizen  of  London, 
refused  to  pay  his  part  of  it.  For  this  the  Lord  Mayor 
ordered  John  Chambers  to  prison,  and  for  that  John  Cham- 
bers brought  a  suit  against  the  Lord  Mayor.  Lord  Say, 
also,  behaved  like  a  real  nobleman,  and  declared  he  would 
not  pay.  But,  the  sturdiest  and  best  opponent  of  the  ship 
money  was  John"  Hampden,  a  gentleman  of  Buckingham- 
shire, who  had  sat  among  the  "  vipers "  in  the  House  of 
Commons  when  there  was  such  a  thing,  and  who  had  been 
the  bosom  friend  of  Sir  John  Eliot.  This  case  was  tried 
before  the  twelve  judges  in  the  Court  of  Exchequer,  and 
again  the  King's  lawyers  said  it  was  impossible  that  ship 


320  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

money  could  be  wrong,  because  the  King  could  do  no 
wrong,  however  hard  he  tried — and  he  really  did  try  very 
hard  during  these  twelve  years.  Seven  of  the  judges  said 
that  was  quite  true,  and  Mr.  Hampden  was  bound  to  pay : 
five  of  the  judges  said  that  was  quite  false,  and  Mr.  Hamp- 
den was  not  bound  to  pay.  So,  the  King  triumphed  (as 
he  thought),  by  making  Hampden  the  most  popular  man  in 
England ;  where  matters  were  getting  to  that  height  now, 
that  many  honest  Englishmen  could  not  endure  their  coun- 
try, and  sailed  away  across  the  seas  to  found  a  colony  in 
Massachusetts  Bay  in  America.  It  is  said  that  Hampden 
himself  and  his  relation  Oliver  Cromwell  were  going 
with  a  company  of  such  voyagers,  and  were  actually  on 
board  ship,  when  they  were  stopped  by  a  proclamation, 
prohibiting  sea  captains  to  carry  out  such  passengers  with- 
out the  royal  license.  But  O !  it  would  have  been  well  for 
the  King  if  he  had  let  them  go ! 

This  was  the  state  of  England.  If  Laud  had  been  a  mad- 
man just  broke  loose,  he  could  not  have  done  more  mischief 
than  he  did  in  Scotland.  In  his  endeavours  (in  which  he 
was  seconded  by  the  King,  then  in  person  in  that  part  of 
his  dominions)  to  force  his  own  ideas  of  bishops,  and  his 
own  religious  forms  and  ceremonies,  upon  the  Scotch,  he 
roused  that  nation  to  a  perfect  frenzy.  They  formed  a  sol- 
emn league,  which  they  called  The  Covenant,  for  the  pres- 
ervation of  their  own  religious  forms ;  they  rose  in  arms 
throughout  the  whole  country;  they  summoned  all  their 
men  to  prayers  and  sermons  twice  a  day  by  beat  of  drum ; 
they  sang  psalms,  in  which  they  compared  their  enemies  to 
all  the  evil  spirits  that  ever  were  heard  of;  and  they  sol- 
emnly vowed  to  smite. them  with  the  sword.  At  first  the 
King  tried  force,  then  treaty,  then  a  Scottish  Parliament 
which  did  not  answer  at  all.  Then  he  tried  the  Earl  of 
Strafford,  formerly  Sir  Thomas  Wentworth;  who,  as 
Lord  Wentworth,  had  been  governing  Ireland.  He^  too, 
had  carried  it  with  a  very  high  hand  there,  though  to  the 
benefit  and  prosperity  of  that  country. 

Strafford  and  Laud  were  for  conquering  the  Scottish  peo- 
ple by  force  of  arms.  Other  lords  who  were  taken  into 
council,  recommended  that  a  Parliament  should  at  last  be 
called;  to  which  the  King  unwillingly  consented.  So,  on 
the  thirteenth  of  April,  one  thousand  six  hundred  and 
forty,  that  then  strange  sight,  a  Parliament,  was  seen  at 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  321 

Westminster.  It  is  called  the  Short  Parliament,  for  it 
lasted  a  very  little  while.  While  the  members  were  all 
looking  at  one  another,  doubtful  who  would  dare  to  speak, 
Mb.  Pym  arose  and  set  forth  all  that  the  King  had  done 
unlawfully  during  the  past  twelve  years,  and  what  was  the 
position  to  which  England  was  reduced.  This  great  exam- 
ple set,  other  members  took  courage  and  spoke  the  truth 
freely,  though  with  great  patience  and  moderation.  The 
King,  a  little  frightened,  sent  to  say  that  if  they  would 
grant  him  a  certain  sum  on  certain  terms,  no  more  ship 
money  should  be  raised.  They  debated  the  matter  for  two 
days ;  and  then,  as  they  would  not  give  him  all  he  asked 
without  promise  or  inquiry,  he  dissolved  them. 

But  they  knew  very  well  that  he  must  have  a  Parliament 
now;  and  he  began  to  make  that  discovery  too,  though 
rather  late  in  the  day.  Wherefore,  on  the  twenty-fourth 
of  September,  being  then  at  York  with  an  army  collected 
against  the  Scottish  people,  but  his  own  men  sullen  and 
discontented  like  the  rest  of  the  nation,  the  King  told  the 
great  Council  of  the  Lords,  whom  he  had  called  to  meet 
him  there,  that  he  would  summon  another  Parliament  to 
assemble  on  the  thii-d  of  November.  The  soldiers  of  the 
Covenant  had  now  forced  their  way  into  England  and  had 
taken  possession  of  the  northern  counties,  where  the  coals 
are  got.  As  it  would  never  do  to  be  without  coals,  and  as 
the  King's  troops  could  make  no  head  against  the  Covenant- 
ers so  full  of  gloomy  zeal,  a  truce  was  made,  and  a  treaty 
with  Scotland  was  taken  into  consideration.  Meanwhile 
the  northern  counties  paid  the  Covenanters  to  leave  the 
coals  alone,  and  keep  quiet. 

We  have  now  disposed  of  the  Short  Parliament.  We 
have  next  to  see  what  memorable  things  were  done  by  the 
Long  one. 

SECOND    PABT. 

The  Long  Parliament  assembled  on  the  third  of  Novem- 
ber, one  thousand  six  hundred  and  forty-one.  That  day 
week  the  Earl  of  Strafford  arrived  from  York,  very  sensible 
that  the  spirited  and  determined  men  who  formed  that  Par- 
liament were  no  friends  towards  him,  who  had  not  only 
deserted  the  cause  of  the  people,  but  who  had  on  all  occa- 
sions opposed  himself  to  their  liberties.  The  King  told 
him,  for  his  comfort,  that  the  Parliament "  should  not  hurt 
21 


322  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

one  hair  of  his  head. "  But,  on  the  very  next  day  Mr. 
Pym,  in  the  House  of  Commons,  and  with  great  solemnity, 
impeached  the  Earl  of  Straiford  as  a  traitor.  He  was  im- 
mediately taken  into  custody  and  fell  from  his  proud 
height. 

It  was  the  twenty-second  of  March  before  he  was  brought 
to  trial  in  Westminster  Hall ;  where,  although  he  was  very 
ill  and  suffered  great  pain,  he  defended  himself  with  such 
ability  and  majesty,  that  it  was  doubtful  whether  he  would 
not  get  the  best  of  it.  But  on  the  thirteenth  day  of  the 
trial,  Pym  produced  in  the  House  of  Commons  a  copy  of 
some  notes  of  a  council,  found  by  young  Sib  Harry  Vane 
in  a  red  velvet  cabinet  belonging  to  his  father  (Secretary 
Vane,  who  sat  at  the  council-table  with  the  earl),  in  which 
Strafford  had  distinctly  told  the  King  that  he  was  free 
from  all  rules  and  obligations  of  government,  and  might  do 
with  his  people  whatever  he  liked;  and  in  which  he  had 
added — "You  have  an  army  in  Ireland  that  you  may  em- 
ploy to  reduce  tliis  kingdom  to  obedience."  It  was  not 
clear  whether  by  the  words  "this  kingdom,"  he  had  really 
meant  England  or  Scotland ;  but  the  Paliament  contended 
that  he  meant  England,  and  this  was  treason.  At  the 
same  sitting  of  the  House  of  Commons  it  was  resolved  to 
bring  in  a  bill  of  attainder  declaring  the  treason  to  have 
been  committed :  in  preference  to  proceeding  with  the  trial 
by  impeachment,  which  would  have  required  the  treason  to 
be  proved. 

So,  a  bill  was  brought  in  at  once,  was  carried  through  the 
House  of  Commons  by  a  large  majority,  and  was  sent  up  to 
the  House  of  Lords.  While  it  was  still  uncertain  whether 
the  House  of  Lords  would  pass  it  and  the  King  consent  to 
it,  Pym  disclosed  to  the  House  of  Commons  that  the  King 
and  Queen  had  both  been  plotting  with  the  officers  of  the 
army  to  bring  up  the  soldiers  and  control  the  Parliament, 
and  also  to  introduce  two  hundred  soldiers  into  the  Tower 
of  London  to  effect  the  earl's  escape.  The  plotting  with 
the  army  was  revealed  by  one  George  Goring,  the  son  of 
a  lord  of  that  name :  a  bad  fellow  who  was  one  of  the  origi- 
nal plotters,  and  turned  traitor.  The  King  had  actually 
given  his  warrant  for  the  admission  of  the  two  hundred 
men  into  the  Tower,  and  they  would  have  got  in  too,  but 
for  the  refusal  of  the  governor — a  sturdy  Scotchman  of  the 
name  of  Balfour — to  admit  them.     These  matters  being 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  323 

made  public,  great  numbers  of  people  began  to  riot  outside 
the  Houses  of  Parliament,  and  to  cry  out  for  the  execution 
of  the  Earl  of  Strafford,  as  one  of  the  King's  chief  instru- 
ments against  them.  The  bill  passed  the  House  of  Lords 
while  the  people  were  in  this  state  of  agitation,  and  was 
laid  before  the  King  for  his  assent,  together  with  another 
bill  declaring  that  the  Parliament  then  assembled  should 
not  be  dissolved  or  adjourned  without  their  own  consent. 
The  King — not  unwilling  to  save  a  faithful  servant,  though 
he  had  no  great  attachment  for  him — was  in  some  doubt 
what  to  do ;  but  he  gave  his  consent  to  both  bills,  although 
he  in  his  heart  believed  that  the  bill  against  the  Earl  of 
Strafford  was  unlawful  and  unjust.  The  Earl  had  written 
to  him,  telling  him  that  he  was  willing  to  die  for  his  sake. 
But  he  had  not  expected  that  his  royal  master  would  take 
him  at  his  word  quite  so  readily ;  for,  when  he  heard  his 
doom,  he  laid  his  hand  upon  his  heart,  and  said,  "  Put  not 
your  trust  in  Prmces ! " 

The  King,  who  never  could  be  straightforward  and  plain, 
through  one  single  day  or  through  one  single  sheet  of  paper, 
wrote  a  letter  to  the  Lords,  and  sent  it  by  the  young  Prince 
of  Wales,  entreating  them  to  prevail  with  the  Commons 
that "  that  unfortunate  man  should  fulfil  the  natural  course 
of  his  life  in  a  close  imprisonment."  In  a  postscript  to  the 
very  same  letter,  he  added,  "  If  he  must  die,  it  were  char- 
ity to  reprieve  him  till  Saturday."  If  there  had  been  any 
doubt  of  his  fate,  this  weakness  and  meanness  would  have 
settled  it.  The  very  next  day,  which  was  the  twelfth  of 
May,  he  was  brought  out  to  be  beheaded  on  Tower  Hill. 

Archbishop  Laud,  who  had  been  so  fond  of  having  peo- 
ple's ears  cropped  off  and  their  noses  slit,  was  now  con- 
fined in  the  Tower  too ;  and  when  the  earl  went  by  his  win- 
dow to  his  death,  he  was  there,  at  his  request,  to  give  him 
his  blessing.  They  had  been  great  friends  in  the  King's 
cause,  and  the  earl  had  written  to  him  in  the  days  of  their 
power  that  he  thought  it  would  be  an  admirable  thing  to 
have  Mr.  Hampden  publicly  whipped  for  refusing  to  pay 
the  ship  money.  However,  those  high  and  mighty  doings 
were  over  now,  and  the  earl  went  his  way  to  death  with 
dignity  and  heroism.  The  governor  wished  him  to  get  into 
a  coach  at  the  Tower  gate,  for  fear  the  people  should  tear 
him  to  pieces ;  but  he  said  it  was  all  one  to  him  whether  he 
died  by  the  axe  or  by  the  people's  hands.     So,  he  walked, 


324  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

with  a  firm  tread  and  a  stately  look,  and  sometimes  pulled 
off  his  hat  to  them  as  he  passed  along.  They  were  pro- 
foundly quiet.  He  made  a  speech  on  the  scaffold  from 
some  notes  he  had  prepared  (the  paper  was  found  lying 
there  after  his  head  was  struck  off),  and  one  blow  of  the 
axe  killed  him,  in  the  forty-ninth  year  of  his  age. 

This  bold  and  daring  act,  the  Parliament  accompanied  by 
other  famous  measures,  all  originating  (as  even  this  did)  in 
the  King's  having  so  grossly  and  so  long  abused  his  power. 
The  name  of  Delinquents  was  applied  to  all  sheriffs  and 
other  officers  who  had  been  concerned  in  raising  the  ship 
money,  or  any  other  money,  from  the  people,  in  an  unlaw- 
ful manner;  the  Hampden  judgment  was  reversed;  the 
judges  who  had  decided  against  Hampden  were  called  upon 
to  give  large  securities  that  they  would  take  such  conse- 
quences as  Parliament  might  impose  upon  them;  and  one 
was  arrested  as  he  sat  in  High  Court,  and  carried  off  to 
prison.  Laud  was  impeached;  the  unfortunate  victims 
whose  ears  had  been  cropped  and  whose  noses  had  been 
slit,  were  brought  out  of  prison  in  triumph;  and  a  bill  was 
passed  declaring  that  a  Parliament  should  be  called  every 
third  year,  and  that  if  the  King  and  the  King's  officers  did 
not  call  it,  the  people  should  assemble  of  themselves  and 
summon  it,  as  of  their  own  right  and  power.  Great  illu- 
minations and  rejoicings  took  place  over  all  these  things, 
and  the  country  was  wildly  excited.  That  the  Parliament 
took  advantage  of  this  excitement  and  stirred  them  up  by 
every  means,  there  is  no  doubt;  but  you  are  always  to  re- 
member those  twelve  long  years,  during  which  the  King  had 
tried  so  hard  whether  he  really  could  do  any  wrong  or 
not. 

All  this  time  there  was  a  great  religious  outcry  against  ' 
the  right  of  the  Bishops  to  sit  in  Parliament;  to  which  the 
Scottish  people  particularly  objected.  The  English  were 
divided  on  this  subject,  and,  partly  on  this  account  and 
partly  because  they  had  had  foolish  expectations  that  the 
Parliament  would  be  able  to  take  off  nearly  all  the  taxes, 
numbers  of  them  sometimes  wavered  and  inclined  towards 
the  King. 

I  believe  myself,  that  if,  at  this  or  almost  any  other  pe- 
riod of  his  life,  the  King  could  have  been  trusted  by  any 
man  not  out  of  his  senses,  he  might  have  saved  himself 
and  kept  his  throne.     But,  on  the  English  army  being  dis- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  325 

banded,  he  plotted  with  the  officers  again,  as  he  had  done 
before,  and  established  the  fact  beyond  all  doubt  by  put- 
ting his  signature  of  approval  to  a  petition  against  the  Par- 
liamentary leaders,  which  was  drawn  up  by  certain  officers. 
When  the  Scottish  army  was  disbanded,  he  went  to  Edin- 
burgh in  four  days — which  was  going  very  fast  at  that 
time — to  plot  again,  and  so  darkly  too,  that  it  is  difficult 
to  decide  what  his  whole  object  was.  Some  suppose  that 
he  wanted  to  gain  over  the  Scottish  Parliament,  as  he  did 
in  fact  gain  over,  by  presents  and  favours,  many  Scottish 
lords  and  men  of  power.  Some  thmk  that  he  went  to  get 
proofs  against  the  Parliamentary  leaders  in  England  of 
their  having  treasonably  invited  the  Scottish  people  to 
come  and  help  them.  With  whatever  object  he  went  to 
Scotland,  he  did  little  good  by  going.  At  the  instigation 
of  the  Earl  of  Montrose,  a  desperate  man  who  was  then 
in  prison  for  plotting,  he  tried  to  kidnap  three  Scottish 
lords  who  escaped.  A  committee  of  the  Parliament  at 
home,  who  had  followed  to  watch  him,  writing  an  account 
of  this  Incident,  as  it  was  called,  to  the  Parliament,  the 
Parliament  made  a  fresh  stir  about  it;  were,  or  feigned  to 
be,  much  alarmed  for  themselves;  and  wrote  to  the  Earl 
OF  Essex,  the  commander-in-chief,  for  a  guard  to  protect 
them. 

It  is  not  absolutely  proved  that  the  King  plotted  in  Ire- 
land besides,  but  it  is  very  probable  that  he  did,  and  that 
the  Queen  did,  and  that  he  had  some  wild  hope  of  gaining 
the  Irish  people  over  to  his  side  by  favouring  a  rise  among 
them.  Whether  or  no,  they  did  rise  in  a  most  brutal  and 
savage  rebellion;  in  which,  encouraged  by  their  priests, 
they  committed  such  atrocities  upon  numbers  of  the  Eng- 
lish, of  both  sexes  and  of  all  ages,  as  nobody  could  believe, 
but  for  their  being  related  on  oath  by  eye-witnesses. 
Whether  one  hundred  thousand  or  two  hundred  thousand 
Protestants  were  murdered  in  this  outbreak,  is  uncertain; 
but,  that  it  was  as  ruthless  and  barbarous  an  outbreak  as 
ever  was  known  among  any  savage  people,  is  certain. 

The  King  came  home  from  Scotland,  determined  to  make 
a  great  struggle  for  his  lost  power.  Pie  believed  that, 
through  his  presents  and  favours,  Scotland  would  take  no 
part  against  him;  and  the  Lord  Mayor  of  London  received 
him  with  such  a  magnificent  dinner  that  he  thought  he  must 
have  become  popular  again  in  England.     It  would  take  a 


526  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

good  many  Lord  Mayors,  however,  to  make  a  people,  and 

the  King  soon  found  himself  mistaken. 

Not  so  soon,  though,  but  that  there  was  a  great  opposi- 
tion in  the  Parliament  to  a  celebrated  paper  put  forth  by 
Pym  and  Hampden  and  the  rest,  called  "The  Remon- 
strance," which  set  forth  all  the  illegal  acts  that  the  King 
had  ever  done,  but  politely  laid  the  blame  of  them  on  his 
bad  advisers.  Even  when  it  was  passed  and  presented  to 
him,  the  King  still  thought  himself  strong  enough  to  dis- 
charge Balfour  from  his  command  in  the  Tower,  and  to  put 
in  his  place  a  man  of  bad  character;  to  whom  the  Commons 
instantly  objected,  and  whom  he  was  obliged  to  abandon. 
At  this  time,  the  old  outcry  about  the  Bishops  became 
louder  than  ever,  and  the  old  Archbishop  of  York  was  so 
near  being  murdered  as  he  went  down  to  the  House  of 
Lords — being  laid  hold  of  by  the  mob  and  violently  knocked 
about,  in  return  for  very  foolishly  scolding  a  shrill  boy 
who  was  yelping  out  "  No  Bishops ! " — that  he  sent  for  all 
the  Bishops  who  Avere  in  town,  and  proposed  to  them  to 
sign  a  declaration  that,  as  they  could  no  longer  without 
danger  to  their  lives  attend  their  duty  in  Parliament,  they 
protested  against  the  lawfulness  of  everything  done  in  their 
absence.  This  they  asked  the  King  to  send  to  the  House 
of  Lords,  which  he  did.  Then  the  House  of  Commons  im- 
peached the  whole  party  of  Bishops  and  sent  them  off  to 
the  Tower. 

Taking  no  warning  from  this;  but  encouraged  by  there 
being  a  moderate  party  in  the  Parliament  who  objected  to 
these  strong  measures,  the  King,  on  the  third  of  January, 
one  thousand  six  hundred  and  forty-two,  took  the  rashest 
step  that  ever  was  taken  by  mortal  man. 

Of  his  own  accord  and  without  advice,  he  sent  the  At- 
torney-General to  the  House  of  Lords,  to  accuse  of  treason 
certain  members  of  Parliament  who  as  popular  leaders  were 
the  most  obnoxious  to  him;  Lokd  Kimbolton,  Sir  Ar- 
thur Haselrig,  Denzil  Hollis,  John  Pym  (they  used 
to  call  him  King  Pym,  he  possessed  such  power  and  looked 
so  big),  John  Hampden,  and  William  Strode.  The 
houses  of  those  members  he  caused  to  be  entered,  and  their 
papers  to  be  sealed  up.  At  the  same  time,  he  sent  a  mes- 
senger to  the  House  of  Commons  demanding  to  have  the 
five  gentlemen  who  were  members  of  that  House  immedi- 
ately produced.    To  this  the  House  replied  'hat  they  should 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND.  327 

appear  as  soon  as  there  was  any  legal  charge  against  them, 
and  immediately  adjourned. 

Next  day,  the  House  of  Commons  send  into  the  City  to 
let  the  Lord  Mayor  know  that  their  privileges  are  invaded 
by  the  King,  and  that  there  is  no  safety  for  anybody  or 
anything.  Then,  when  the  live  members  are  gone  out  of 
the  way,  down  comes  the  King  himself,  with  all  his  guard 
and  from  two  to  three  hundred  gentlemen  and  soldiers,  of 
whom  the  greater  part  were  armed.  These  he  leaves  in  the 
hall;  and  then,  with  his  nephew  at  his  side,  goes  into  the 
House,  takes  off  his  hat,  and  walks  up  to  the  Speaker's 
chair.  The  Speaker  leaves  it,  the  King  stands  in  front  of 
it,  looks  about  him  steadily  for  a  little  while,  and  says  he 
has  come  for  those  five  members.  No  one  speaks,  and  then 
he  calls  John  Pym  by  name.  No  one  speaks,  and  then  he 
calls  Denzil  HoUis  by  name.  No  one  speaks,  and  then 
he  asks  the  Speaker  of  the  House  where  those  five 
members  are?  The  Speaker,  answering  on  his  knee,  nobly 
replies  that  he  is  the  servant  of  that  House,  and  that  he  has 
neither  eyes  to  see,  nor  tongue  to  speak,  anything  but  what 
the  House  commands  him.  Upon  this,  the  King,  beaten 
from  that  time  ever  more,  replies  that  he  will  seek  them  him- 
self, for  they  have  committed  treason ;  and  goes  out,  with 
his  hat  in  his  hand,  amid  some  audible  murmurs  from  the 
members. 

No  words  can  describe  the  hurry  that  arose  out  of  doors 
when  all  this  was  known.  The  five  members  had  gone  for 
safety  to  a  house  in  Colemen-street,  in  the  City,  where 
tliey  were  guarded  all  night;  and  indeed  the  whole  city 
watched  in  arms  like  an  army.  At  ten  o'clock  in  the 
morning,  the  King  already  frightened  at  what  he  had  done, 
came  to  the  Guildhall,  with  only  half  a  dozen  lords,  and 
made  a  speech  to  the  people,  hoping  they  would  not  shelter 
those  whom  he  accused  of  treason.  Next  day,  he  issued  a 
proclamation  for  the  apprehension  of  the  five  members;  but 
the  Parliament  minded  it  so  little  that  they  made  great 
arrangements  for  having  them  brought  down  to  Westmin- 
ster in  great  state,  five  days  afterwards.  The  King  was  so 
alarmed  now  at  his  own  imprudence,  if  not  for  his  own 
safety,  that  he  left  his  palace  at  Whitehall,  and  went  away 
with  his  Queen  and  children  to  Hampton  Court. 

It  was  the  eleventh  of  May,  when  the  five  members  were 
carried  in  state  and  triumph  to  Westminster.     They  were 


328  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

taken  by  water.  The  river  could  not  be  seen  for  the  boats 
on  it;  and  the  live  members  were  hemmed  in  by  barges  full 
of  men  and  great  guns,  ready  to  protect  them,  at  any  cost. 
Along  the  Strand  a  large  body  of  the  train-bands  of  Lon- 
don, under  their  commander,  Skippon,  marched  to  be  ready 
to  assist  the  little  fleet.  Beyond  them,  came  a  crowd  who 
choked  the  streets^  roaring  incessantly  about  the  Bishops 
and  the  Papists,  and  crying  out  contemptuously  as  they 
passed  Whitehall,  "  What  has  become  of  the  King?  "  With 
this  great  noise  outside  the  House  of  Commons,  and  with 
great  silence  within,  Mr.  Pym  rose  and  informed  the 
House  of  the  great  kindness  with  which  they  had  been  re- 
ceived in  the  City.  Upon  that,  the  House  called  the  sher- 
iffs in  and  thanked  them,  and  requested  the  train-bands, 
under  their  commander  Skippon,  to  guard  the  House  of 
Commons  every  day.  Then,  came  four,  thousand  men  ou 
horseback  out  of  Buckinghamshire,  offering  their  services 
as  a  guard  too,  and  bearing  a  petition  to  the  King,  com- 
plaining of  the  injury  that  had  been  done  to  Mr.  Hamp- 
den, who  was  their  county  man  and  much  beloved  and 
honoured. 

When  the  King  set  off  for  Hampton  Court,  the  gentle- 
men and  soldiers  who  had  been  with  him  followed  him  out 
of  town  as  far  as  Kingstou-upon-Thames;  next  day.  Lord 
Digby  came  to  them  from  the  King  at  Hampton  Court,  in 
his  coach  and  six,  to  inform  them  that  the  King  accepted 
their  protection.  This,  the  Parliament  said,  was  making 
war  against  the  kingdom ,  and  Lord  Digby  fled  abroad.  The 
Parliament  then  immediately  applied  themselves  to  getting 
hold  of  the  military  power  of  the  country,  well  knowing 
that  the  King  was  already  trying  hard  to  use  it  against 
them,  and  that  he  had  secretly  sent  the  Earl  of  Newcastle 
to  Hull,  to  secure  a  valuable  magazine  of  arms  and  gun- 
powder that  was  there.  In  those  times,  every  county  had 
its  own  magazines  of  arms  and  powder,  for  its  own  train- 
bands or  militia;  so,  the  Parliament  brought  in  a  bill  claim- 
ing the  right  (which  up  to  this  time  had  belonged  to  the 
King)  of  appointing  the  Lord  Lieutenants  of  counties,  who 
commanded  these  train-bands;  also,  of  having  all  the  forts, 
castles,  and  garrisons  in  the  kingdom,  put  into  the  hands 
of  such  governors  as  they,  the  Parliament,  could  confide  in. 
It  also  passed  a  law  depriving  the  Bishops  of  their  votes. 
The   King   gave   his  assent  to   that  bill,  but  would  not 


A  CHILD'S   HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  329 

abandon  the  right  of  appointing  the  Lord  Lieutenants, 
though  he  said  he  was  willing  to  appoint  such  as  might  be 
suggested  to  him  by  the  Parliament.  When  the  Earl  of 
Pembroke  asked  him  whether  he  would  not  give  way  on 
that  question  for  a  time,  he  said,  "By  God!  not  for  one 
hour !  "  and  upon  this  he  and  the  Parliament  went  to  war. 

His  young  daughter  was  betrothed  to  the  Prince  of 
Orange.  On  pretence  of  taking  her  to  the  country  of  her 
future  husband,  the  Queen  was  already  got  safely  away  to 
Holland,  there  to  pawn  the  Crown  jewels  for  money  to 
raise  an  army  on  the  King's  side.  The  Lord  Admiral  be- 
ing sick,  the  House  of  Commons  now  named  the  Earl  of 
Warwick  to  hold  his  place  for  a  year.  The  King  named 
another  gentleman;  the  House  of  Commons  took  its  own 
way,  and  the  Earl  of  Warwick  became  Lord  Admiral  with- 
out the  King's  consent.  The  Parliament  sent  orders  down 
to  Hull  to  have  that  magazine  removed  to  London;  the 
King  went  down  to  Hull  to  take  it  himself.  The  citizens 
would  not  admit  him  into  the  town,  and  the  governor 
would  not  admit  him  into  the  castle.  The  Parliament  re- 
solved that  whatever  the  two  Houses  passed,  and  the  King 
would  not  consent  to,  should  be  called  an  Oedinance,  and 
should  be  as  much  a  law  as  if  he  did  consent  to  it.  The 
King  protested  against  this,  and  gave  notice  that  these  or- 
dinances were  not  to  be  obeyed.  The  King,  attended  by 
the  majority  of  the  House  of  Peers,  and  by  many  members 
of  the  House  of  Commons,  established  himself  at  York, 
The  Chancellor  went  to  him  with  the  Great  Seal,  and  the 
Parliament  made  a  new  Great  Seal.  The  Queen  sent  over 
a  ship  full  of  arms  and  ammunition,  and  the  King  issued 
letters  to  borrow  money  at  high  interest.  The  Parliament 
raised  twenty  reghnehts  of  foot  and  seventy-five  troops 
of  horse;  and  the  people  willingly  aided  them  with  their 
money,  plate,  jewellery,  and  trinkets — the  married  women 
even  with  their  wedding-rings.  Every  member  of  Parlia- 
ment wlio  could  raise  a  troop  or  a  regiment  in  his  own  part 
of  the  country,  dressed  it  according  to  his  taste  and  in  his 
own  colours,  and  commanded  it.  Foremost  among  them 
all,  Oliver  Cromwell  raised  a  troop  of  horse — thoroughly 
in  earnest  and  thoroughly  well  armed — who  were,  perhaps, 
the  best  soldiers  that  ever  were  seen. 

In  some  of  their  proceedings,  this  famous  Parliament 
passed  the  bounds  of  previous  law  and  custom,  yielded  to 


330  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

and  favoured  riotous  assemblages  of  the  people,  and  acted 
tyrannically  in  imprisoning  some  who  differed  from  the 
popular  leaders.  But  again,  you  are  always  to  remember 
that  the  twelve  years  during  which  the  King  had  had  his 
own  wilful  way,  had  gone  before;  and  that  nothing  could 
make  the  times  what  they  might,  could,  would,  or  should 
have  been,  if  those  twelve  years  had  never  rolled  away. 

THIRD    PART. 

I  shall  not  try  to  relate  the  particulars  of  the  great  civil 
war  between  King  Charles  the  First  and  the  Long  Parlia- 
ment, which  lasted  nearly  four  years,  and  a  full  account  of 
which  would  fill  many  large  books.  It  was  a  sad  thing 
that  Englishmen  should  once  more  be  fighting  against  Eng- 
lishmen on  English  ground;  but,  it  is  some  consolation  to 
know  that  on  both  sides  there  was  great  humanity,  forbear- 
ance, and  honour.  The  soldiers  of  the  Parliament  were 
far  more  remarkable  for  these  good  qualities  than  the  sol- 
diers of  the  King  (many  of  whom  fought  for  mere  pay 
without  much  caring  for  the  cause)  ;  but  those  of  the  nobil- 
ity and  gentry  who  were  on  the  King's  side  were  so  brave, 
and  so  faithful  to  him,  that  their  conduct  cannot  but  com- 
mand our  highest  admiration.  Among  them  were  great 
numbers  of  Catholics,  who  took  the  royal  side  because  the 
Queen  was  so  strongly  of  their  persuasion. 

The  King  might  have  distinguished  some  of  these  gallant 
spirits,  if  he  had  been  as  generous  a  spirit  himself,  by 
giving  them  the  command  of  his  army.  Instead  of  that, 
however,  true  to  his  old  high  notions  of  royalty,  he  en- 
trusted it  to  his  two  nephews,  Princk  Rupert  and  Prince 
Maurice,  who  were  of  royal  blood  and  came  over  from 
abroad  to  help  him.  It  might  have  been  better  for  him  if 
they  had  stayed  away;  since  Prince  Rupert  was  an  impet- 
uous hot-headed  fellow,  whose  only  idea  was  to  dash  into 
battle  at  all  times  and  seasons,  and  lay  about  him. 

The  general-in-chief  of  the  Parliamentary  army  was  the 
Earl  of  Essex,  a  gentleman  of  honour  and  an  excellent  sol- 
dier. A  little  while  before  the  war  broke  out,  there  had 
been  some  rioting  at  Westminster  between  certain  officious 
law  students  and  noisy  soldiers,  and  the  shopkeepers  and 
their  apprentices,  and  the  geueral  people  in  the  streets. 
At  that  time  the  King's  friends  called  the  crowd.  Round' 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  331 

heads,  because  the  apprentices  wore  short  hair;  the  crowd, 
in  return,  called  their  opponents  Cavaliers,  meaning  that 
they  were  a  blustering  set,  who  pretended  to  be  very  mili- 
tary. These  two  words  now  began  to  be  used  to  distin- 
guish the  two  sides  in  the  civil  war.  The  Royalists  also 
called  the  Parliamentary  men  Rebels  and  Rogues,  while 
the  Parliamentary  men  called  them  Malignants,  and  spoke 
of  themselves  as  the  Godly,  the  Honest,  and  so  forth. 

The  war  broke  out  at  Portsmouth,  where  that  double 
traitor  Goring  had  again  gone  over  to  the  King  and  was 
besieged  by  the  Parliamentary  troops.  Upon  this,  the 
King  proclaimed  the  Earl  of  Essex  and  the  officers  serving 
under  him,  traitors,  and  called  upon  his  loyal  subjects  to 
meet  him  in  arms  at  Nottingham  on  the  twenty-fifth  of 
August.  But  his  loyal  subjects  came  about  him  in  scanty 
numbers,  and  it  was  a  windy  gloomy  day,  and  the  Royal 
Standard  got  blown  down,  and  the  whole  affair  was  very 
melancholy.  The  chief  engagements  after  this,  took  place 
in  the  vale  of  the  Red  Horse  near  Banbury,  at  Brentford, 
at  Devizes,  at  Chalgrave  Field  (where  Mr.  Hampden  was 
80  sorely  wounded  while  fighting  at  the  head  of  his  men, 
that  he  died  within  a  week),  at  Newbury  (in  which  battle 
LoKD  Falkland,  one  of  the  best  noblemen  on  the  King's 
side,  was  killed),  at  Leicester,  at  Naseby,  at  Winchester, 
at  Marston  Moor  near  York,  at  Newcastle,  and  in  many 
other  parts  of  England  and  Scotland.  These  battles  were 
attended  with  various  successes.  At  one  time,  the  King 
was  victorious;  at  another  time,  the  Parliament.  But 
almost  all  the  great  and  busy  towns  were  against  the  King; 
and  when  it  was  considered  necessary  to  fortify  London, 
all  ranks  of  people,  from  labouring  men  and  women,  up  to 
lords  and  ladies,  worked  hard  together  with  heartiness  and 
good  will.  The  most  distinguished  leaders  on  the  Parlia- 
mentary side  were  Hampden,  Sir  Thomas  Fairfax,  and, 
above  all,  Oliver  Cromwell,  and  his  son-in-law  Iretok. 

During  the  whole  of  this  war,  the  people,  to  whom  it  was 
very  expensive  and  irksome,  and  to  whom  it  was  made  the 
more  distressing  by  almost  every  family  being  divided — 
some  of  its  members  attaching  themselves  to  one  side  and 
some  to  the  other — were  over  and  over  again  most  anxious 
for  peace.  So  were  some  of  the  best  men  in  each  cause. 
Accordingly,  treaties  of  peace  were  discussed  between  com' 
missioners  from  the  Parliament  and  the  Kingj  at  York,  at 


332  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

Oxford  (where  the  King  held  a  little  Parliament  of  his 
own),  and  at  Uxbridge.  But  they  came  to  nothing.  In 
all  these  negotiations,  and  in  all  his  difficulties,  the  King 
showed  himself  at  his  best.  He  was  courageous,  cool,  self- 
possessed,  and  clever;  but,  the  old  taint,  of  his  character 
was  always  in  him,  and  he  was  never  for  one  single  mo- 
ment to  be  trusted.  Lord  Clarendon,  the  historian,  one  of 
his.highest  adjnirers,  supposes  that  he  had  unhappily  prom- 
ised the  Queen  never  to  make  peace  without  her  consent, 
and  that  this  must  often  be  taken  as  his  excuse.  He  never 
kept  his  word  from  night  to  morning.  He  signed  a  cessa- 
tion of  hostilities  with  the  blood-stained  Irish  rebels  for 
a  sum  of  money,  and  invited  the  Irish  regiments  over,  to 
help  him  against  the  Parliament.  In  the  battle  of  Kaseby, 
his  cabinet  was  seized  and  was  found  to  contain  a  corre- 
spondence with  the  Queen,  in  which  he  expressly  told  her 
that  he  had  deceived  the  Parliament — a  mongrel  Parlia- 
ment, he  called  it  now,  as  an  improvement  on  his  old  term 
of  vipers — in  pretending  to  recognise  it  and  to  treat  with 
it;  and  from  which  it  further  appeared  that  he  had  long 
been  in  secret  treaty  with  the  Duke  of  Lorraine  for  a  for- 
eign army  of  ten  thousand  men.  Disappointed  in  this,  he 
sent  a  most  devoted  friend  of  his,  the  Earl  of  Glamor- 
gan, to  Ireland,  to  conclude  a  secret  treaty  with  the  Cath- 
olic powers,  to  send  him  an  Irish  army  of  ten  thousand  men; 
in  return  for  which  he  was  to  bestow  great  favours  on  the 
Catholic  religion.  And,  when  this  treaty  was  discovered 
in  the  carriage  of  a  fighting  Irish  Archbishop  who  was  killed 
in  one  of  the  many  skirmishes  of  those  days,  he  basely  de- 
nied and  deserted  his  attached  friend,  the  earl,  on  his  being 
charged  with  high  treason;  and — even  worse  than  this — had 
left  blanks  in  the  secret  instructions  he  gave  him  with  his 
own  kingly  hand,  expressly  that  he  might  thus  save  himself. 
At  last,  on  the  twenty-seventh  day  of  April,  one  thou- 
sand six  hundred  and  forty-six,  the  King  found  himself  in 
the  city  of  Oxford,  so  surrounded  by  the  Parliamentary 
army  who  were  closing  in  upon  him  on  all  sides  that  he  felt 
that  if  he  would  escape  he  must  delay  no  longer.  So,  that 
night,  having  altered  the  cut  of  his  hair  and  beard,  he  was 
dressed  up  as  a  servant  and  put  upon  a  horse  with  a  cloak 
strapped  behind  him,  and  rode  out  of  tlie  town  behind  one 
of  liis  own  faithful  followers,  with  a  clergyman  of  that 
country  who  knew  the  road  well,  for  a  guide.     He  rode 


A  CHILDS  HISTORY  OF  ENOLAND.  333 

towards  London  as  far  as  Harrow,  and  then  altered  his 
plans  and  resolved,  it  would  seem,  to  go  to  the  Scottish 
camp.  The  Scottish  men  had  been  invited  over  to  help  the 
Parliamentary  army,  and  had  a  large  force  then  in  Eng- 
land. The  King  was  so  desperately  intriguing  in  every- 
thing he  did,  that  it  is  doubtful  what  he  exactly  meant  by 
this  step.  He  took  it,  anyhow,  and  delivered  himself  up 
to  the  Earl  of  Leven,  the  Scottish  general-in-chief,  who 
"treated  him  as  an  honourable  prisoner.  Negotiations  be- 
tween the  Parliament  on  the  one  hand  and  the  Scottish 
authorities  on  the  other,  as  to  what  should  be  done  with 
him,  lasted  until  the  following  February.  Then,  when  the 
King  had  refused  to  the  Parliament  the  concession  of  that 
old  militia  point  for  twenty  years,  and  had  rsfused  to  Scot- 
land the  recognition  of  its  Solemn  League  and  Covenant, 
Scotland  got  a  handsome  sum  for  its  army  and  its  help, 
and  the  King  into  the  bargain.  Pie  was  taken,  by  certain 
Parliamentary  commissioners  appointed  to  receive  him,  to 
one  of  his  own  houses,  called  Holmby  House,  near  Althorpe, 
in  Northamptonshire. 

While  the  civil  war  was  still  in  progress,  John  Pym  died, 
and  was  buried  with  great  honour  in  Westminster  Abbey — 
not  with  greater  honour  than  he  deserved,  for  the  liberties 
of  Englishmen  owe  a  mighty  debt  to  Pym  and  Hampden. 
The  war  was  but  newly  over  when  the  Earl  of  Essex  died, 
of  an  illness  brought  on  by  his  having  overheated  himself 
in  a  stag  hunt  in  Windsor  Forest.  He,  too,  was  buried  in 
W^estmiuster  Abbey,  with  great  state.  I  wish  it  were  not 
necessary  to  add  that  Archbishop  Laud  died  upon  the 
scaffold  when  the  war  was  not  yet  done.  His  trial  lasted 
in  all  nearly  a  year,  and,  it  being  doubtful  even  then 
whether  the  charges  brought  against  him  amounted  to  trea- 
son, the  odious  old  contrivance  of  the  worst  kings  was  re- 
sorted to,  and  a  bill  of  attainder  was  brought  in  against 
him.  He  was  a  violently  prejudiced  and  mischievous  per- 
son ;  had  had  strong  ear-cropping  and  nose-splitting  pro- 
pensities, as  you  know;  and  had  done  a  world  of  harm. 
But  he  died  peaceably,  and  like  a  brave  old  man. 

POT7BTH    PART. 

When  the  Parliament  had  got  the  Kjng  into  their  hands, 
they  became  very  anxious  to  get  rid  of  their  army,  in  which 
Oliver  Cromwell  had  begun  to  acquire  great  power;  not 


334  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

only  because  of  his  courage  and  high  abilities,  but  becausa 
he  professed  to  be  very  sincere  in  the  Scottish  sort  of  Pu- 
ritan religion  that  was  then  exceedingly  popular  among  the 
soldiers.  They  were  as  much  opposed  to  the  Bishops  as 
to  the  Pope  himself;  and  the  very  privates,  drummers,  and 
trumpeters  had  such  an  inconvenient  habit  of  starting  up 
and  preaching  long-winded  discourses,  that  I  would  not 
have  belonged  to  that  army  on  any  account. 

So,  the  Parliament,  being  far  from  sure  but  that  the ' 
army  might  begin  to  preach  and  fight  against  them  now  it 
had  nothing  else  to  do,  proposed  to  disband  the  greater 
part  of  it,  to  send  another  part  to  serve  in  Ireland  against 
the  rebels,  and  to  keep  only  a  small  force  in  England. 
But,  the  army  would  not  consent  to  be  broken  up,  except 
upon  its  own  conditions;  and,  when  the  Parliament 
showed  an  intention  of  compelling  it,  it  acted  for  itself  in 
an  unexpected  manner  A  certain  cornet,  of  the  name  of 
JoiCE,  arrived  at  Holmby  House  one  night,  attended  by 
four  hundred  horsemen,  went  into  the  King's  room  with 
his  hat  in  one  hand  and  a  pistol  in  the  other,  and  told  the 
King  that  he  had  come  to  take  him  away.  The  King  was 
willing  enough  to  go,  and  only  stipulated  that  he  should 
be  publicly  required  to  do  so  next  morning.  Next  morn- 
ing, accordingly,  he  appeared  on  the  top  of  the  steps  of  the 
house,  and  asked  Cornet  Joice  before  his  men  and  the  guard 
set  there  by  the  Parliament,  what  authority  he  had  for 
taking  him  away?  To  this  Comet  Joice  replied,  "The 
authority  of  the  army."  "Have  you  a  written  commis- 
sion? "  said  the  King.  Joice,  pointing  to  his  four  hundred 
men  on  horseback,  replied,  "That  is  my  commission." 
"  Well,"  said  the  King,  smiling,  as  if  he  were  pleased,  "I 
never  before  read  such  a  commission ;  but  it  is  written  in 
fair  and  legible  characters.  This  is  a  company  of  as  hand- 
some proper  gentlemen  as  I  have  seen  a  long  while."  He 
was  asked  where  he  would  like  to  live,  and  he  said  at  New- 
market, So,  to  Newmarket  he  and  Cornet  Joice  and  the 
four  hundred  horsemen  rode;  the  King  remarking,  in  the 
same  smiling  way,  that  he  could  ride  as  far  at  a  spell  as 
Cornet  Joice,  or  any  man  there. 

The  King  quite  believed,  I  think,  that  the  army  were  his 
friends.  He  said  as  much  to  Fairfax  when  that  general, 
Oliver  Cromwell,  and  Ireton,  went  to  persuade  him  to  re- 
turn to  the  custody  of  the  Parliament.     He  preferred  to 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  335 

remain  as  he  was,  and  resolved  to  remain  as  he  was.  And 
when  the  army  moved  nearer  and  nearer  London  to  fright- 
en the  Parliament  into  yielding  to  their  demands,  they  took 
the  King  with  them.  It  was  a  deplorable  thing  that  Eng- 
land should  be  at  the  mercy  of  a  great  body  of  soldiers 
with  arms  in  their  hands;  but  the  King  certainly  favoured 
tliem  at  this  important  time  of  his  life,  as  compared  with 
the  more  lawful  power  that  tried  to  control  hun.  It  must 
be  added,  however,  that  they  treated  him,  as  yet,  more  re- 
spectfully and  kindly  than  the  Parliament  had  done.  They 
allowed  him  to  be  attended  by  his  own  servants,  to  be 
splendidly  entertained  at  various  houses,  and  to  see  his 
children — at  Cavesham  House,  near  Reading — for  two 
days.  Whereas,  the  Parliament  had  been  rather  hard  with 
him,  and  had  only  allowed  him  to  ride  out  and  play  at 
bowls. 

It  is  much  to  be  believed  that  if  the  King  could  have 
been  trusted,  even  at  this  time,  he  might  have  been  saved. 
Even  Oliver  Cromwell  expressly  said  that  he  did  believe  that 
no  man  could  enjoy  his  possessions  in  peace,  unless  the  King 
had  his  rights.  He  was  not  unfriendly  toward  the  King; 
he  had  been  present  when  he  received  his  children,  and  had 
been  much  affected  by  the  pitiable  nature  of  the  scene;  he 
saw  the  King  often;  he  frequently  walked  and  talked  with 
him  in  the  long  galleries  and  pleasant  gardens  of  the  Pal- 
ace at  Hampton  Court,  whither  he  was  now  removed;  and 
in  all  this  risked  something  of  his  influence  with  the  army. 
But,  the  King  was  in  secret  hopes  of  help  from  the  Scottish 
people;  and  the  moment  he  was  encouraged  to  join  them 
he  began  to  be  cool  to  his  new  friends,  the  army,  and  to  tell 
the  officers  that  they  could  not  possibly  do  without  him. 
At  the  very  time,  too,  when  he  was  promising  to  make 
Cromwell  and  Ireton  noblemen,  if  they  would  help  him  up 
to  his  old  height,  he  was  writing  to  the  Queen  that  he 
meant  to  hang  them.  They  both  afterwards  declared  that 
they  had  been  privately  informed  that  such  a  letter  would 
be  found,  on  a  certain  evening,  sewed  up  in  a  saddle  which 
would  be  taken  to  the  Blue  Boar  in  Holborn  to  be  sent  to 
Dover;  and  that  they  went  there,  disguised  as  common 
soldiers,  and  sat  drinking  in  the  inn-yard  until  a  man  came 
with  the  saddle,  which  they  ripped  up  with  their  knives, 
and  therein  found  the  letter.  I  see  little  reason  to  doubt 
the  story.     It  is  certain  that  Oliver  Cromwell  told  one  of 


336  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND, 

the  King's  most  faithful  followers  that  the  King  could  not 
be  trusted,  and  that  he  would  not  be  answerable  if  any- 
thing amiss  were  to  happen  to  him.  Still,  even  after  that, 
he  kept  a  promise  he  had  made  to  the  King,  by  letting  him 
know  that  there  was  a  plot  with  a  certain  portion  of  the 
army  to  seize  him.  I  believe  that,  in  fact,  he  sincerely 
wanted  the  King  to  escape  abroad,  and  so  to  be  got  rid  of 
without  more  trouble  or  danger.  That  Oliver  himself  had 
work  enough  with  the  army  is  pretty  plain;  for  some  of 
the  troops  were  so  mutinous  against  him,  and  against  those 
who  acted  with  him  at  this  time,  that  he  found  it  neces- 
sary to  have  one  man  shot  at  the  head  of  his  regiment  to 
overawe  the  rest. 

The  King,  when  he  received  Oliver's  warning,  made  his 
escape  from  Hampton  Court;  after  some  indecision  and 
uncertainty,  he  went  to  Carisbrooke  Castle  in  the  Isle  of 
Wight.  At  first,  he  was  pretty  free  there;  but,  even 
there,  he  carried  on  a  pretended  treaty  with  the  Parlia- 
ment, while  he  was  really  treating  with  commissioners  from 
Scotland  to  send  an  army  into  England  to  take  his  part. 
When  he  broke  off  this  treaty  with  the  Parliament  (having 
settled  with  Scotland)  and  was  treated  as  a  prisoner,  his 
treatment  was  not  changed  too  soon,  for  he  had  plotted  to 
escape  that  very  night  to  a  ship  sent  by  the  Queen,  which 
was  lying  off  the  island. 

He  was  doomed  to  be  disappointed  in  his  hopes  from 
Scotland.  The  agreement  he  had  made  with  the  Scottish 
Commissioners  was  not  favourable  enough  to  the  religion 
of  that  country  to  please  the  Scottish  clergy;  and  they 
preached  against  it.  The  consequence  was,  that  the  army 
raised  in  Scotland  and  sent  over,  was  too  small  to  do  much ; 
and  that,  although  it  was  helped  by  a  rising  of  the  Royal- 
ists in  England  and  by  good  soldiers  from  Ireland,  it  could 
make  no  head  against  the  Parliamentary  army  under  such 
men  as  Cromwell  and  Fairfax.  The  King's  eldest  son,  the 
Prince  of  Wales,  came  over  from  Holland  with  nineteen 
ships  (a  part  of  the  English  fleet  having  gone  over  to  him) 
to  help  his  father;  but  nothing  came  of  his  voyage,  and  he 
was  fain  to  return.  The  most  remarkable  event  of  this 
second  civil  war  was  the  cruel  execution  by  the  Parliamen- 
tary General,  of  Sir  Charles  Lucas  and  Sir  George 
Lisle,  two  grand  Royalist  generals,  who  had  bravely  de- 
fended Colchester  under  every  disadvantage  of  famine  and 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  337 

distress  for  nearly  three  montlis.  When  Sir  Charles  Lucas 
was  shot,  Sir  George  Lisle  kissed  his  body,  and  said  to  the 
soldiers  who  were  to  shoot  him,  "  Come  nearer,  and  make 
sure  of  me."  "  I  warrant  you,  Sir  George,"  said  one  of  the 
soldiers,  "we  shall  hit  you."  "Ay?  "  he  returned  with  a 
smile,  "  but  I  have  been  nearer  to  you,  my  friends,  many 
a  tiine,  and  you  have  missed  me." 

The  Parliament,  after  being  fearfully  bullied  by  the  army 
— who  demanded  to  have  seven  members  whom  they  dis- 
liked given  up  to  them — had  voted  that  they  would  have 
nothing  more  to  do  with  the  King.  On  the  conclusion, 
however,  of  this  second  civil  war  (which  did  not  last  more 
than  six  months),  they  appointed  commissioners  to  treat 
with  him.  The  King,  then  so  far  released  again  as  to  be 
allowed  to  live  in  a  private  house  at  Newport  in  the  Isle  of 
Wight,  managed  his  own  part  of  the  negotiation  with  a 
sense  that  was  admired  by  all  who  saw  him,  and  gave  up, 
in  the  end,  all  that  was  asked  of  him — even  yielding 
(which  he  had  steadily  refused,  so  far)  to  the  temporary 
abolition  of  the  bishops,  and  the  transfer  of  their  Church 
land  to  the  Crown.  Still,  with  his  old  fatal  vice  upon 
him,  when  his  best  friends  joined  the  commissioners  in 
beseeching  him  to  yield  all  those  points  as  the  only  means 
of  saving  himself  from  the  army,  he  was  plotting  to  escape 
from  the  island;  he  was  holding  correspondence  with  his 
friends  and  the  Catholics  in  Ireland,  though  declaring  that 
he  was  not;  and  he  was  writing,  with  his  own  hand,  that  in 
what  he  yielded  he  meant  nothing  but  to  get  time  to  escape. 

Matters  were  at  this  pass  when  the  army,  resolved  to 
defy  tlie  Parliament,  marched  up  to  London.  The  Parlia- 
ment, not  afraid  of  them  now,  and  boldly  led  by  Hollis, 
voted  that  the  King's  concessions  were  sufficient  ground  for 
settling  the  peace  of  the  kingdom.  Upon  that.  Colonel 
Rich  and  Colonel  Pride  went  down  to  the  House  of  Com- 
mons with  a  regiment  of  horse  soldiers  and  a  regiment  of 
foot;  and  Colonel  Pride,  standing  in  the  lobby  with  a  list 
of  the  members  who  were  obnoxious  to  the  army  in  his 
hand,  had  them  pointed  out  to  him  as  they  came  through, 
and  took  them  all  into  custody.  This  proceeding  was  after- 
wards called  by  the  people,  for  a  joke,  Pride's  Purge. 
Cromwell  was  in  the  North,  at  the  head  of  his  men,  at  the 
time,  but  when  he  came  home,  approved  of  what  had  been 
done. 

22 


338  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND 

What  with  imprisoning  some  members  and  causing  oth- 
ers to  stay  away,  the  army  had  now  reduced  the  House  of 
Commons  to  some  fifty  or  so.  These  soon  voted  that  it 
was  treason  in  a  king  to  make  war  against  his  parliament 
and  his  people,  and  sent  an  ordinance  up  to  the  House  of 
Lords  for  the  King's  being  tried  as  a  traitor.  The  House 
of  Lords,  then  sixteen  in  number,  to  a  man  rejected  it. 
Thereupon,  the  Commons  made  an  ordinemce  of  their  own, 
that  they  were  the  supreme  government  of  the  country, 
and  would  bring  the  King  to  trial. 

The  King  had  been  taken  for  security  to  a  place  called 
Hurst  Castle :  a  lonely  house  on  a  rock  in  the  sea,  con- 
nected with  the  coast  of  Hampshire  by  a  rough  road  two 
miles  long  at  low  water.  Thence,  he  was  ordered  to  be 
removed  to  Windsor;  thence,  after  being  but  rudely  used 
there,  and  having  none  but  soldiers  to  wait  upon  him  at 
table,  he  was  brought  up  to  Saint  James's  Palace  in  Lon- 
don, and  told  that  his  trial  was  appointed  for  next  day. 

On  Saturday,  the  twentieth  of  January,  one  thousand 
six  hundred  and  forty-nine,  this  memorable  trial  began. 
The  House  of  Commons  had  settled  that  one  hundred  and 
thirty-five  persons  should  form  the  Court,  and  these  were 
taken  from  the  House  itself,  from  among  the  officers  of  the 
army,  and  from  among  the  lawyers  and  citizens.  John 
Bradshaw,  serjeant-at-law,  was  appointed  president.  The 
place  was  Westminster  Hall.  At  the  upper  end,  in  a  red 
velvet  chair,  sat  the  president,  with  his  hat  (lined  with 
plates  of  iron  for  his  protection)  on  his  head.  The  rest 
of  the  Court  sat  on  side  benches,  also  wearing  their  hats. 
The  King's  seat  was  covered  with  velvet,  like  that  of 
the  president,  and  was  opposite  to  it.  He  was  brought 
from  Saint  James's  to  Whitehall,  and  from  Whitehall  he 
came  by  water  to  his  trial. 

When  he  came  in,  he  looked  round  very  steadily  on  the 
Court,  and  on  the  great  number  of  spectators,  and  then  sat 
down:  presently  he  got  up  and  looked  round  again.  On 
the  indictment  "against  Charles  Stuart,  for  high  treason," 
being  read,  he  smiled  several  times,  and  he  denied  the  au- 
thority of  the  Court,  saying  that  there  could  be  no  Parlia- 
ment without  a  House  of  Lords,  and  that  he  saw  no  House 
of  Lords  there.  Also,  that  the  King  ought  to  be  there, 
and  that  he  saw  no  King  in  the  King's  right  place.  Brad- 
shaw replied,  that  the  Court  was  satisfied  with  its  authority, 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  339 

aud  that  its  authority  was  God's  authority  and  the  king- 
dom's. He  then  adjourned  the  Court  to  the  following 
Monday.  On  that  day,  the  trial  was  resumed,  and  went 
on  all  the  week.  When  the  Saturday  came,  as  the  King 
passed  forward  to  his  place  in  the  Hall,  some  soldiers  and 
others  cried  for  "  justice !  "  and  execution  on  him.  That 
day,  too,  Bradshaw,  like  an  angry  Sultan,  wore  a  red  robe, 
instead  of  the  black  robe  he  had  worn  before.  The  King 
was  sentenced  to  death  that  day.  As  he  went  out,  one 
solitary  soldier  said,  "  God  bless  you,  Sir !  "  For  this,  his 
officer  struck  him.  The  King  said  he  thought  the  punish- 
ment exceeded  the  offence.  The  silver  head  of  his  walking- 
stick  had  fallen  off  while  he  leaned  upon  it,  at  one  time  of 
the  trial.  The  accident  seemed  to  disturb  him,  as  if  he 
thought  it  ominous  of  the  falling  of  his  own  head;  and  he 
admitted  as  much,  now  it  was  all  over. 

Being  taken  back  to  Whitehall,  he  sent  to  the  House  of 
Commons,  saying  that  as  the  time  of  his  execution  might 
be  nigli,  he  wished  he  might  be  allowed  to  see  his  darling 
children.  It  was  granted.  On  the  Monday  he  was  taken 
back  to  Saint  James's;  and  his  two  children  then  in  Eng- 
land, the  Princess  Elizabeth  thirteen  years  old,  and  the 
Duke  of  Gloucester  nine  years  old,  were  brought  to  take 
leave  of  him,  from  Sion  House,  near  Brentford.  It  was  a 
sad  and  touching  scene,  when  he  kissed  and  fondled  those 
poor  children,  and  made  a  little  present  of  two  diamond 
seals  to  the  Princess,  and  gave  them  tender  messages  to 
their  mother  (who  little  deserved  them,  for  she  had  a  lover 
of  her  own  whom  she  married  soon  afterwards),  and  told 
them  that  he  died  "for  the  laws  and  liberties  of  the  land." 
I  am  bound  to  say  that  I  don't  think  he  did,  but  I  dare  say 
he  believed  so. 

There  were  ambassadors  from  Holland  that  day,  to  inter- 
cede for  the  unhappy  King,  whom  you  and  I  both  wish  the 
Parliament  had  spared;  but  they  got  no  answer.  The 
Scottish  commissioners  interceded  too ;  so  did  the  Prince 
of  Wales,  by  a  letter  in  which  he  offered  as  the  next  heir 
to  the  throne,  to  accept  any  conditions  from  the  Parlia- 
ment ;  so  did  the  Queen,  by  letter  likewise.  Notwithstand- 
ing all,  the  warrant  for  the  execution  was  this  day  signed. 
There  is  a  story  that  as  Oliver  Cromwell  went  to  the  table 
with  the  pen  in  his  hand  to  put  his  signature  to  it,  he  drew 
his  pen  across  the  face  of  one  of  the  commissioners,  who 


340  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAITO. 

was  standing  near,  and  marked  it  with  ink.  That  com- 
missioner  had  not  signed  his  own  name  yet,  and  the  stoiy 
adds  that  when  he  came  to  do  it  he  marked  Cromwell's  face 
with  ink  in  the  same  way. 

The  King  slept  well,  untroubled  by  the  knowledge  that 
it  was  his  last  night  on  earth,  and  rose  on  the  thirtieth  of 
January,  two  hours  before  day,  and  dressed  himself  care- 
fully. He  put  on  two  shirts  lest  he  should  tremble  with 
the  cold,  and  had  his  hair  very  carefully  combed.  The 
warrant  had  been  directed  to  three  officers  of  the  army, 
Colonel  Hacker,  Colonel  Hunks  and  Colonel  Phayer. 
At  ten  o'clock,  the  first  of  these  came  to  the  door  and 
said  it  was  time  to  go  to  Whitehall.  The  King,  who  had 
always  been  a  quick  walker,  walked  at  his  usual  speed 
through  the  Park,  and  called  out  to  the  guard,  with  his 
accustomed  voice  of  command,  "  March  on  apace !  "  When 
he  came  to  Whitehall,  he  was  taken  to  his  own  bedroom, 
where  a  breakfast  was  set  forth.  As  he  had  taken  the  Sac- 
rament, lie  would  eat  nothing  more ;  but,  at  about  the  time 
when  tl)e  church  bells  struck  twelve  at  noon  (for  he  had  to 
wait,  through  the  scaffold  not  being  ready),  he  took  the 
advice  of  the  good  Bishop  Juxon  who  was  with  him,  and 
ate  a  little  bread  and  drank  a  glass  of  claret.  Soon  after 
he  had  taken  this  refreshment.  Colonel  Hacker  came  to 
the  chamber  with  the  warrant  in  his  hand,  and  called  for 
Charles  Stuart. 

And  then,  through  the  long  gallery  of  Whitehall  Palace, 
which  he  had  often  seen  light  and  gay  and  merry  and 
crowded,  in  very  different  times,  the  fallen  King  passed 
along,  until  he  came  to  the  centre  window  of  the  Banquet- 
ing House,  through  which  he  emerged  upon  the  scaffold, 
which  was  hung  with  black.  He  looked  at  the  two  execu- 
tioners, Avho  were  dressed  in  black  and  masked;  he  looked 
at  the  troops  of  soldiers  on  horseback  and  on  foot,  and  all 
looked  up  at  him  in  silence ;  he  looked  at  the  vast  array  of 
spectators,  filling  up  the  view  beyond,  and  turning  all  their 
faces  upon  him;  he  looked  at  his  old  Palace  of  Saint 
James's;  and  he  looked  at  the  block.  He  seemed  a  little 
troubled  to  find  that  it  was  so  low,  and  asked,  "  if  there 
were  no  place  higher?  "  Then,  to  those  upon  the  scaffold, 
he  said  "  that  it  was  the  Parliament  who  had  begun  the 
war,  and  not  he ;  but  he  hoped  they  might  be  guiltless  too, 
as  ill  instruments  had  gone  between  them.     In  one  respect," 


||/;jpjyM;i,i;rM,'^j\\x^ii^'Si'T^?^^^^^^^^g 


EXECUTION   OF   KING   CRARLES. 


A  CHILD  S  HISTORY   OF  ENGLAND.  341 

he  said,  "  he  suffered  justly ;  and  that  was  because  he  had 
permitted  an  unjust  sentence  to  be  executed  on  another." 
In  this  he  referred  to  the  Earl  of  Strafford. 

He  was  not  at  all  afraid  to  die ;  but  he  was  anxious  to 
die  easily  When  some  one  touched  the  axe  while  he  was 
speaking,  he  broke  off  and  called  out,  "  Take  heed  of  the 
axe !  take  heed  of  the  axe ! "  He  also  said  to  Colonel 
Hacker,  "  Take  care  that  they  do  not  put  me  to  pain  "  He 
told  the  executioners,  "  I  shall  say  but  very  short  prayers, 
and  then  thrust  out  my  hands  " — as  the  sign  to  strike. 

He  put  his  hair  up,  under  a  white  satin  cap  which  the 
bisiiop  had  carried,  and  said,  "  I  have  a  good  cause  and  a 
gracious  God  on  my  side."  The  bishop  told  him  that  he 
iiad  but  one  stage  more  to  travel  in  this  weary  world,  and 
that,  tliougli  it  was  a  turbulent  and  troublesome  stage,  it 
was  a  short  one,  and  would  carry  him  a  great  way — all  the 
way  from  earth  to  Heaven.  The  King's  last  word,  as  he 
gave  his  cloak  and  the  George— the  decoration  from  his 
bieast — to  the  bishop,  was,  "  Eemember ! "  He  then 
kneeled  down,  laid  his  head  on  the  block,  spread  out  his 
hands,  and  was  instantly  killed.  One  universal  groan 
broke  from  the  crowd ;  and  the  soldiers,  who  had  sat  on 
their  horses  and  stood  in  their  ranks  immovable  as  statues, 
were  of  a  sudden  all  in  motion,  clearing  the  streets. 

Thus,  in  tlie  forty-ninth  year  of  his  age,  falling  at  the 
same  time  of  his  career  as  Strafford  had  fallen  in  his,  per- 
ished Charles  the  First.  With  all  my  sorrow  for  him,  I 
cannot  agree  with  him  that  he  died  "  the  martyr  of  the 
people ;  "  for  the  people  had  been  martyrs  to  him,  and  to 
his  ideas  of  a  King' s  rights,  long  before.  Indeed,  I  am 
afraid  that  he  was  but  a  bad  judge  of  martyrs ;  for  he  had 
called  that  infamous  Duke  of  Buckingham  "  the  Martyr  of 
his  Sovereign." 


CHAPTER    XXXIV. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  OLIVER  CROMWELL. 

Before  sunset  on  the  memorable  day  on  which  King 
Charles  the  First  was  executed,  the  House  of  Commons 
passed  an  act  declarmg  it  treason  in  any  one  to  proclaim 
the  Prince  of  Wales — or  anybody  else — King  of  England. 


342  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

Soon  afterwards,  it  declared  that  the  House  of  Lords  was 
useless  and  dangerous,  and  ought  to  be  abolished;  and  di- 
rected that  the  late  King's  statue  should  be  taken  down 
from  the  Eoyal  Exchange  in  the  City  and  other  public 
places.  Having  laid  hold  of  some  famous  Royalists  who 
had  escaped  from  prison,  and  having  beheaded  the  Duke 
OF  Hamilton,  Lord  Holland,  and  Lord  Capel,  in  Pal- 
ace Yard  (all  of  whom  died  very  courageously),  they  then 
appointed  a  Council  of  State  to  govern  the  country.  It 
consisted  of  forty-one  members,  of  whom  five  were  peers. 
Bradshaw  was  made  president.  The  House  of  Commons 
also  readmitted  members  who  had  opposed  the  King's 
death,  and  made  up  its  numbers  to  about  a  hundred  and 
fifty. 

But,  it  still  had  an  army  of  more  than  forty  thousand 
men  to  deal  with,  and  a  very  hard  task  it  was  to  manage 
them.  Before  the  King's  execution,  the  army  had  ap- 
pointed some  of  its  officers  to  remonstrate  between  them 
and  the  Parliament ;  and  now  the  common  soldiers  began 
to  take  that  office  upon  themselves.  The  regiments  under 
orders  for  Ireland  mutinied ;  one  troop  of  horse  in  the  city 
of  London  seized  their  own  flag,  and  refused  to  obey  orders. 
For  this,  the  ringleader  was  shot :  which  did  not  mend  the 
matter,  for,  both  his  comrades  and  the  people  made  a  pub- 
lic funeral  for  him,  and  accompanied  the  body  to  the  grave 
with  sound  of  trumpets  and  with  a  gloomy  procession  of 
persons  carrying  bundles  of  rosemary  steeped  in  blood. 
Oliver  was  the  only  man  to  deal  with  such  difficulties  as 
these,  and  he  soon  cut  them  short  by  bursting  at  midnight 
into  the  town  of  Burford,  near  Salisbury,  where  the  muti- 
neers were  sheltered,  taking  four  hundred  of  them  prison- 
ers, and  shooting  a  number  of  them  by  sentence  of  court- 
martial.  The  soldiers  soon  found,  as  all  men  did,  that 
Oliver  was  not  a  man  to  be  trifled  with.  And  there  was 
an  end  of  the  mutiny. 

The  Scottish  Parliament  did  not  know  Oliver  yet ;  so,  on 
hearing  of  the  King's  execution,  it  proclaimed  the  Prince 
of  Wales  King  Charles  the  Second,  on  condition  of  his  re- 
specting the  Solemn  League  and  Covenant.  Charles  was 
abroad  at  that  time,  and  so  was  Montrose,  from  whose  help 
he  had  hopes  enough  to  keep  him  holding  on  and  off  with 
commissioners  from  Scotland,  just  as  his  father  might  have 
done.     These  hopes  were  soon  at  an  end;  for,  Montrose^ 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY   OF  ENGLAKD.  343 

having  raised  a  few  hundred  exiles  in  Germany,  and  landed 
with  them  in  Scotland,  found  that  the  people  there,  instead 
of  joining  him,  deserted  the  country  at  his  approach.  He 
was  soon  taken  prisoner  and  carried  to  Edinburgh.  There 
he  was  received  with  every  possible  insult,  and  carried  to 
prison  in  a  cart,  his  officers  going  two  and  two  before  him. 
He  was  sentenced  by  the  Parliament  to  be  hanged  on  a  gal- 
lows thirty  feet  high,  to  have  his  head  set  on  a  spike  in 
Edinburgh,  and  his  limbs  distributed  in  other  places,  ac- 
cording to  the  old  barbarous  manner.  He  said  he  had 
always  acted  under  the  Royal  orders,  and  only  wished  he 
had  limbs  enough  to  be  distributed  through  Christendom, 
that  it  might  be  the  more  widely  known  how  loyal  he  had 
been.  He  went  to  the  scaffold  in  a  bright  and  brilliant 
dress,  and  made  a  bold  end  at  thirty-eight  years  of  age. 
The  breath  was  scarcely  out  of  his  body  when  Charles 
abandoned  his  memory,  and  denied  that  he  had  ever  given 
him  orders  to  rise  in  his  behalf  O  the  family  failing  was 
strong  in  that  Charles  then ! 

Oliver  had  been  appointed  by  the  Parliament  to  com- 
mand the  army  in  Ireland,  where  he  took  a  terrible  ven- 
geance for  the  sanguinary  rebellion,  and  made  tremendous 
havoc,  particularly  in  the  siege  of  Drogheda,  where  no 
quarter  was  given,  and  where  he  found  at  least  a  thousand 
of  the  inhabitants  shut  up  together  in  the  great  church : 
every  one  of  Avhom  was  killed  by  his  soldiers,  usually  known 
as  Oliver's  Ironsides.  There  were  numbers  of  friars  and 
priests  among  them,  and  Oliver  gruffly  wrote  home  in  his 
despatch  that  these  were  "  knocked  on  the  head  "  like  the 
rest. 

But,  Charles  having  got  over  to  Scotland  where  the  men 
of  the  Solemn  League  and  Covenant  led  him  a  prodigiously 
dull  life  and  made  him  very  weary  with  long  sermons  and 
grim  Sundays,  the  Parliament  called  the  redoubtable  Oliver 
home  to  knock  the  Scottish  men  on  the  head  for  setting  up 
that  Prince.  Oliver  left  his  son-in-law,  Ireton,  as  general 
in  Ireland  in  his  stead  (he  died  there  afterwards),  and  he 
imitated  the  example  of  his  father-in-law  with  such  good 
will  that  he  brought  the  country  to  subjection,  and  laid  it 
at  the  feet  of  the  Parliament.  In  the  end,  they  passed 
an  act  for  the  settlement  of  Ireland,  generally  pardoning 
all  the  common  people,  but  exempting  from  this  grace  such 
of  the  wealthier  sort  as  had  been  concerned  in  the  rebellion, 


344  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND 

or  in  any  killing  of  Protestants,  or  who  refused  to  lay  down 
their  arms.  Great  numbers  of  Irish  were  got  out  of  the 
country  to  serve  under  Catholic  powers  abroad,  and  a  quan- 
tity of  land  was  declared  to  have  been  forfeited  by  past 
offences,  and  was  given  to  people  who  had  lent  money  to 
the  Parliament  early  in  the  war.  These  were  sweeping 
measures;  but  if  Oliver  Cromwell  had  had  his  own  way 
fully,  and  had  stayed  in  Ireland,  he  would  have  done  more 
yet. 

However,  as  I  have  said,  the  Parliament  wanted  Oliver 
for  Scotland ;  so,  home  Oliver  came,  and  was  made  Com- 
mander of  all  the  Forces  of  the  Commonwealth  of  England, 
and  in  three  days  away  he  went  with  sixteen  thousand  sol- 
diers to  fight  the  Scottish  men.  Now,  the  Scottish  men, 
being  then — as  you  will  generally  find  them  now — mighty 
cautious,  reflected  that  the  troops  they  had  were  not  used 
to  war  like  the  Ironsides,  and  would  be  beaten  in  an  open 
fight.  Therefore  they  said,  "  If  we  lie  quiet  in  our  trenches 
in  Edinburgh  here,  and  if  all  the  farmers  come  into  the 
town  and  desert  the  country,  the  Ironsides  will  be  driven 
out  by  iron  hunger  and  be  forced  to  go  away."  This  was, 
no  doubt,  the  wisest  plan ;  but  as  the  Scottish  clergy  would 
interfere  with  what  they  knew  nothing  about,  and  would 
perpetually  preach  long  sermons  exhorting  the  soldiers  to 
come  out  and  fight,  the  soldiers  got  it  in  their  heads  that 
they  absolutely  must  come  out  and  fight.  Accordingly,  in 
an  evil  hour  for  themselves,  they  came  out  of  their  safe 
position.  Oliver  fell  upon  them  instantly,  and  killed  three 
thousand,  and  took  ten  thousand  prisoners. 

To  gratify  the  Scottish  Parliament,  and  preserve  their 
favour,  Charles  had  signed  a  declaration  they  laid  before 
him,  reproaching  the  memory  of  his  father  and  mother, 
and  representing  himself  as  a  most  religious  Prince,  to 
whom  the  Solemn  League  and  Covenant  was  as  dear  as  life. 
He  meant  no  sort  of  truth  in  this,  and  soon  afterwards  gal- 
loped away  on  horseback  to  join  some  tiresome  Highland 
friends,  who  were  always  flourishing  dirks  and  broad- 
swords. He  was  overtaken  and  induced  to  return ;  but  this 
attempt,  which  was  called  "The  Start,"  did  him  just  so 
much  service,  that  they  did  not  preach  quite  such  long  ser- 
mons at  him  afterwards  as  they  had  done  before. 

On  the  first  of  January,  one  thousand  six  hundred  and 
fifty-one,  the  Scottish  people  crowned  him  at  Scone.     He 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  345 

immediately  took  the  chief  command  of  an  army  of  twenty 
thousand  men,  and  marched  to  Stirling.  His  hopes  were 
heightened,  I  dare  say,  by  the  redoubtable  Oliver  being  ill 
of  an  ague ;  but  Oliver  scrambled  out  of  bed  in  no  time, 
and  went  to  work  with  such  energy  that  he  got  behind  the 
Royalist  army  and  cut  it  off  from  all  communication  with 
Scotland.  There  was  nothing  for  it  then,  but  to  go  on 
to  England ;  so  it  went  on  as  far  as  Worcester,  where  the 
mayor  and  some  of  the  gentry  proclaimed  King  Charles 
the  Second  straightway.  His  proclamation,  however,  was 
of  little  use  to  him,  for  very  few  Royalists  appeared ;  and, 
on  the  very  same  day,  two  people  were  publicly  beheaded 
on  Tower  Hill  for  espousing  his  cause.  Up  came  Oliver 
to  Worcester  too,  at  double  quick  speed,  and  he  and  his 
Ironsides  so  laid  about  them  in  the  great  battle  which  was 
fought  there,  that  they  completely  beat  the  Scottish  men, 
and  destroyed  the  Royalist  army ;  though  the  Scottish  men 
fought  so  gallantly  that  it  took  live  hours  to  do. 

The  escape  of  Charles  after  this  battle  of  Worcester  did 
him  good  service  long  afterwards,  for  it  induced  many  of 
the  generous  English  people  to  take  a  romantic  interest  in 
him,  and  to  think  much  better  of  him  than  he  ever  deserved. 
He  fled  in  the  night,  with  not  more  than  sixty  followers, 
to  the  house  of  a  Catholic  lady  in  Staffordshire.  There, 
for  his  greater  safety,  the  whole  sixty  left  him.  He 
cropped  his  hair,  stained  his  face  and  hands  brown  as  if 
they  were  sunburnt,  put  on  the  clothes  of  a  labouring  coun- 
tryman, and  went  out  in  the  morning  with  his  axe  in  his 
hand,  accompanied  by  four  wood-cutters  who  were  brothers, 
and  another  man  who  was  their  brother-in-law.  These 
good  fellows  made  a  bed  for  him  under  a  tree,  as  the 
weather  was  very  bad ;  and  the  wife  of  one  of  them  brought 
him  food  to  eat ;  and  the  old  mother  of  the  four  brothers 
came  and  fell  down  on  her  knees  before  him  in  the  wood, 
and  thanked  God  that  her  sons  were  engaged  in  saving  his 
life.  At  night,  he  came  out  of  the  forest  and  went  on  to 
another  house  which  was  near  the  river  Severn,  with  the 
intention  of  passing  into  Wales ;  but  the  place  swarmed 
with  soldiers,  and  the  bridges  were  guarded,  and  all  the 
boats  were  made  fast.  So,  after  lying  in  a  hayloft  covered 
over  with  hay,  for  some  time,  he  came  out  of  his  place, 
attended  by  Colonel  Careless,  a  Catholic  gentleman  who 
had  met  him  there,  and  with  whom  he  lay  hid,  all  next 


346  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

day,  up  in  the  shady  branches  of  a  fine  old  oak.  It  was 
hicky  for  the  King  that  it  was  September-time,  and  that 
the  leaves  had  not  begun  to  fall,  since  he  and  the  colonel, 
perched  up  in  this  tree,  could  catch  glimpses  of  the  soldiers 
riding  about  below,  and  could  hear  the  crash  in  the  wood 
as  they  went  about  beating  the  boughs. 

After  this,  he  walked  and  walked  until  his  feet  were  all 
blistered;  and,  having  been  concealed  all  one  day  in  a 
house  which  was  searched  by  the  troopers  while  he  was 
there,  went  with  Lord  Wilmot,  another  of  his  good 
friends,  to  a  place  called  Bentley,  where  one  Miss  Lane,  a 
Protestant  lady,  had  obtained  a  pass  to  be  allowed  to  ride 
through  the  guards  to  see  a  relation  of  hers  near  Bristol. 
Disguised  as  a  servant,  he  rode  in  the  saddle  before  this 
young  lady  to  the  house  of  Sir  John  Winter,  while  Lord 
Wilmot  rode  there  boldly,  like  a  plain  country  gentleman, 
with  dogs  at  his  heels.  It  happened  that  Sir  John  Win- 
ter's butler  had  been  servant  in  Kichmond  Palace,  and 
knew  Charles  the  moment  he  set  eyes  upon  him ;  but,  the 
butler  was  faithful  and  kept  the  secret.  As  no  ship  could 
be  found  to  carry  him  abroad,  it  was  planned  that  he  should 
go — still  travelling  with  Miss  Lane  as  her  servant — to 
another  house,  at  Trent  near  Sherborne  in  Dorsetshire ;  and 
then  Miss  Lane  and  her  cousin,  Mr.  Lascelles,  who  had 
gone  on  horseback  beside  her  all  the  way,  went  home.  I 
hope  Miss  Lane  was  going  to  marry  that  cousin,  for  I  am 
sure  she  must  have  been  a  brave  kind  girl.  If  I  had  been 
that  cousin,  I  should  certainly  have  loved  Miss  Lane. 

When  Charles,  lonely  for  the  loss  of  Miss  Lane,  was  safe 
at  Trent,  a  ship  was  hired  at  Lyme,  the  master  of  which 
engaged  to  take  two  gentlemen  to  France.  In  the  evening 
of  the  same  day,  the  King — now  riding  as  servant  before 
another  young  lady — set  off  for  a  public-house  at  a  place 
called  Charmouth,  where  the  captain  of  the  vessel  was  to 
take  him  on  board.  But,  the  captain's  wife,  being  afraid 
of  her  husband  getting  into  trouble,  locked  him  up  and 
would  not  let  him  sail.  Then  they  went  away  to  Bridport ; 
and,  coming  to  the  inn  there,  found  the  stable-yard  full  of 
soldiers  who  were  on  the  look-out  for  Charles,  and  who 
talked  about  him  while  they  drank.  He  had  such  presence 
of  mind,  that  he  led  the  horses  of  his  party  through  the 
yard  as  any  other  servant  might  have  done,  and  said, 
"  Come  out  of  the  way,  you  soldiers ;  let  us  have  room  to 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  347 

pass  here ! "  As  he  went  along,  he  met  a  half-tipsy  ostler, 
who  rubbed  his  eyes  and  said  to  him,  "  Why,  I  was  formerly 
servant  to  Mr.  Potter  at  Exeter,  and  surely  I  have  some- 
times seen  you  there,  young  man?  "  He  certainly  had,  for 
Charles  had  lodged  there.  His  ready  answer  was,  "  Ah,  I 
did  live  with  him  once ;  but  I  have  no  time  to  talk  now. 
We'll  have  a  pot  of  beer  together  when  I  come  back." 

From  this  dangerous  place  he  returned  to  Trent,  and  lay 
there  concealed  several  days.  Then  he  escaped  to  Heale, 
near  Salisbury ;  where,  in  the  house  of  a  widow  lady,  he 
was  hidden  live  days,  until  the  master  of  a  collier  lying  off 
Shoreham  in  Sussex,  undertook  to  convey  a  "  gentleman  " 
to  France  On  the  night  of  the  fifteenth  of  Oct  )ber,  ac- 
companied by  two  colonels  and  a  merchant,  the  King  rode 
to  Brighton,  then  a  little  fishing  village,  to  give  the  captain 
of  the  ship  a  supper  before  going  on  board ;  but,  so  many 
people  knew  him,  that  this  captain  knew  him  too,  and  not 
only  he,  but  the  landlord  and  landlady  also.  Before  he 
went  away,  the  landlord  came  behind  his  chair,  kissed  his 
hand,  and  said  he  hoped  to  live  to  be  a  lord  and  to  see  his 
wife  a  lady ;  at  which  Charles  laughed.  They  had  had  a 
good  supper  by  this  time,  and  plenty  of  smoking  and  drink- 
ing, at  which  the  King  was  a  first-rate  hand ;  so,  the  cap- 
tain assured  him  that  he  would  stand  by  him,  and  he  did. 
It  was  agreed  that  the  captain  should  pretend  to  sail  to 
Deal,  and  that  Charles  should  address  the  sailors  and  say 
he  was  a  gentleman  in  debt  who  was  running  away  from 
his  creditors,  and  that  he  hoped  they  would  join  him  in 
persuading  the  captain  to  put  him  ashore  in  France.  As 
the  King  acted  his  part  very  well  indeed,  and  gave  the 
sailors  twenty  shillings  to  drink,  they  begged  the  captain 
to  do  what  such  a  worthy  gentleman  aske.d.  He  pretended 
to  yield  to  their  entreaties,  and  the  King  got  safe  to 
Normandy. 

Ireland  being  now  subdued,  and  Scotland  kept  quiet  by 
plenty  of  forts  and  soldiers  put  there  by  Oliver,  the  Parlia- 
ment would  have  gone  on  quietly  enough,  as  far  as  fighting 
with  any  foreign  enemy  went,  but  for  getting  into  trouble 
with  the  Dutch,  who  in  the  spring  of  the  year  one  thou- 
sand six  hundred  and  fifty-one  sent  a  fleet  into  the  Downs 
under  their  Admiral  Van  Tromp,  to  call  upon  the  bold 
English  Admiral  Blake  (who  was  there  with  half  as  many 
ships  as  the  Dutch)  to  strike  his  flag.     Blake  fired  a  rag' 


348  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

ing  broadside  instead,  and  beat  off  Van  Tromp ;  who,  in  the 
autumn,  came  back  again  with  seventy  ships,  and  chal- 
lenged the  bold  Blake — who  still  was  only  half  as  strong 
—to  fight  him.  Blake  fought  him  all  day;  but,  finding 
that  the  Dutch  were  too  many  for  him,  got  quietly  off  at 
night.  What  does  Van  Tromp  upon  this,  but  goes  cruising 
and  boasting  about  the  Channel,  between  the  North  Fore- 
land and  the  Isle  of  Wight,  with  a  great  Dutch  broom  tied 
to  his  masthead,  as  a  sign  that  he  could  and  Avould  sweep 
the  English  off  the  sea!  Within  three  months,  Blake  low- 
ered his  tone  though,  and  his  broom  too;  for,  he  and  two 
other  bold  commanders.  Dean  and  Monk,  fought  him  three 
whole  days,  took  twenty-three  of  his  ships,  shivered  his 
broom  to  pieces,  and  settled  his  basiness. 

Things  were  no  sooner  quiet  again,  than  the  army  began 
to  complain  to  tlie  Parliament  that  they  were  not  govern- 
ing the  nation  properly,  and  to  hint  that  they  thought  they 
could  do  it  better  themselves.  Oliver,  who  had  now  made 
up  his  mind  to  be  the  head  of  the  state,  or  nothing  at  all, 
supported  them  in  this,  and  called  a  meeting  of  officers  and 
his  own  Parliamentary  friends,  at  his  lodgings  in  White- 
hall, to  consider  the  best  way  of  getting  rid  of  the  Parlia- 
ment. It  had  now  lasted  just  as  many  years  as  the  King's 
unbridled  power  had  lasted,  before  it  came  into  existence. 
The  end  of  the  deliberation  was,  that  Oliver  went  down  to 
the  House  in  his  usual  plain  black  dress,  with  his  usual 
grey  worsted  stockings,  but  with  an  unusual  party  of  sol- 
diers behind  him.  These  last  he  left  in  the  lobby,  and 
then  went  in  and  sat  down.  Presently  he  got  up,  made 
the  Parliament  a  speech,  told  them  that  the  Lord  had  done 
with  them,  stamped  his  foot  and  said,  "You  are  no  Parlia- 
ment. Bring  them  in !  Bring  them  in !  "  At  this  signal 
the  door  flew  open,  and  the  soldiers  appeared.  "  This  is 
not  honest,"  said  Sir  Harry  Vane,  one  of  the  members. 
"  Sir  Harry  Vane !  "  cried  Cromwell ;  "  0,  Sir  Harry  Vane ! 
The  Lord  deliver  me  from  Sir  Harry  Vane !  "  Then  he 
pointed  out  members  one  by  one,  and  said  this  man  was  a 
drunkard,  and  that  man  a  dissipated  fellow,  and  that  man 
a  liar,  and  so  on.  Then  he  caused  the  Speaker  to  be  walked 
out  of  his  chair,  told  the  guard  to  clear  the  House,  called 
the  mace  upon  the  table — which  is  a  sign  that  the  House 
is  sitting— "a  fool's  bauble,"  and  said,  "here,  carry  it 
away ! "     Being   obeyed   in   all   these   orders,    he  quietly 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  349 

locked  the  door,  put  the  key  in  his  pocket,  walked  back  to 
Wliitehall  again,  and  told  his  friends,  who  were  still  assem- 
bled  there,  what  he  had  done. 

They  formed  a  new  Council  of  State  after  this  extraor- 
dinary proceeding,  and  got  a  new  Parliament  together  in 
their  own  way :  which  Oliver  himself  opened  in  a  sort  of 
sermon,  and  which  he  said  was  the  beginning  of  a  perfect 
heaven  upon  earth.  In  this  Parliament  there  sat  a  well- 
known  leather-seller,  who  had  taken  the  singular  name  of 
Praise  God  Bareboiies,  and  from  whom  it  was  called,  for  a 
joke,  Barebones's  Parliament,  though  its  general  name  was 
the  Little  Parliament.  As  it  soon  appeared  that  it  was 
not  going  to  put  Oliver  in  the  first  place,  it  turned  out  to 
be  not  at  all  like  the  beginning  of  heaven  upon  earth,  and 
Oliver  said  it  really  was  not  to  be  borne  with.  So  he 
cleared  off  that  Parliament  in  much  the  same  way  as  he 
had  disposed  of  the  other;  and  then  the  council  of  officers 
decided  that  he  must  be  made  the  supreme  authority  of  the 
kingdom,  under  the  title  of  the  Lord  Protector  of  the  Com- 
monwealth. 

So,  on  the  sixteenth  of  December,  one  thousand  six  hun- 
dred and  fifty-tliree,  a  great  procession  was  formed  at  Oli- 
ver's door,  and  he  came  out  in  a  black  velvet  suit  and  a 
big  pair  of  boots,  and  got  into  his  coach  and  went  down  to 
Westminster,  attended  by  the  judges,  and  the  lord  mayor, 
and  the  aldermen,  and  all  the  other  great  and  wonderful 
personages  of  the  country.  There,  in  the  Court  of  Chancery, 
he  publicly  accepted  the  office  of  Lord  Protector.  Then  he 
was  sworn,  and  the  City  sword  was  handed  to  him,  and  the 
seal  was  handed  to  him,  and  all  the  other  thhigs  were  handed 
to  him  which  are  usually  handed  to  Kings  and  Queens  on 
state  occasions.  When  Oliver  had  handed  them  all  back, 
he  was  quite  made  and  completely  finished  off  as  Lord  Pro- 
tector; and  several  of  the  Ironsides  preached  about  it  at 
great  length,  all  the  evening. 

SECOND  PART. 

Oliver  Cromwell — whom  the  people  long  called  Old 
Noll — in  accepting  the  office  of  Protector,  had  bound  him- 
self by  a  certain  paper  which  was  handed  to  him,  called  "  the 
Instrument,"  to  summon  a  Parliament,  consisting  of  between 
four  and  five  hundred  members,  in  the  election  of  whicl 


360  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

neither  the  Royalists  nor  the  Catholics  were  to  have  any 
share.  He  had  also  pledged  himself  that  this  Parliament 
should  not  be  dissolved  without  its  own  consent  until  it 
had  sat  five  months. 

When  this  Parliament  met,  Oliver  made  a  speech  to  them 
of  three  hours  long,  very  wisely  advising  them  what  to  do 
for  the  credit  and  happiness  of  the  country.  To  keep  down 
the  more  violent  members,  he  required  them  to  sign  a  recog- 
nition of  what  they  were  forbidden  by  "  the  Instrument " 
to  do ;  which  was,  chiefly,  to  take  the  power  from  one  sin- 
gle person  at  the  head  of  the  state  or  to  command  the  army. 
Then  he  dismissed  them  to  go  to  work.  With  his  usual 
vigour  and  resolution  he  went  to  work  himself  with  some 
frantic  preachers — who  were  rather  overdoing  their  ser- 
mons in  calling  him  a  villain  and  a  tyrant — by  shutting  up 
their  chapels,  and  sending  a  few  of  them  off  to  prison. 

There  was  not  at  that  time,  in  England  or  anywhere  else, 
a  man  so  able  to  govern  the  country  as  Oliver  Cromwell. 
Although  he  ruled  with  a  strong  hand,  and  levied  a  very 
heavy  tax  on  the  Royalists  (but  not  until  they  had  plotted 
against  his  life),  he  ruled  wisely,  and  as  the  times  required. 
He  caused  England  to  be  so  respected  abroad,  that  I  wish 
some  lords  and  gentlemen  who  have  governed  it  under 
kings  and  queens  in  later  days  would  have  taken  a  leaf  out 
of  Oliver  Cromwell's  book.  He  sent  bold  Admiral  Blake 
to  the  Mediterranean  Sea,  to  make  the  Duke  of  Tuscany 
pay  sixty  thousand  pounds  for  injuries  he  had  done  to  Brit- 
ish subjects,  and  spoliation  he  had  committed  on  English 
merchants.  He  further  despatched  him  and  his  fleet  to 
Algiers,  Tunis,  and  Tripoli,  to  have  every  English  ship 
and  every  English  man  delivered  up  to  him  that  had  been 
taken  by  pirates  in  those  parts.  All  this  was  gloriously 
done ;  and  it  began  to  be  thoroughly  well  known,  all  over 
the  world,  that  England  was  governed  by  a  man  in  earnest, 
who  would  not  allow  the  English  name  to  be  insulted  or 
slighted  anywhere  o 

These  were  not  all  his  foreign  triumphs.  He  sent  a  fleet 
to  sea  against  the  Dutch ;  and  the  two  powers,  each  with 
one  hundred  ships  upon  its  side,  met  in  the  English  Chan- 
nel off  the  North  Foreland,  where  the  fight  lasted  all  day 
long.  Dean  was  killed  in  this  fight;  but  Monk,  who  com- 
manded in  the  same  ship  with  him,  threw  his  cloak  over 
his  body,  that  the  sailors  might  not  know  of  his  death,  and 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  351 

be  disheartened.  Nor  were  they.  The  English  broadsides 
so  exceedingly  astonished  the  Dutch  that  they  sheered  off 
at  last,  though  the  redoubtable  Van  Tromp  tired  upon  them 
with  his  own  guns  for  deserting  their  flag.  Soon  after- 
wards, the  two  fleets  engaged  again,  off  the  coast  of  Hol- 
land. There,  the  valiant  Van  Tromp  was  shot  through 
the  heart,  and  the  Dutch  gave  in,  and  peace  was  made. 

Further  than  this,  Oliver  resolved  not  to  bear  the  domi- 
neering and  bigoted  conduct  of  Spain,  which  country  not 
only  claimed  a  right  to  all  the  gold  and  silver  that  could 
be  found  in  South  America,  and  treated  the  ships  of  all 
other  countries  who  visited  those  regions,  as  pirates,  but 
put  English  subjects  into  the  horrible  Spanish  prisons  of 
the  Inquisition.  So,  Oliver  told  the  Spanish  ambassador 
that  English  ships  must  be  free  to  go  wherever  they  would, 
and  that  English  merchants  must  not  be  thrown  into  those 
same  dungeons,  no,  not  for  the  pleasure  of  all  the  priests 
in  Spain.  To  this,  the  Spanish  ambassador  replied  that 
the  gold  and  silver  country,  and  the  Holy  Inquisition,  were 
his  King's  two  eyes,  neither  of  which  he  could  submit  to 
have  put  out.  Very  well,  said  Oliver,  then  he  was  afraid 
he  (Oliver)  must  damage  those  two  eyes  directly. 

So,  another  fleet  was  despatched  under  two  commanders, 
Penn  and  Venables,  for  Hispaniola;  where,  however,  the 
Spaniards  got  the  better  of  the  fight.  Consequently,  the 
fleet  came  home  again,  after  taking  Jamaica  on  the  way. 
Oliver,  indignant  with  the  two  commanders  who  had  not 
done  what  bold  Admiral  Blake  would  have  done,  clapped 
them  both  into  prison,  declared  war  against  Spain,  and 
made  a  treaty  with  France,  in  virtue  of  which  it  was  to 
shelter  the  King  and  his  brother  the  Duke  of  York  no 
longer.  Then,  he  sent  a  fleet  abroad  under  bold  Admiral 
Blake,  which  brought  the  King  of  Portugal  to  his  senses — 
just  to  keep  its  hand  in — and  then  engaged  a  Spanish  fleet, 
sunk  four  great  ships,  and  took  two  more,  laden  with  silver 
to  the  value  of  two  millions  of  pounds:  which  dazzling 
prize  was  brought  from  Portsmouth  to  London  in  waggons, 
with  the  populace  of  all  the  towns  and  villages  through 
which  the  waggons  passed,  shouting  with  all  their  might. 
After  this  victory,  bold  Admiral  Blake  sailed  away  to  the 
port  of  Santa  Cruz  to  cut  off  the  Spanish  treasure-ships 
coming  from  Mexico.  There,  he  found  them,  ten  in  num- 
ber, with  severe  others  to  take  care  of  them,  and  a  big  castle. 


352  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

and  seven  batteries,  all  roaring  and  blazing  away  at  him 
with  great  guns.  Blake  cared  no  more  for  great  guns  than 
for  pop-guns — no  more  for  their  hot  iron  balls  than  for 
snow-balls.  He  dashed  into  the  harbour,  captured  and 
burnt  every  one  of  the  ships,  and  came  sailing  out  again 
triumphantly,  with  the  victorious  English  flag  flying  at  his 
masthead.  This  was  the  last  triumph  of  this  great  com- 
mander, who  had  sailed  and  fought  until  he  was  quite  worn 
out.  He  died,  as  his  successful  ship  was  coming  into  Ply- 
mouth Harbour  amidst  the  joyful  acclamations  of  the  peo- 
ple, and  was  buried  in  state  in  Westminster  Abbey.  Not 
to  lie  there,  long. 

Over  and  above  all  this,  Oliver  found  that  the  Vaudois, 
or  Protestant  people  of  the  valleys  of  Lucerne,  were  inso- 
lently treated  by  the  Catholic  powers,  and  were  even  put 
to  death  for  their  religion,  in  an  audacious  and  bloody 
manner.  Instantly,  he  informed  those  powers  that  this 
was  a  thing  which  Protestant  England  would  not  allow ; 
and  he  speedily  carried  his  point,  through  the  might  of  his 
great  name,  and  established  their  right  to  worship  God  in 
peace  after  their  own  harmless  manner. 

Lastly,  his  English  army  won  such  admiration  in  fight- 
ing with  the  French  against  the  Spaniards,  that,  after 
^hey  had  assaulted  the  town  of  Dunkirk  together,  the 
French  King  in  person  gave  it  up  to  the  English,  that  it 
might  be  a  token  to  them  of  their  might  and  valour. 

There  were  plots  enough  against  Oliver  among  the  fran- 
tic religionists  (who  called  themselves  Fifth  Monarchy 
Men),  and  among  the  disappointed  Republicans.  He  had 
a  dilficult  game  to  play,  for  the  Royalists  were  always  ready 
to  side  with  either  party  against  him.  The  "  King  over 
the  water,"  too,  as  Charles  was  called,  had  no  scruples 
about  plotting  with  any  one  against  his  life ;  although  there 
is  reason  to  suppose  that  he  woiild  willingly  have  married 
one  of  his  daughters,  if  Oliver  would  have  had  such  a  son- 
in-law.  There  was  a  certain  Colonel  Saxby  of  the  army, 
once  a  great  supporter  of  Oliver's  but  now  turned  against 
him,  who  was  a  grievous  trouble  to  him  through  all  this 
part  of  his  career ;  and  who  came  and  went  between  the 
discontented  in  England  and  Spain,  and  Charles  who  put 
himself  in  alliance  with  Spain  on  being  thrown  off  by 
France.  This  man  died  in  prison  at  last ;  but  not  until 
there  had  been  very  serious  plots  between  the  Royalists 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  353 

and  Republicans,  and  an  actual  rising  of  them  in  England, 
when  they  burst  into  the  city  of  Salisbury  on  a  Sunday 
night,  seized  the  judges  who  were  going  to  hold  the  assizes 
there  next  day,  and  would  have  hanged  them  but  for  the 
merciful  objections  of  the  more  temperate  of  their  number. 
Oliver  was  so  vigorous  and  shrewd  that  he  soon  put  this 
revolt  down,  as  he  did  most  other  conspiracies ;  and  it 
was  well  for  one  of  its  chief  managers — that  same  Lord 
Wilmot  who  had  assisted  in  Charles's  flight,  and  was  now 
Earl  of  Rochester — that  he  made  his  escape.  Oliver 
seemed  to  have  eyes  and  ears  everywhere,  and  secured  such 
sources  of  information  as  his  enemies  little  dreamed  of. 
There  was  a  chosen  body  of  six  persons,  called  the  Sealed 
Knot,  who  were  in  the  closest  and  most  secret  confidence 
of  Charles.  One  of  the  foremost  of  these  very  men,  a  Sir 
Richard  Willis,  reported  to  Oliver  everything  that  passed 
among  them,  and  had  two  hundred  a  year  for  it. 

Miles  Syndarcomb,  also  of  the  old  army,  was  another 
conspirator  against  the  Protector.  He  and  a  man  named 
Cecil,  bribed  one  of  his  Life  Guards  to  let  them  have  good 
notice  when  he  was  going  out — intending  to  shoot  him  from 
a  window.  But,  owing  either  to  his  caution  or  his  good 
fortune,  they  could  never  get  an  aim  at  him.  Disappointed 
in  this  design,  they  got  into  the  chapel  in  Whitehall,  with 
a  basketful  of  combustibles,  which  were  to  explode  by  means 
of  a  slow  match  in  six  hours ;  then,  in  the  noise  and  confu- 
sion of  the  fire,  they  hoped  to  kill  Oliver.  But,  the  Life 
Guardsman  himself  disclosed  this  plot;  and  they  were 
seized,  and  Miles  died  (or  killed  himself  in  prison)  a  little 
while  before  he  was  ordered  for  execution.  A  few  such 
plotters  Oliver  caused  to  be  beheaded,  a  few  more  to  be 
hanged,  and  many  more,  including  those  who  rose  in  arms 
against  him,  to  be  sent  as  slaves  to  the  West  Indies.  If 
he  were  rigid,  he  was  impartial  too,  in  asserting  the  laws 
of  England.  When  a  Portuguese  nobleman,  the  brother 
of  the  Portuguese  ambassador,  killed  a  London  citizen  in 
mistake  for  another  man  with  whom  he  had  had  a  quarrel, 
Oliver  caused  him  to  be  tried  before  a  jury  of  Englishmen 
and  foreigners,  and  had  him  executed  in  spite  of  the  en- 
treaties of  all  the  ambassadors  in  London. 

One  of  Oliver's  own  friends,  the  Duke  of  Oldenburgh, 
in  sending  him  a  present  of  six  fine  coach-horses,  was  very 
near  doing  more  to  please  the  Royalists  than  all  the  plot- 
23 


864  A  CHH^D'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND. 

ters  put  together.  One  day,  Oliver  went  with  his  coach, 
drawn  by  these  six  horses,  into  Hyde  Park,  to  dine  with 
his  secretary  and  some  of  his  other  gentlemen  under  the 
trees  there.  After  dinner,  being  merry,  he  took  it  into  his 
head  to  put  his  friends  inside  and  to  drive  them  home :  a 
postilion  riding  one  of  the  foremost  horses,  as  the  custom 
was.  On  account  of  Oliver's  being  too  free  with  the  whip, 
the  six  fine  horses  went  off  at  a  galop,  the  postilion  got 
thrown,  and  Oliver  fell  upon  the  coach-pole  and  narrowly 
escaped  being  shot  by  his  own  pistol,  which  got  entangled 
with  his  clothes  in  the  harness,  and  went  off.  He  was 
dragged  some  distance  by  the  foot,  until  his  foot  came  out 
of  the  shoe,  and  then  he  came  safely  to  the  ground  under 
the  broad  body  of  the  coach,  and  was  very  little  the  worse. 
The  gentlemen  inside  were  only  bruised,  and  the  discon- 
tented people  of  all  parties  were  much  disappointed. 

The  rest  of  the  history  of  the  Protectorate  of  Oliver 
Cromwell  is  a  history  of  his  Parliaments.  His  first  one 
not  pleasing  him  at  all,  he  waited  until  the  five  months 
were  out,  and  then  dissolved  it.  The  next  was  better 
suited  to  his  views ;  and  from  that  he  desired  to  get — if  he 
could  with  safety  to  himself — the  title  of  King.  He  had 
had  this  in  his  mind  some  time :  whether  because  he  thought 
that  the  English  people,  being  more  used  to  the  title,  were 
more  likely  to  obey  it ;  or  whether  because  he  really  wished 
to  be  a  king  himself,  and  to  leave  the  succession  to  that 
title  in  his  family,  is  far  from  clear.  He  was  already  as 
high,  in  England  and  in  all  the  world,  as  he  would  ever 
be,  and  I  doubt  if  he  cared  for  the  mere  name.  However, 
a  paper,  called  the  "Humble  Petition  and  Advice,"  was 
presented  to  him  by  the  House  of  Commons,  praying  him 
to  take  a  high  title  and  to  appoint  his  successor.  That  he 
would  have  taken  the  title  of  King  there  is  no  doubt,  but 
for  the  strong  opposition  of  the  army.  This  induced  him 
to  forbear,  and  to  assent  only  to  the  other  points  of  the 
petition.  Upon  which  occasion  there  was  another  grand 
show  in  Westminster  Hall,  when  the  Speaker  of  the  House 
of  Commons  formally  invested  him  with  a  purple  robe 
lined  with  ermine,  and  presented  him  with  a  splendidly 
bound  Bible,  and  put  a  golden  sceptre  in  his  hand.  The 
next  time  the  Parliament  met,  he  called  a  House  of  Lords 
of  sixty  members,  as  the  petition  gave  him  power  to  do ; 
but  as  that  Parliament  did  not  please  him  either,  and  would 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  355 

not  proceed  to  the  business  of  the  country,  he  jumped  into 
a  coach  one  morning,  took  six  Guards  with  him,  and  sent 
them  to  the  rightabout.  I  wish  this  had  been  a  warning 
to  Parliaments  to  avoid  long  speeches,  and  do  more  work. 
It  was  the  mouth  of  August,  one  thousand  six  hundred 
and  fifty-eight,  when  Oliver  Cromwell' s  favourite  daughter, 
Elizabeth  Claypole  (who  had  lately  lost  her  youngest 
son),  lay  very  ill,  and  his  mind  was  greatly  troubled,  be- 
cause he  loved  her  dearly.  Another  of  his  daughters  was 
married  to  Lord  Falconberg,  another  to  the  grandson  of 
the  Earl  of  Warwick,  and  he  had  made  his  son  Richard  one 
of  the  Members  of  the  Upper  House.  He  was  very  kind 
and  loving  to  them  all,  being  a  good  father  and  a  good 
husband,  but  he  loved  this  daughter  the  best  of  the  family, 
and  went  down  to  Hampton  Court  to  see  her,  and  could 
hardly  be  induced  to  stir  from  her  sick  room  until  she  died. 
Although  his  religion  had  been  of  a  gloomy  kind,  his  dis- 
position had  been  always  cheerful.  He  had  been  fond  of 
music  in  his  home,  and  had  kept  open  table  once  a  week 
for  all  officers  of  the  army  not  below  the  rank  of  captain, 
and  had  always  preserved  in  his  house  a  quiet  sensible  dig- 
nity. He  encouraged  men  of  genius  and  learning,  and 
loved  to  have  them  about  him.  Milton  was  one  of  his 
great  friends,  He  was  good  humoured  too,  with  the  no- 
bility, whose  dresses  and  manners  were  very  different  from 
his ;  and  to  show  them  what  good  information  he  had,  he 
would  sometimes  jokingly  tell  them  when  they  were  his 
guests,  where  they  had  last  drunk  the  health  of  the  "  King 
over  the  water,"  and  would  recommend  them  to  be  more 
private  (if  they  could)  another  time.  But  he  had  lived  in 
busy  times,  had  borne  the  weight  of  heavy  State  affairs, 
and  had  often  gone  in  fear  of  his  life.  He  was  ill  of  the 
gout  and  ague ;  and  when  the  death  of  his  beloved  child 
came  upon  him  in  addition,  he  sank,  never  to  raise  his 
head  again.  He  told  his  physicians  on  the  twenty-fourth 
of  August  that  the  Lord  had  assured  him  that  he  was  not 
to  die  in  that  illness,  and  that  he  would  certainly  get  bet- 
ter. This  was  only  his  sick  fancy,  for  on  the  third  of  Sep- 
tember, which  was  the  anniversary  of  the  great  battle  of 
Worcester,  and  the  day  of  the  year  which  he  called  his 
fortunate  day,  he  died,  in  the  sixtieth  year  of  his  age.  He 
had  been  delirious,  and  had  lain  insensible  some  hours,  but 
he  had  been  overheard  to  murmur  a  very  good  prayer  the 


356  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

day  before.  The  whole  country  lamented  his  death.  If 
you  want  to  know  the  real  worth  of  Oliver  Cromwell,  and 
his  real  services  to  his  country,  you  can  hardly  do  better 
than  compare  England  under  him,  with  England  under 
Charles  the  Second. 

He  had  appointed  his  son  Kichard  to  succeed  him,  and 
after  there  had  been,  at  Somerset  House  in  the  Strand,  a 
lying  in  state  more  splendid  than  sensible — as  all  such 
vanities  after  death  are,  I  think — Eichard  became  Lord 
Protector.  He  was  an  amiable  country  gentleman,  but  had 
none  of  his  father's  great  genius,  and  was  quite  unfit  for 
such  a  post  in  such  a  storm  of  parties.  Richard's  Protec- 
torate, which  only  lasted  a  year  and  a  half,  is  a  history  of 
quarrels  between  the  officers  of  the  army  and  the  Parlia- 
ment, and  between  the  officers  among  themselves ;  and  of 
a  growing  discontent  among  the  people,  who  had  far  too 
many  long  sermons  and  far  too  few  amusements,  and  wanted 
a  change.  At  last,  General  Monk  got  the  army  well  into 
his  own  hands,  and  then  in  pursuance  of  a  secret  plan  he 
seems  to  have  entertained  from  the  time  of  Oliver's  death, 
declared  for  the  King's  cause.  He  did  not  do  this  openly ; 
but,  in  his  place  in  the  House  of  Commons,  as  one  of  the 
members  for  Devonshire,  strongly  advocated  the  proposals 
of  one  Sir  John  Greenville,  who  came  to  the  House  with 
a  letter  from  Charles,  dated  from  Breda,  and  with  whom 
he  had  previously  been  in  secret  communication.  There 
had  been  plots  and  counterplots,  and  a  recall  of  the  last 
members  of  the  Long  Parliament,  and  an  end  of  the  Long 
Parliament,  and  risings  of  the  Eoyalists  that  were  made 
too  soon ;  and  most  men  being  tired  out,  and  there  being 
no  one  to  head  the  country  now  great  Oliver  was  dead,  it 
was  readily  agreed  to  welcome  Charles  Stuart.  Some  of 
the  wiser  and  better  members  said — what  was  most  true — 
that  in  the  letter  from  Breda,  he  gave  no  real  promise  to 
govern  well,  and  that  it  would  be  best  to  make  him  pledge 
himself  beforehand  as  to  what  he  should  be  bound  to  do  for 
the  benefit  of  the  kingdom.  Monk  said,  however,  it  would 
be  all  right  when  he  came,  and  he  could  not  come  too 
soon. 

So,  everybody  found  out  all  in  a  moment  that  the  coun- 
try mxist  be  prosperous  and  happy,  having  another  Stuart 
to  condescend  to  reign  over  it;  and  there  was  a  prodigious 
firing  off  of  guns,  lighting  of  bonfires,  ringing  of  bells,  and 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  357 

throwing  up  of  caps.  The  people  drank  the  King's  health 
by  thousands  in  the  open  streets,  and  everybody  rejoiced. 
Down  came  the  Arms  of  tlie  Commonwealth,  up  went 
the  Royal  Arms  instead,  and  out  came  the  public  money. 
Fifty  thousand  pounds  for  the  King,  ten  thousand  pounds 
for  his  brother  the  Duke  of  York,  live  thousand  pounds  for 
his  brother  the  Duke  of  Gloucester.  Prayers  for  these 
gracious  Stuarts  were  put  up  in  all  the  churches ;  commis- 
sioners were  sent  to  Holland  (which  suddenly  found  out 
that  Charles  was  a  great  man,  and  that  it  loved  him)  to  in- 
vite the  King  home;  Monk  and  the  Kentish  grandees  went 
to  Dover,  to  kneel  down  before  him  as  he  landed.  He 
kissed  and  embraced  Monk,  made  him  ride  in  the  coach 
with  himself  and  his  brothers,  came  on  to  London  amid 
wonderful  shoutings,  and  passed  through  the  army  at  Black- 
heath  on  the  twenty-ninth  of  May  (his  birthday),  in  the 
year  one  thousand  six  hundred  and  sixty.  Greeted  by 
splendid  dinners  under  tents,  by  flags  and  tapestry  stream- 
ing from  all  the  houses,  by  delighted  crowds  in  all  the 
streets,  by  troops  of  noblemen  and  gentlemen  in  rich 
dresses,  by  City  companies,  train-bands,  drummers,  trum- 
peters, the  great  Lord  Mayor,  and  the  majestic  Aldermen, 
the  King  went  on  to  Whitehall.  On  entering  it,  he  com- 
memorated his  Restoration  with  the  joke  that  it  really 
would  seem  to  have  been  his  own  fault  that  he  had  not 
come  long  ago,  since  everybody  told  him  that  he  had.  always 
wished  for  him  with  all  his  heart. 


CHAPTEK    XXXV. 

ENGLAND  UNDER  CHARLES  THE  SECOND,  CALLED 
THE  MERRY  MONARCH. 

There  never  were  such  profligate  times  in  England  as 
under  Charles  the  Second.  Whenever  you  see  his  portrait, 
with  his  swarthy  ill-looking  face  and  great  nose,  you  may 
fancy  him  in  his  Court  at  Whitehall,  surrounded  by  some 
of  the  very  worst  vagabonds  in  the  kingdom  (though  they 
were  lords  and  ladies),  drinking,  gambling,  indulging  in 
vicious  conversation,  and  committing  every  kind  of  profli- 


368  A  CinLDS  HISTORY  OP  EI^GLAND. 

gate  excess.  It  has  been  a  fashion  to  call  Charles  the  Sec- 
ond "The  Merry  Monarch."  Let  me  try  to  give  you  a 
general  idea  of  some  of  the  merry  things  that  were  done, 
in  the  merry  days  when  this  merry  gentleman  sat  upon  his 
merry  throne,  in  merry  England. 

The  first  merry  proceedmg  was — of  course — to  declare 
that  he  was  one  of  the  greatest,  the  wisest,  and  the  noblest 
kings  that  ever  shone,  like  the  blessed  sun  itself,  on  this 
benighted  earth.  The  next  merry  and  pleasant  piece  of 
business  was,  for  the  Parliament,  in  the  humblest  manner, 
to  give  him  one  million  two  hundred  thousand  pounds  a 
year,  and  to  settle  upon  him  for  life  that  old  disputed  ton- 
nage and  poundage  which  had  been  so  bravely  fought  for. 
Then,  General  Monk,  being  made  Earl  of  Albemarle, 
and  a  few  other  Koyalists  similarly  rewarded,  the  law  went 
to  work  to  see  what  was  to  be  done  to  those  persons  (they 
were  called  Regicides)  who  had  been  concerned  in  making 
a  martyr  of  the  late  King.  Ten  of  these  were  merrily  exe- 
cuted ;  that  is  to  say,  six  of  the  judges,  one  of  the  council, 
Colonel  Hacker  and  another  officer  who  had  commanded  the 
Guards,  and  Hugh  Peters,  a  preacher  who  had  preached 
against  the  martyr  with  all  his  heart.  These  executions 
were  so  extremely  merry,  that  every  horrible  circumstance 
which  Cromwell  had  abandoned  was  revived  with  appalling 
cruelty.  The  hearts  of  the  sufferers  were  torn  out  of  their 
living  bodies ;  their  bowels  were  burned  before  their  faces ; 
the  executioner  cut  jokes  to  the  next  victim,  as  he  rubbed 
his  filthy  hands  together,  that  were  reeking  with  the  blood 
of  the  last;  and  the  heads  of  the  dead  were  drawn  on 
sledges  with  the  living  to  the  place  of  suffering.  Still, 
even  so  merry  a  monarch  could  not  force  one  of  these  dying 
men  to  say  that  he  was  sorry  for  what  he  had  done.  Nay, 
the  most  memorable  thing  said  among  them  was,  that  if 
the  thing  were  to  do  again  they  would  do  it. 

Sir  Harry  Vane,  who  had  furnished  the  evidence  against 
Strafford,  and  was  one  of  the  most  staunch  of  the  Republi- 
cans, was  also  tried,  found  guilty,  and  ordered  for  execu- 
tion. When  he  came  upon  the  scaffold  on  Tower  Hill, 
after  conducting  his  own  defence  with  great  power,  his 
notes  of  what  he  had  meant  to  say  to  the  people  were  torn 
away  from  him,  and  the  drums  and  trumpets  were  ordered 
to  sound  lustily  and  drown  his  voice ;  for,  the  people  had 
been  so  much  impressed  by  what  the  Regicides  had  calmly 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  359 

said  with  their  last  breath,  that  it  was  the  custom  now,  to 
have  the  drums  and  trumpets  always  under  the  scaffold, 
ready  to  strike  up.  Vane  said  no  more  than  this :  "  It  is  a 
bad  cause  which  cannot  bear  the  words  of  a  dying  man :  ** 
and  bravely  died. 

These  merry  scenes  were  succeeded  by  another,  perhaps 
even  merrier.  On  the  anniversary  of  the  late  King's  death, 
the  bodies  of  Oliver  Cromwell,  Ireton,  and  Bradshaw  were 
torn  out  of  their  graves  in  Westminster  Abbey,  dragged  to 
Tyburn,  hanged  there  on  a  gallows  all  day  long,  and  then 
beheaded .  Imagine  the  head  of  Oliver  Cromwell  set  upon  a 
pole  to  be  stared  at  by  a  brutal  crowd,  not  one  of  whom 
would  have  dared  to  look  the  living  Oliver  in  the  face  for 
half  a  moment!  Think,  after  you  have  read  this  reign, 
what  England  was  under  Oliver  Cromwell  who  was  torn 
out  of  his  grave,  and  what  it  was  under  this  merry  monarch 
who  sold  it,  like  a  merry  Judas,  over  and  over  again. 

Of  course,  the  remains  of  Oliver's  wife  and  daughter 
were  not  to  be  spared  either,  though  they  had  been  most 
excellent  women.  The  base  clergy  of  that  time  gave  up 
their  bodies,  which  had  been  buried  in  the  Abbey,  and — to 
the  eternal  disgrace  of  England — they  were  thrown  into  a 
pit,  together  with  the  mouldering  bones  of  Pym  and  of  the 
brave  and  bold  old  Admiral  Blake. 

The  clergy  acted  this  disgraceful  part  because  they  hoped 
to  get  the  nonconformists,  or  dissenters,  thoroughly  put 
down  in  ^his  reign,  and  to  have  but  one  prayer-book  and 
one  service  for  all  kinds  of  people,  no  matter  what  their 
private  opinions  were.  This  was  pretty  well,  I  think,  for 
a  Protestant  Church,  which  had  displaced  the  Romish 
Church  because  people  had  a  right  to  their  own  opinions  in 
religious  matters.  However,  they  carried  it  with  a  high 
hand,  and  a  prayer-book  was  agreed  upon,  in  which  the 
extremest  opinions  of  Archbishop  Laud  were  not  forgotten. 
An  Act  was  passed,  too,  preventing  any  dissenter  from 
holding  any  office  under  any  corporation.  So,  the  regular 
clergy  in  their  triumph  were  soon  as  merry  as  the  King. 
The  army  being  by  this  time  disbanded,  and  the  King 
crowned,  everything  was  to  go  on  easily  for  evermore, 

I  must  say  a  word  here  about  the  King's  family.  He 
had  not  been  long  upon  the  throne  when  his  brother  the 
Duke  of  Gloucester,  and  his  sister  the  Princess  of  Oj?- 
ANGE,  died  within  a  few  months  of  each  other,  of  small- 


360  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAI^fD. 

pox.  His  remaining  sister,  the  Princess  Henrietta,  mar- 
ried the  Duke  of  Orleans,  the  brother  of  Louis  the 
Fourteenth,  King  of  France.  His  brother  James,  Duke 
OF  York,  was  made  High  Admiral,  and  by-and-bye  became 
a  Catholic.  He  was  a  gloomy  sullen  bilious  sort  of  man, 
with  a  remarkable  partiality  for  the  ugliest  women  in  the 
country.  He  married,  under  very  discreditable  circum- 
stances, Anne  Hyde,  the  daughter  of  Lord  Clarendon, 
then  the  King's  principal  minister — not  at  all  a  delicate 
minister  either,  but  doing  much  of  the  dirty  work  of  a  very 
dirty  palace.  It  became  important  now  that  the  King  him- 
self should  be  married ;  and  divers  foreign  Monarchs,  not 
very  particular  about  the  character  of  their  son-in-law,  pro- 
posed their  daughters  to  him.  The  King  of  Portugal 
offered  his  daughter,  Catherine  of  Braganza,  and  fifty 
thousand  pounds:  in  addition  to  which,  the  French  King, 
who  was  favourable  to  that  match,  offered  a  loan  of  another 
fifty  thousand.  The  King  of  Spain,  on  the  other  hand, 
offered  any  one  out  of  a  dozen  of  Princesses,  and  other 
hopes  of  gain.  But  the  ready  money  carried  the  day,  and 
Catherine  came  over  in  state  to  her  merry  marriage. 

The  whole  Court  was  a  great  flaunting  crowd  of  de- 
bauched men  and  shameless  women ;  and  Catherine's  merry 
husband  insulted  and  outraged  her  in  every  possible  way, 
until  she  consented  to  receive  those  worthless  creatures  as 
her  very  good  friends,  and  to  degrade  herself  by  their  com- 
panionship. A  Mrs.  Palmer,  whom  the  King  made  Lady 
Castlemaine,  and  afterwards  Duchess  of  Cleveland,  was 
one  of  the  most  powerful  of  the  bad  women  about  the 
Court,  and  had  great  influence  with  the  King  nearly  all 
through  his  reign.  Another  merry  lady  named  Moll  Da- 
vies,  a  dancer  at  the  theatre,  was  afterwards  her  rival. 
So  was  Nell  Gwyn,  first  an  orange  girl  and  then  an  actress, 
who  really  had  good  in  her,  and  of  whom  one  of  the  worst 
things  I  know  is,  that  actually  she  does  seem  to  have  been 
fond  of  the  King.  The  first  Duke  of  St.  Albans  was 
this  orange  girl's  child.  In  like  manner  the  son  of  a  merry 
waiting-lady,  whom  the  King  created  Duchess  of  Ports- 
mouth, became  the  Duke  of  Richmond.  Upon  the  whole 
it  is  not  so  bad  a  thing  to  be  a  commoner. 

The  Merry  Monarch  was  so  exceedingly  merry  among 
these  merry  ladies,  and  some  equally  merr}^  (and  equally 
infamous)  lords  and  gentlemen,  that  he  soon  got  through 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  361 

his  hundred  thousand  pounds,  and  then,  by  way  of  raising 
a  little  pocket-money,  made  a  merry  bargain.  He  sold 
Dunkirk  to  the  French  King  for  five  millions  of  livres. 
When  I  think  of  the  dignity  to  which  Oliver  Croinwell 
raised  England  in  the  eyes  of  foreign  powers,  and  when  I 
think  of  the  manner  in  which  he  gained  for  England  this 
very  Dunkirk,  I  am  much  inclined  to  consider  that  if  the 
Merry  Monarch  had  been  made  to  follow  his  father  for  this 
action,  he  would  have  received  his  just  deserts. 

Though  he  was  like  his  father  in  none  of  that  father's 
greater  qualities,  he  was  like  him  in  being  worthy  of  no 
trust.  When  he  sent  that  letter  to  the  Parliament,  from 
Breda,  he  did  expressly  promise  that  all  sincere  religious 
opinions  should  be  respected.  Yet  he  was  no  sooner  firm 
in  his  power  than  he  consented  to  one  of  the  worst  Acts  of 
Parliament  ever  passed.  Under  this  law,  every  minister 
Avho  should  not  give  his  solemn  assent  to  the  Prayer-Book 
by  a  certain  day,  was  declared  to  be  a  minister  no  longei-, 
and  to  be  deprived  of  his  church.  The  consequence  of  this 
was  that  some  two  thousand  honest  men  were  taken  from 
their  congregations,  and  reduced  to  dire  poverty  and  dis- 
tress. It  was  followed  by  another  outrageous  law,  called 
the  Conventicle  Act,  by  which  any  person  above  the  age  of 
sixteen  who  was  present  at  any  religious  service  not  accord- 
ing to  the  Prayer-Book,  was  to  be  imprisoned  three  months 
for  the  first  offence,  six  for  the  second,  and  to  be  trans- 
ported for  the  third.  This  Act  alone  filled  the  prisons, 
which  were  then  most  dreadful  dungeons,  to  overflow- 
ing. 

The  Covenanters  in  Scotland  had  already  fared  no  bet- 
ter, A  base  Parliament,  usually  known  as  the  Drunken 
Parliament,  in  consequence  of  its  principal  members  being 
seldom  sober,  had  been  got  together  to  make  laws  against 
the  Covenanters,  and  to  force  all  men  to  be  of  one  mind  in 
religious  matters.  The  Marquis  of  Argyle,  relying  on 
the  King's  honour,  had  given  himself  up  to  him;  but,  he 
was  wealthy,  and  his  enemies  wanted  his  wealth.  He  was 
tried  for  treason,  on  the  evidence  of  some  private  letters  in 
which  he  had  expressed  opinions — as  well  he  might — more 
favourable  to  the  government  of  the  late  Lord  Protector 
than  of  the  present  merry  and  religious  King.  He  was 
executed,  as  were  two  men  of  mark  among  the  Covenanters ; 
and  Sharp,  a  traitor  who  had  once  been  the  friend  of  the 


362  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

Presbyterians  and  betrayed  them,  was  made  Archbishop  of 
Saint  Andrew's,  to  teach  the  Scotch  how  to  like  bishops. 

Things  being  in  this  merry  state  at  home,  the  Merry 
Monarch  undertook  a  war  with  the  Dutch ;  principally  be- 
cause they  interfered  with  an  African  company,  established 
with  the  two  objects  of  buying  gold-dust  and  slaves,  of 
which  the  Duke  of  York  was  a  leading  member.  After 
some  preliminary  hostilities,  the  said  duke  sailed  to  the 
coast  of  Holland  with  a  fleet  of  ninety-eight  vessels  of  war, 
and  four  fire-ships.  This  engaged  with  the  Dutch  fleet, 
of  no  fewer  than  one  hundred  and  thirteen  ships.  In  the 
great  battle  between  the  two  forces,  the  Dutch  lost  eighteen 
ships,  four  admirals,  and  seven  thousand  men.  But,  the 
English  on  shore  were  in  no  mood  of  exultation  when  they 
heard  the  news. 

For,  this  was  the  year  and  the  time  of  the  Great  Plague 
in  London.  During  the  winter  of  one  thousand  six  hun- 
dred and  sixty-four  it  had  been  whispered  about,  that  some 
few  people  had  died  here  and  there  of  the  disease  called 
the  Plague,  in  some  of  the  unwholesome  suburbs  around 
London.  News  was  not  published  at  that  time  as  it  is 
now,  and  some  people  believed  these  rumours,  and  some 
disbelieved  them,  and  they  were  soon  forgotten.  But,  in 
the  month  of  May,  one  thousand  six  hundred  and  sixty- 
five,  it  began  to  be  said  all  over  the  town  that  the  disease 
had  burst  out  with  great  violence  in  Saint  Giles's,  and  that 
the  people  were  dying  in  great  numbers.  This  soon  turned 
out  to  be  awfully  true.  The  roads  out  of  London  were 
choked  up  by  people  endeavouring  to  escape  from  the  in- 
fected city,  and  large  sums  were  paid  for  any  kind  of  con- 
veyance. The  disease  soon  spread  so  fast,  that  it  was 
necessary  to  shut  up  the  houses  in  which  sick  people  were, 
and  to  cut  them  off  from  communication  with  the  living. 
Every  one  of  these  houses  was  marked  on  the  outside  of 
the  door  with  a  red  cross,  and  the  words,  Lord,  have  mercy 
upon  us !  The  streets  were  all  deserted,  grass  grew  in  the 
public  ways,  and  there  was  a  dreadful  silence  in  the  air. 
When  night  came  on,  dismal  rumblings  used  to  be  heard, 
and  these  were  the  wheels  of  the  death-carts,  attended  by 
men  with  veiled  faces  and  holding  cloths  to  their  mouths, 
who  rang  doleful  bells  and  cried  in  a  loud  and  solemn  voice, 
"  Bring  out  your  dead !  "  The  corpses  put  into  these  carts 
were  buried  by  torchlight  in  great  pits ;  no  service  being 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  363 

performed  over  them ;  all  men  being  afraid  to  stay  for  a 
moment  on  the  brink  of  the  ghastly  graves.  In  the  gen- 
eral fear,  children  ran  away  from  their  parents,  and  parents 
from  their  children.  Some  who  were  taken  ill,  died  alone, 
without  any  help.  Some  were  stabbed  or  strangled  by 
hired  nurses  who  robbed  them  of  all  their  money,  and  stole 
the  very  beds  on  which  they  lay.  Some  went  mad,  dropped 
from  the  windows,  ran  through  the  streets,  and  in  their 
pain  and  frenzy  flung  themselves  into  the  river. 

These  were  not  all  the  horrors  of  the  time.  The  wicked 
and  dissolute,  in  wild  desperation,  sat  in  the  taverns  sing- 
ing roaring  songs,  and  were  stricken  as  they  drank,  and 
went  out  and  died.  The  fearful  and  superstitious  persuaded 
themselves  that  they  saw  supernatural  sights — burning 
swords  in  the  sky,  gigantic  arms  and  darts.  Others  pre- 
tended that  at  nights  vast  crowds  of  ghosts  walked  round 
and  round  the  dismal  pits.  One  madman,  naked,  and  car- 
rying a  brazier  full  of  burning  coals  upon  his  head,  stalked 
through  the  streets,  crying  out  that  he  was  a  Prophet,  com- 
missioned to  denounce  the  vengeance  of  the  Lord  on  wicked 
London.  Another  always  went  to  and  fro,  exclaiming, 
"  Yet  forty  days,  and  London  shall  be  destroyed ! "  A 
third  awoke  the  echoes  in  the  dismal  streets,  by  night  and 
by  day,  and  made  the  blood  of  the  sick  run  cold,  by  calling 
out  incessantly,  in  a  deep  hoarse  voice,  "0,  the  great  and 
dreadful  God!" 

Through  the  months  of  July  and  August  and  September, 
the  Great  Plague  raged  more  and  more.  Great  fires  were 
lighted  in  the  streets,  in  the  hope  of  stopping  the  infec- 
tion ;  but  there  was  a  plague  of  rain  too,  and  it  beat  the 
fires  out.  At  last,  the  winds  which  usually  arise  at  that 
time  of  the  year  which  is  called  the  equinox,  when  day  and 
niglit  are  of  equal  length  all  over  the  world,  began  to  blow, 
and  to  purify  the  wretched  town.  The  deaths  began  to  de- 
crease, the  red  crosses  slowly  to  disappear,  the  fugitives  to 
return,  the  shops  to  open,  pale  frightened  faces  to  be  seen 
in  the  streets.  The  Plague  had  been  in  every  part  of  Eng- 
land, but  in  close  and  unwholesome  London  it  had  killed 
one  hundred  thousand  people. 

All  this  time,  the  Merry  Monarch  was  as  merry  as  ever, 
and  as  worthless  as  ever.  All  this  time,  the  debauched 
lords  and  gentlemen  and  the  shameless  ladies  danced  and 
gamed  and  drank,  and  loved  and  hated  one  another,  accord- 


364  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  Eiq^GLAND. 

ing  to  their  merry  ways.  So  little  humanity  did  the  gov 
ernment  learn  from  the  late  aflfiiction,  that  one  of  the  first 
things  the  Parliament  did  when  it  met  at  Oxford  (being  as 
yet  afraid  to  come  to  London),  was  to  make  a  law,  called 
the  Five  Mile  Act,  expressly  directed  against  those  poor 
ministers  who,  in  time  of  the  Plague,  had  manfully  come 
back  to  comfort  the  unhappy  people.  This  infamous  law, 
by  forbidding  them  to  teach  in  any  school,  or  to  come 
within  five  miles  of  any  city,  town,  or  village,  doomed 
them  to  starvation  and  death. 

The  fleet  had  been  at  sea,  and  healthy.  The  King  of 
France  was  now  in  alliance  with  the  Dutch,  though  his 
navy  was  chiefly  employed  in  looking  on  while  the  English 
and  Dutch  fought.  The  Dutch  gained  one  victory;  and 
the  English  gained  another  and  a  greater ;  and  Prince  Eu- 
pert,  one  of  the  English  admirals,  was  out  in  the  Channel 
one  windy  night,  looking  for  the  French  Admiral,  with  the 
intention  of  giving  him  something  more  to  do  than  he  had 
had  yet,  when  the  gale  increased  to  a  storm,  and  blew  him 
into  Saint  Helen's.  That  night  was  the  third  of  Septem- 
ber, one  thousand  six  hundred  and  sixty-six,  and  that  wind 
fanned  the  Great  Fire  of  London. 

It  broke  out  at  a  baker's  shop  near  London  Bridge,  on 
the  spot  on  which  the  Monument  now  stands  as  a  remem- 
brance of  those  raging  flames.  It  spread  and  spread,  and 
burned  and  burned,  for  three  days.  The  nights  were 
lighter  than  the  days ;  in  the  daytime  there  was  an  immense 
cloud  of  smoke,  and  in  the  night-time  there  was  a  great 
tower  of  fire  mounting  up  into  the  sky,  which  lighted  the 
whole  country  landscape  for  ten  miles  round.  Showers  of 
hot  ashes  rose  into  the  air  and  fell  on  distant  places ;  flying 
sparks  carried  the  conflagration  to  great  distances,  and 
kindled  it  in  twenty  new  spots  at  a  time ;  church  steeples 
fell  down  with  tremendous  crashes ;  houses  crumbled  into 
cinders  by  the  hundred  and  the  thousand.  The  summer 
had  been  intensely  hot  and  dry,  the  streets  were  very 
narrow,  and  the  houses  mostly  built  of  wood  and  plaster. 
Nothing  could  stop  the  tremendous  fire,  but  the  want  of 
more  houses  to  burn;  nor  did  it  stop  until  the  whole  way 
from  the  Tower  to  Temple  Bar  was  a  desert,  composed  of 
the  ashes  of  thirteen  thousand  houses  and  eighty-nine 
churches. 

This  was  a  terrible  visitation  at  the  time,  and  occasioned 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  365 

great  loss  and  suffering  to  the  two  hundred  thousand  burnt- 
out  people,  who  were  obliged  to  lie  in  the  fields  under  the 
open  night  sky,  or  in  hastily-made  huts  of  mud  and  straw, 
while  the  lanes  and  roads  were  rendered  impassable  by 
carts  which  had  broken  down  as  they  tried  to  save  their 
goods.  But  the  Fire  was  a  great  blessing  to  the  City  after- 
wards, for  it  arose  from  its  ruins  very  much  imj)roved — 
built  more  regularly,  more  widely,  more  cleanly  and  care- 
fully, and  therefore  much  more  healthily.  It  might  be  far 
more  healthy  than  it  is,  but  there  are  some  people  in  it  still 
— even  now,  at  this  time,  nearly  two  hundred  years  later — 
so  selfish,  so  pig-headed,  and  so  ignorant,  that  I  doubt  if 
even  another  Great  Fire  would  warm  them  up  to  do  their 
duty . 

The  Catholics  were  accused  of  having  wilfully  set  Lon- 
don in  flames ;  one  poor  Frenchinan,  who  had  been  mad  for 
years,  even  accused  himself  of  having  with  his  own  hand 
fired  the  first  house.  There  is  no  reasonable  doubt,  how- 
ever, that  the  fire  was  accidental.  An  inscription  on  the 
Monument  long  attributed  it  to  the  Catholi(;s ;  but  it  is  re- 
moved now,  and  Avas'always  a  malicious  and  stupid  untruth. 

SECOND  PART. 

That  the  Merry  Monarch  might  be  very  merry  indeed,  in 
the  meri-y  times  when  his  people  were  suffering  under  pes- 
tilence and  fire,  he  drank  and  gambled  and  flung  away 
among  his  favourites  the  money  which  the  Parliament  had 
voted  for  the  war.  The  consequence  of  this  was  that  the 
stout-hearted  English  sailors  were  merrily  starving  of  want, 
and  dying  in  the  streets;  while  the  Dutch,  under  their  ad- 
mirals De  Witt  and  De  Ruyter,  came  into  the  river 
Thames,  and  up  the  river  Medway  as  far  as  Upnor,  burned 
the  guard-shi^Ds,  silenced  the  weak  batteries,  and  did  what 
they  would  to  the  English  coast  for  six  whole  weeks.  Most 
of  the  English  ships  that  could  have  prevented  them  had 
neither  powder  nor  shot  on  board;  in  this  merry  reign, 
public  officers  made  themselves  as  merry  as  the  King  did 
with  the  public  money ;  and  when  it  was  entrusted  to  them 
to  spend  in  national  defences  or  preparations,  they  put  it 
into  their  own  pockets  with  the  merriest  grace  in  the  world. 

Lord  Clarendon  had,  by  this  time,  run  as  long  a  coarse 
as  is  usually  allotted  to  the  unscrupulous  nunisters  of  bad 


366  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

kings.  He  was  impeached  by  his  political  opponents,  but 
unsuccessfully.  The  King  then  commanded  him  to  with- 
draw from  England  and  retire  to  France,  which  he  did,  after 
defending  himself  in  writing.  He  was  no  great  loss  at 
home,  and  died  abroad  some  seven  years  afterwards. 

There  then  came  into  power  a  ministry  called  the  Cabal 
Ministry,  because  it  was  composed  of  Lord  Clifford,  the 
Earl  of  Arlington,  the  Duke  of  Buckingham  (a  great 
rascal,  and  the  King's  most  powerful  favourite).  Lord 
Ashley,  and  the  Duke  of  Lauderdale,  c.  a.  b.  a.  l. 
As  the  French  were  making  conquests  in  Flanders,  the  first 
Cabal  proceeding  was  to  make  a  treaty  with  the  Dutch,  for 
uniting  with  Spain  to  oppose  the  French.  It  was  no  sooner 
made  than  the  Merry  Monarch,  who  always  wanted  to  get 
money  without  being  accountable  to  a  Parliament  for  his 
expenditure,  apologised  to  the  King  of  France  for  having 
had  anything  to  do  with  it,  and  concluded  a  secret  treaty 
with  him,  making  himself  his  infamous  pensioner  to  the 
amount  of  two  millions  of  livres  down,  and  three  millions 
more  a  year;  and  engaging  to  desert  that  very  Spain,  to 
make  war  against  those  very  Dutch,  and  to  declare  himself 
a  Catholic  when  a  convenient  time  should  arrive.  This 
religious  King  had  lately  been  crying  to  his  Catholic  brother 
on  the  subject  of  his  strong  desire  to  be  a  Catholic ;  and  now 
he  merrily  concluded  this  treasonable  conspiracy  against 
the  country  he  governed,  by  undertaking  to  beconae  one  as 
soon  as  he  safely  could.  For  all  of  which,  though  he  had 
had  ten  merry  heads  instead  of  one,  he  richly  deserved  to 
lose  them  by  the  headsman's  axe. 

As  his  one  merry  head  might  have  been  far  from  safe,  if 
these  things  had  been  known,  they  were  kept  very  quiet, 
and  war  was  declared  by  France  and  England  against  the 
Dutch.  But,  a  very  uncommon  man,  afterwards  most  im- 
portant to  English  history  and  to  the  religion  and  liberty 
of  this  land,  arose  among  them,  and  for  many  long  years 
defeated  the  whole  projects  of  France.  This  was  William 
OF  Nassau,  Prince  of  Orange,  son  of  the  last  Prince  of 
Orange  of  the  same  name,  who  married  the  daughter  of 
Charles  the  First  of  England.  He  was  a  young  man  at 
this  time,  only  just  of  age ;  but  he  was  brave,  cool,  intrepid, 
and  wise.  His  father  had  been  so  detested  that,  upon  his 
death,  the  Dutch  had  abolished  the  authority  to  which  this 
son  would  have  otherwise  succeeded  (Stadtholder  it  was 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  367 

called),  and  placed  the  chief  power  in  the  hands  of  John 
DE  Witt,  who  educated  this  young  prince.  Now,  the 
Prince  became  very  popular,  and  John  de  Witt's  brother 
Cornelius  was  sentenced  to  banishment  on  a  false  accusa- 
tion of  conspiring  to  kill  him.  John  went  to  the  prison 
where  he  was,  to  take  him  away  to  exile,  in  his  coach ;  and 
a  great  mob  who  collected  on  the  occasion,  then  and  there 
cruelly  murdered  both  the  brothers.  This  left  the  govern- 
ment in  the  hands  of  the  Prince,  who  was  really  the  choice 
of  the  nation ;  and  from  this  time  he  exercised  it  with  the 
greatest  vigour,  against  the  whole  power  of  France,  under 
its  famous  generals  Conde  and  Tueenne,  and  in  support 
of  the  Protestant  religion.  It  was  full  seven  years  before 
this  war  ended  in  a  treaty  of  peace  made  at  Nimeguen,  and 
its  details  would  occupy  a  very  considerable  space.  It  is 
enough  to  say  that  William  of  Orange  established  a  famous 
character  with  the  whole  world ;  and  that  the  Merry  Mon- 
arch, adding  to  and  improving  on  his  former  baseness, 
bound  himself  to  do  everything  the  King  of  France  liked, 
and  nothing  the  King  of  France  did  not  like,  for  a  pension 
of  one  hundred  thousand  pounds  a  year,  which  was  af- 
terwards doubled.  Besides  this,  the  King  of  France,  by 
means  of  his  corrupt  ambassador — who  wrote  accounts  of 
his  proceedings  in  England,  which  are  not  always  to  be  be- 
lieved, I  think— bought  our  English  members  of  Parlia- 
ment, as  he  wanted  them.  So,  in  point  of  fact,  during  a 
considerable  portion  of  this  merry  reign,  the  King  of  France 
was  the  real  King  of  this  country. 

But  there  was  a  better  time  to  come,  and  it  was  to  come 
(though  his  royal  uncle  little  thought  so)  through  that  very 
William,  Prince  of  Orange.  He  came  over  to  England, 
saw  Mary,  the  elder  daughter  of  the  Duke  of  York,  and 
married  her.  We  shall  see  by-and-bye  what  came  of  that 
marriage,  and  why  it  is  never  to  be  forgotten. 

This  daughter  was  a  Protestant,  but  her  mother  died  a 
Catholic.  She  and  her  sister  Anxe,  also  a  Protestant, 
were  the  only  survivors  of  eight  children.  Anne  after- 
wards married  George,  Prince  of  Denmark,  brother  to 
the  King  of  that  country. 

Lest  you  should  do  the  Merry  Monarch  the  injustice  of 
supposing  that  he  was  even  good  humoured  (except  when 
he  had  everything  his  own  way),  or  that  he  was  high  spir- 
ited and  honourable,  I  will  mention  here  what  was  done  to 


368  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

a  member  of  the  House  of  Commons,  Sir  John  Coventry. 
He  made  a  remark  in  a  debate  about  taxing  the  theatres, 
which  gave  the  King  offence.  The  King  agreed  with  his 
illegitimate  son,  who  had  been  born  abroad,  and  whom 
he  had  made  Duke  of  Monmouth,  to  take  the  following 
merry  vengeance.  To  waylay  him  at  night,  fifteen  armed 
men  to  one,  and  to  slit  his  nose  with  a  penknife.  Like 
master,  like  man.  The  King's  favourite,  the  Duke  of 
Buckingham,  was  strongly  suspected  of  setting  on  an  assas- 
sin to  murder  the  Duke  of  Obmond  as  he  was  returning 
home  from  a  dinner;  and  that  duke's  spirited  son,  Lord 
OssoRT,  was  so  persuaded  of  his  guilt,  that  he  said  to  him 
at  Court,  even  as  he  stood  beside  the  King,  "My  lord,  I 
know  very  well  that  you  are  at  the  bottom  of  this  late 
attempt  upon  my  father.  But  I  give  you  warning,  if  he 
ever  come  to  a  violent  end,  his  blood  shall  be  upon  you, 
and  wherever  I  meet  you  I  will  pistol  you!  I  will  do  so, 
though  I  find  you  standing  behind  the  King's  chair;  and  I 
tell  you  this  in  his  Majesty's  presence,  that  you  may  be 
quite  sure  of  my  doing  what  I  threaten."  Those  were 
merry  times  indeed. 

There  was  a  fellow  named  Blood,  who  was  seized  for 
making,  with  two  companions,  an  audacious  attempt  to 
steal  the  crown,  the  globe,  and  sceptre,  from  the  place 
where  the  jewels  were  kept  in  the  Tower.  This  robber, 
who  was  a  swaggering  ruffian,  being  taken,  declared  that 
he  was  the  man  who  had  endeavoured  to  kill  the  Duke  of 
Ormond,  and  that  he  had  meant  to  kill  the  King  too,  but 
was  overawed  by  the  majesty  of  his  appearance,  when  he 
might  otherwise  have  done  it,  as  he  was  bathing  at  Batter- 
sea.  The  King  being  but  an  ill-looking  fellow,  I  don't  be- 
lieve a  word  of  this.  Whether  he  was  flattered,  or  whether 
he  knew  that  Buckingham  had  really  set  Blood  on  to  mur- 
der the  duke,  is  uncertain.  But  it  is  quite  certain  that  he 
pardoned  this  thief,  gave  him  an  estate  of  five  hundred  a 
year  in  Ireland  (which  had  had  the  honour  of  giving  him 
birth),  and  presented  him  at  Court  to  the  debauched  lords 
and  the  shameless  ladies,  who  made  a  great  deal  of  him — 
as  I  have  no  doubt  they  would  have  made  of  the  devil  him- 
self, if  the  King  had  introduced  him. 

Infamously  pensioned  as  he  was,  the  King  still  wanted 
money,  and  consequently  was  obliged  to  call  Parliaments. 
In  these,  the  great  object  of  the  Protestants  was  to  thwart 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  369 

the  Catholic  Duke  of  York,  who  married  a  second  time ; 
his  new  wife  being  a  young  lady  only  fifteen  years  old, 
the  Catholic  sister  of  the  Duke  of  Modena.  In  this  they 
were  seconded  by  the  Protestant  dissenters,  though  to  their 
own  disadvantage :  since,  to  exclude  Catholics  from  power, 
they  were  even  willing  to  exclude  themselves.  The  King's 
object  was  to  pretend  to  be  a  Protestant,  while  he  was 
really  a  Catholic ;  to  swear  to  the  bishops  that  he  was  de- 
voutly attached  to  the  English  Church,  while  he  knew  he 
had  bargained  it  away  to  the  King  of  France;  and  by 
cheating  and  deceiving  them,  and  all  who  were  attached  to 
royalty,  to  become  despotic  and  be  powerful  enough  to  con- 
fess what  a  rascal  he  was.  Meantime,  the  King  of  France, 
knowing  his  merry  pensioner  well,  intrigued  with  the 
King's  opponents  in  Parliament,  as  well  as  with  the  King 
and  his  friends. 

The  fears  that  the  country  had  of  the  Catholic  religion 
being  restored,  if  the  Duke  of  York  should  come  to  the 
throne,  and  the  low  cunning  of  the  King  in  pretending  to 
share  their  alarms,  led  to  some  very  terrible  results.  A 
certain  Dr.  Tonge,  a  dull  clergyman  in  the  City,  fell  into 
the  hands  of  a  certain  Titus  Gates,  a  most  infamous  char- 
acter, who  pretended  to  have  acquired  among  the  Jesuits 
abroad  a  knowledge  of  a  great  plot  for  the  murder  of  the 
King,  and  the  re-establishment  of  the  Catholic  religion. 
Titus  Gates,  being  produced  by  this  unlucky  Dr.  Tonge  and 
solemnly  examined  before  the  Council,  contradicted  himself 
in  a  thousand  ways,  told  the  most  ridiculous  and  improba- 
ble stories,  and  implicated  Coleman,  the  Secretary  of  the 
Duchess  of  York.  Now,  although  what  he  charged  against 
Coleman  was  not  true,  and  although  you  and  I  know  very 
well  that  the  real  dangerous  Catholic  plot  Avas  that  one 
with  the  King  of  France  of  which  the  Merry  Monarch  was 
himself  the  head,  there  happened  to  be  found  among  Cole- 
man's papers,  some  letters,  in  which  he  did  praise  the  days 
of  Bloody  Queen  Mary,  and  abuse  the  Protestant  religion. 
This  was  great  good  fortune  for  Titus,  as  it  seemed  to  con- 
firm him;  but  better  still  was  in  store.  Sir  Edmundbury 
Godfrey,  the  magistrate  who  had  first  examined  him,  be- 
ing unexpectedly  found  dead  near  Primrose  Hill,  was  con- 
fidently believed  to  have  been  killed  by  the  Catholics.  I 
think  there  is  no  doubt  that  he  had  been  melancholy  mad, 
and  that  he  killed  himself;  but  he  had  a  great  Protestant 
24 


370  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND. 

funeral,  and  Titus  was  called  the  Saver  of  the  Nation,  and 
received  a  pension  of  twelve  hundred  pounds  a  year. 

As  soon  as  Oates's  wickedness  had  met  with  this  success, 
up  started  another  villain,  named  William  Bedloe,  who, 
attracted  by  a  reward  of  five  hundred  pounds  offered  for 
the  apprehension  of  the  murderers  of  Godfrey,  came  for- 
ward and  charged  two  Jesuits  and  some  other  persons  Avith 
having  committed  it  at  the  Queen's  desire.  Gates,  going 
into  partnership  with  this  new  informer,  had  the  audacity 
to  accuse  the  poor  Queen  herself  of  high  treason.  Then 
appeared  a  third  informer,  as  bad  as  either  of  the  two,  and 
accused  a  Catholic  banker  named  Stayley  of  having  said 
that  the  King  was  the  greatest  rogue  in  the  world  (which 
would  not  have  been  far  from  the  truth),  and  that  he 
would  kill  him  with  his  own  hand.  This  banker,  being  at 
once  tried  and  executed,  Coleman  and  two  others  were  tried 
and  executed.  Then,  a  miserable  wretch  named  Pbance, 
a  Catholic  silversmith,  being  accused  by  Bedloe,  was  tor- 
tured into  confessing  that  he  had  taken  part  in  Godfrey's 
murder,  and  into  accusing  three  other  men  of  having  com- 
mitted it.  Then,  five  Jesuits  were  accused  by  Gates,  Bed- 
loe, and  Prance  together,  and  were  all  found  guilty,  and 
executed  on  the  same  kind  of  contradictory  and  absurd  evi- 
dence. The  Queen's  physician  and  three  monks  were  next 
put  on  their  trial;  but  Gates  and  Bedloe  had  for  the  time 
gone  far  enough,  and  these  four  were  acquitted.  The  pub- 
lic mind,  however,  was  so  full  of  a  Catholic  plot,  and  so 
strong  against  the  Duke  of  York,  that  James  consented  to 
obey  a  written  order  from  his  brother,  and  to  go  with  his 
family  to  Brussels,  provided  that  his  rights  should  never  be 
sacrificed  in  his  absence  to  the  Duke  of  Monmouth.  The 
House  of  Commons,  not  satisfied  with  this  as  the  King 
hoped,  passed  a  bill  to  exclude  the  duke  from  ever  succeed- 
ing to  the  throne.  In  return,  the  King  dissolved  the  Par- 
liament. He  had  deserted  his  old  favourite,  the  Duke  of 
Buckingham,  who  was  now  in  the  opposition. 

To  give  any  sufficient  idea  of  the  miseries  of  Scotland  in 
this  merry  reign,  would  occupy  a  hundred  pages.  Because 
the  people  would  not  have  bishops,  and  were  resolved  to 
stand  by  their  solemn  League  and  Covenant,  such  cruelties 
were  inflicted  upon  them  as  make  the  blood  run  cold.  Fe- 
rocious dragoons  galloped  through  the  country  to  punish 
the  peasants  for  deserting  the  churchesj  sons  were  hanged 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  571 

up  at  their  fathers'  doors  for  refusing  to  disclose  where 
their  fathers  were  concealed;  wives  were  tortured  to  death 
for  not  betraying  their  husbands;  people  were  taken  out  of 
their  fields  and  gardens,  and  shot  on  the  public  roads  with- 
out trial;  lighted  matches  were  tied  to  the  fingers  of  pris- 
oners, and  a  most  horrible  torment  called  the  Boot  was  in- 
vented, and  constantly  applied,  which  ground  and  mashed 
the  victims'  legs  with  iron  wedges.  Witnesses  were  tor- 
tured as  well  as  prisoners.  All  the  prisons  were  full;  all 
the  gibbets  were  heavy  with  bodies;  murder  and  plunder 
devastated  the  whole  country.  In  spite  of  all,  the  Cove- 
nanters were  by  no  means  to  be  dragged  into  the  churches, 
and  persisted  in  worshipping  God  as  they  thought  right. 
A  body  of  ferocious  Highlanders,  turned  upon  them  from 
the  mountains  of  their  own  country,  had  no  greater  effect 
than  the  English  dragoons  under  Gbahame  of  Claver- 
HousE,  the  most  cruel  and  rapacious  of  all'  their  enemies, 
whose  name  will  ever  be  cursed  through  the  length  and 
breadth  of  Scotland.  Archbishop  Sharp  had  ever  aided 
and  abetted  all  these  outrages.  But  he  fell  at  last;  for, 
when  the  injuries  of  the  Scottish  people  were  at  their 
height,  he  was  seen,  in  his  coach-and-six  coming  across  a 
moor,  by  a  body  of  men,  headed  by  one  Johk  Balfouk, 
who  were  waiting  for  another  of  their  oppressors.  Upon 
this  they  cried  out  that  Heaven  had  delivered  him  into 
their  hands,  and  killed  him  with  many  wounds.  If  ever  a 
man  deserved  such  a  death,  I  think  Archbishop  Sharp  did. 

It  made  a  great  noise  directly,  and  the  Merry  Monarch 
— strongly  suspected  of  having  goaded  the  Scottish  people 
on,  that  he  might  have  an  excuse  for  a  greater  army  than 
the  Parliament  Avere  willing  to  give  him — sent  down  his 
son,  the  Duke  of  Monmouth,  as  commander-in-chief,  with 
instructions  to  attack  the  Scottish  rebels,  or  Whigs  as  they 
were  called,  wlienever  he  came  up  with  them.  Marching 
with  ten  thousand  men  from  Edinburgh,  he  found  them,  in 
number  four  or  five  thousand,  drawn  up  at  Bothwell  Bridge, 
by  the  Clyde.  They  were  soon  dispersed;  and  Monmouth 
showed  a  more  humane  character  towards  them,  than  he 
had  shown  towards  that  Member  of  Parliament  whose  nose 
he  had  caused  to  be  slit  with  a  penknife.  But  the  Duke  of 
Lau.derdale  was  their  bitter  foe,  and  sent  Claverhouse  to 
finish  them. 

As  the  Duke  of  York  became  more  and  more  unpopular, 


372  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

the  Duke  of  Monmouth  became  more  and  more  popular. 
It  would  have  been  decent  in  the  latter  not  to  have  voted 
in  favour  of  the  rencAved  bill  for  the  exclusion  of  James 
from  the  throne;  but  he  did  so,  much  to  the  King's  amuse- 
ment, who  used  to  sit  in  the  House  of  Lords  by  the  lire, 
hearing  the  debates,  which  he  said  were  as  good  as  a  play. 
The  House  of  Commons  passed  the  bill  by  a  large  majority, 
and  it  was  carried  up  to  the  House  of  Lords  by  Lord  Rus- 
sell, one  of  the  best  of  the  leaders  on  the  Protestant  side. 
It  was  rejected  there,  chiefly  because  the  bishops  helped  the 
King  to  get  rid  of  it;  and  the  fear  of  Catholic  plots  revived 
again.  There  had  been  another  got  up,  by  a  fellow  out  of 
Newgate,  named  Dangerfield,  which  is  more  famous  than 
it  deserves  to  be,  under  the  name  of  the  Meal-Tub  Plot. 
This  jail-bird  having  been  got  out  of  Newgate  by  a  Mrs. 
Cellier,  a  Catholic  nurse,  had  turned  Catholic  himself, 
and  pretended  that  he  knew  of  a  plot  among  the  Presbyte- 
rians against  the  King's  life.  This  was  very  pleasant 
to  the  Duke  of  York,  who  hated  the  Presbyterians,  who 
returned  the  compliment.  He  gave  Dangerfield  twenty 
guineas,  and  sent  him  to  the  King  his  brother.  But 
Dangerfield,  breaking  down  altogether  in  his  charge,  and 
being  sent  back  to  Newgate,  almost  astonished  the  duke 
out  of  his  five  senses  by  suddenly  swearing  that  the  Catlio- 
lic  nurse  had  put  that  false  design  into  his  head,  and  that 
what  he  really  knew  about,  was,  a  Catholic  plot  against  the 
King;  the  evidence  of  which  would  be  found  in  some 
papers,  concealed  in  a  meal- tub  in  Mrs.  Cellier' s  house. 
There  they  were,  of  course — for  he  had  put  them  there 
himself — and  so  the  tub  gave  the  name  to  the  plot.  But, 
the  nurse  was  acquitted  on  her  trial,  and  it  came  to 
nothing. 

Lord  Ashley,  the  Cabal,  was  now  Lord  Shaftesbury,  and 
was  strong  against  the  succession  of  the  Duke  of  York. 
The  House  of  Commons,  aggravated  to  the  utmost  extent, 
as  we  may  well  suppose,  by  suspicions  of  the  King's  con- 
spiracy with  the  King  of  France,  made  a  desperate  point 
of  the  exclusion  still,  and  were  bitter  against  the  Catholics 
generally.  So  unjustly  bitter  were  they,  I  grieve  to  say, 
that  they  impeached  the  venerable  Lord  Stafford,  a  Catholic 
nobleman  seventy  years  old,  of  a  design  to  kill  the  King. 
The  witnesses  were  that  atrocious  Gates  and  two  other 
birds  of  the  same  feather.     He  was  found  guilty,  on  evi- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  373 

dence  quite  as  foolish  as  it  was  false,  and  was  beheaded 
on  Tower  Hill,  The  people  were  opposed  to  him  when  he 
first  appeared  upon  the  scaffold;  but,  when  he  had  ad- 
dressed them  and  shown  them  how  innocent  he  was  and 
how  wickedly  he  was  sent  there,  their  better  nature  was 
aroused,  and  they  said,  "  We  believe  you,  my  Lord.  God 
bless  you,  my  Lord !  " 

The  House  of  Commons  refused  to  let  the  King  have  any 
money  until  he  should  consent  to  the  Exclusion  Bill;  but, 
as  he  could  get  it  and  did  get  it  from  his  master  the  King 
of  France,  he  could  afford  to  hold  them  very  cheap.  He 
called  a  Parliament  at  Oxford,  to  which  he  went  down  with 
a  great  show  of  being  armed  and  protected  as  if  he  were  in 
danger  of  his  life,  and  to  which  the  opposition  members 
also  went  armed  and  protected,  alleging  that  they  were  in 
fear  of  the  Papists,  who  were  numerous  among  the  King's 
guards.  However,  they  went  on  with  the  Exclusion  Bill, 
and  were  so  earnest  upon  it  that  they  would  have  carried 
it  again,  if  the  King  had  not  popped  his  crown  and  state 
robes  into  a  sedan-chair,  bundled  himself  into  it  along  with 
them,  hurried  down  to  tlie  chamber  where  the  House  of 
Lords  met,  and  dissolved  the  Parliament.  After  which  he 
scampered  home,  and  the  members  of  Parliament  scampered 
home  too,  as  fast  as  their  legs  could  carry  them. 

The  Duke  of  York,  then  residing  in  Scotland,  had,  under 
the  law  which  excluded  Catholics  from  public  trust,  no 
right  whatever  to  public  employment.  Nevertheless,  he 
was  openly  employed  as  the  King's  representative  in  Scot- 
laud,  and  there  gratified  his  sullen  and  cruel  nature  to  his 
heart's  content  by  directing  the  dreadful  cruelties  against 
the  Covenanters.  There  were  two  ministers  named  Car- 
gill  and  Cameron  who  had  escaped  from  the  battle  of 
Bothwell  Bridge,  and  who  returned  to  Scotland,  and  raised 
the  miserable  but  still  brave  and  unsubdued  Covenanters 
afresh,  under  the  name  of  Caraeronians.  As  Cameron  pub- 
licly posted  a  declaration  that  the  King  was  a  forsworn 
tyrant,  no  mercy  was  shown  to  his  unhappy  followers  after 
he  was  slain  in  battle.  The  Duke  of  York,  who  was  par- 
ticularly fond  of  the  Boot  and  derived  great  pleasure  from 
having  it  applied,  offered  their  lives  to  some  of  these  peo- 
ple, if  they  would  cry  on  the  scaffold  "  God  save  the  King !  " 
But  their  relations,  friends,  and  countrymen,  had  been  so 
barbarously  tortured  and  murdered  in  this  merry  reign,  that 


874  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

they  preferred  to  die,  and  did  die.  The  duke  then  obtained 
his  merry  brother's  permission  to  hold  a  Parliament  in 
Scotland,  which  first,  with  most  shameless  deceit,  confirmed 
the  laws  for  securing  the  Protestant  religion  against  Pop- 
ery, and  then  declared  that  nothing  must  or  should  prevent 
the  succession  of  the  Popish  duke.  After  this  double-faced 
beginning,  it  established  an  oath  which  no  human  being 
could  understand,  but  which  everybody  was  to  take,  as  a 
proof  that  his  religion  was  the  lawful  religion.  The  Earl 
of  Argyle,  taking  it  with  the  explanation  that  he  did  not 
consider  it  to  prevent  him  from  favouring  any  alteration 
either  in  the  Church  or  State  which  was  not  inconsistent 
with  the  Protestant  religion  or  with  his  loyalty,  was  tried 
for  high  treason  before  a  Scottish  jury  of  which  the  Mar- 
quis OF  Montrose  Avas  foreman,  and  was  found  guilty. 
He  escaped  the  scaffold,  for  that  time,  by  getting  away,  in 
the  disguise  of  a  page,  in  the  train  of  his  daughter.  Lady 
Sophia  Lindsay.  It  was  absolutely  proposed,  by  certain 
members  of  the  Scottish  Council,  that  this  lady  should  be 
whipped  through  the  streets  of  Edinburgh.  But  this  was 
too  much  even  for  the  duke,  who  had  the  manliness  then 
(he  had  very  little  at  most  times)  to  remark  that  English- 
men were  not  accustomed  to  treat  ladies  in  that  manner. 
In  those  merry  times  nothing  could  equal  the  brutal  ser- 
vility of  the  Scottish  fawners,  but  the  conduct  of  similar 
degraded  beings  in  England. 

After  the  settlement  of  these  little  affairs,  the  duke  re- 
turned to  England,  and  soon  resumed  his  place  at  the  Coun- 
cil, and  his  office  of  High  Admiral — all  this  by  his  broth- 
er's favour,  and  in  open  defiance  of  the  law.  It  would 
have  been  no  loss  to  the  country,  if  he  had  been  drowned 
when  his  ship,  in  going  to  Scotland  to  fetch  his  family, 
struck  on  a  sand-bank,  and  was  lost  with  two  hundred  souls 
on  board.  But  he  escaped  in  a  boat  with  some  friends; 
and  the  sailors  were  so  brave  and  unselfish,  that,  when 
they  saw  him  rowing  aivay,  they  gave  three  cheers,  while 
they  themselves  were  going  down  for  ever. 

The  Merry  Monarch,  having  got  rid  of  his  Parliament, 
went  to  work  to  make  liimself  despotic,  with  all  speed. 
Having  had  the  villany  to  order  the  execution  of  Oliver 
Plunket,  Bishop  of  Armagh,  falsely  accused  of  a  plot  to 
establish  Popery  in  that  country  by  means  of  a  French 
army — the  very  thing  this  royal  traitor  was  himself  trying 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  375 

to  do  at  home — and  having  tried  to  ruin  Lord  Shaftesbury, 
and  failed — he  turned  his  hand  to  controlling  the  corpora- 
tions all  over  the  country ;  because,  if  he  could  only  do 
that,  he  could  get  what  juries  he  chose,  to  bring  in  perjured 
verdicts,  and  could  get  what  members  he  chose,  returned 
to  Parliament.  These  merry  times  produced,  and  made 
Chief  Justice  of  the  Court  of  King's  Bench,  a  drunken  ruff- 
ian of  the  name  of  Jeffreys  ;  a  red-faced  swollen  bloated 
horrible  creature,  with  a  bullying  roaring  voice,  and  a 
more  savage  nature  perhaps  than  was  ever  lodged  in  any 
human  breast.  This  monster  was  the  Merry  Monarch's 
especial  favourite,  and  he  testified  his  admiration  of  him 
by  giving  him  a  ring  from  his  own  finger,  which  the  peo- 
ple used  to  call  Judge  Jeffreys' s  Bloodstone.  Him  the  King 
employed  to  go  about  and  bully  the  corporations,  beginning 
with  London ;  or,  as  Jeffreys  himself  elegantly  called  it, 
"to  give  them  a  lick  with  the  rough  side  of  his  tongue." 
And  he  did  it  so  thoroughly,  that  they  soon  became  the 
basest  and  most  sycophantic  bodies  in  the  kingdom — except 
the  University  of  Oxford,  which,  in  that  respect,  was  quite 
pre-eminent  and  unapproachable. 

Lord  Shaftesbuiy  (who  died  soon  after  the  King's  fail- 
ure against  him).  Lord  William  Russell,  the  Duke  of 
Monmouth,  Lord  Howard,  Lord  Jersey,  Algernon 
Sidney,  John  Hampden  (grandson  of  the  great  Hampden), 
and  some  others,  used  to  hold  a  council  together  after  the 
dissolution  of  the  Parliament,  arranging  what  it  might  be 
necessary  to  do,  if  the  King  carried  his  Popish  plot  to  the 
utmost  height.  Lord  Shaftesbury  having  been  much  the 
most  violent  of  this  party,  brought  two  violent  men  into 
their  secrets — Eumsey,  who  had  been  a  soldier  in  the  Re- 
publican army ;  and  West,  a  lawyer.  These  two  knew  an 
old  officer  of  Cromwell's,  called  Rumbold,  who  had  mar- 
ried a  maltster's  widow,  and  so  had  come  into  possession  of 
a  solitary  dwelling  called  the  Rye  House,  near  Hoddesdon, 
in  Hertfordshire.  Rumbold  said  to  them  what  a  capital 
place  this  house  of  his  would  be  from  which  to  shoot  at  the 
King,  who  often  passed  there  going  to  and  fro  from  New- 
market. They  liked  the  idea,  and  entertained  it.  But, 
one  of  their  body  gave  information;  and  they,  together 
with  Shepherd  a  wine  merchant,  Lord  Russell,  Algernon 
Sidney,  Lord  Essex,  Lord  Howard,  and  Hampden,  were 
all  arrested. 


376  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

Lord  Russell  might  have  easily  escaped,  but  scorned  to 
do  so,  being  innocent  of  any  wrong;  Lord  Essex  might 
have  easily  escaped,  but  scorned  to  do  so,  lest  his  ilight 
should  prejudice  Lord  Russell.  But  it  weighed  upon  his 
mind  that  he  had  brought  into  their  council,  Lord  Howard 
— who  now  turned  a  miserable  traitor — against  a  great  dis- 
like Lord  Russell  had  always  had  of  him.  He  could  not 
bear  the  reflection,  and  destroyed  himself  before  Lord  Rus- 
sell was  brought  to  trial  at  the  Old  Bailey. 

He  knew  very  well  that  he  had  nothing  to  hope,  having 
always  been  manful  in  the  Protestant  cause  against  the  two 
false  brothers,  the  one  on  the  throne,  and  the  other  stand- 
ing next  to  it.  He  had  a  wife,  one  of  the  noblest  and  best 
of  women,  who  acted  as  his  secretary  on  his  trial,  who 
comforted  him  in  his  prison,  who  supped  with  him  on  the 
night  before  he  died,  and  whose  love  and  virtue  and  devo- 
tion have  made  her  name  imperishable.  Of  course,  he  was 
found  guilty,  and  was  sentenced  to  be  beheaded  in  Lincoln's 
Inn-fields,  not  many  yards  from  his  own  house.  When  he 
had  parted  from  his  children  on  the  evening  before  his 
death,  his  wife  still  stayed  with  him  until  ten  o'clock  at 
night;  and  when  their  final  separation  in  this  world  was 
over,  and  he  had  kissed  her  many  times,  he  still  sat  for  a 
long  while  in  his  prison,  talking  of  her  goodness.  Hearing 
the  rain  fall  fast  at  that  time,  he  calmly  said,  "  Such  a 
rain  to-morrow  will  spoil  a  great  show,  which  is  a  dull 
thing  on  a  rainy  day."  At  midnight  he  went  to  bed,  and 
slept  till  four;  even  when  his  servant  called  him,  he  fell 
asleep  again  while  his  clothes  were  being  made  ready.  He 
rode  to  the  scaffold  in  his  own  carriage,  attended  by  two 
famous  clergymen,  Tillotson  and  Burnet,  and  sang  a 
psalm  to  himself  very  softly,  as  he  went  along.  He  was  as 
quiet  and  as  steady  as  if  he  had  been  going  out  for  an  or- 
dinary ride.  After  saying  that  he  was  surprised  to  see  so 
great  a  crowd,  he  laid  down  his  head  upon  the  block,  as  if 
upon  the  pillow  of  his  bed,  and  had  it  struck  off  at  the 
second  blow.  His  noble  wife  was  busy  for  him  even  then ; 
for  that  true-hearted  lady  printed  and  widely  circulated  his 
last  words,  of  which  he  had  given  her  a  copy.  They  made 
the  blood  of  all  the  honest  men  in  England  boil. 

The  University  of  Oxford  distinguished  itself  on  the  very 
same  day  by  pretending  to  believe  that  the  accusation 
against  Lord  Russell  was  true^  and  by  calling  the  Kingj 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  377 

in  a  written  paper,  the  Breath  of  their  Nostrils  and  the 
Anointed  of  the  Lord.  This  paper  the  Parliament  after- 
wards caused  to  be  burned  by  the  common  hangman  ;  which 
I  am  sorry  for,  as  I  wish  it  had  been  framed  and  glazed 
and  hung  up  in  some  public  place,  as  a  monument  of  base- 
ness for  the  scorn  of  mankind. 

Next,  came  the  trial  of  Algernon  Sidney,  at  which  Jef- 
freys presided,  like  a  great  crimson  toad,  sweltering  and 
swelling  with  rage.  "  I  pray  God,  Mr.  Sidney,"  said  this 
Chief  Justice  of  a  merry  reign,  after  passing  sentence,  "  to 
work  in  you  a  temper  lit  to  go  to  the  other  world,  for  I  see 
you  are  not  lit  for  this."  "  My  lord,"  said  the  prisoner, 
composedly  holding  out  his  arm,  "  feel  my  pulse,  and  see  if 
I  be  disordered.  I  thank  Heaven  I  never  was  in  better 
temper  than  I  am  now."  Algernon  Sidney  was  executed 
on  Tower  Hill,  on  the  seventh  of  December,  one  thousand 
six  hundred  and  eighty-three.  He  died  a  hero,  and  died, 
in  his  own  words,  "  For  that  good  old  cause  in  which  he 
had  been  engaged  from  his  youth,  and  for  which  God  had 
so  often  and  so  wonderfully  declared  himself." 

The  Duke  of  Monmouth  had  been  making  his  uncle,  the 
Duke  of  York,  very  jealous,  by  going  about  the  country  in 
a  royal  sort  of  way,  playing  at  the  people's  games,  becom- 
ing godfather  to  their  children,  and  even  touching  for  the 
King's  evil,  or  stroking  the  faces  of  the  sick  to  cure  them 
— though,  for  the  matter  of  that,  I  should  say  he  did  them 
about  as  much  good  as  any  crowned  king  could  have  done. 
His  father  had  got  him  to  write  a  letter,  confessing  his 
having  had  a  part  in  the  conspiracy,  for  which  Lord  Rus- 
sell had  been  beheaded ;  but  he  was  ever  a  weak  man,  and 
as  soon  as  he  had  written  it,  he  was  ashamed  of  it  and  got 
it  back  again.  For  this,  he  was  banished  to  the  Nether- 
lauds  ;  but  he  soon  returned  and  had  an  interview  with  his 
father,  unknown  to  his  uncle.  It  would  seem  that  he  was 
coming  into  the  Merry  Monarch's  favour  again,  and  that 
the  Duke  of  York  was  sliding  out  of  it,  when  Death  ap- 
peared to  the  merry  galleries  at  Whitehall,  and  astonished 
the  debauched  lords  and  gentlemen,  and  the  shameless 
ladies,  very  considerably. 

On  Monday,  the  second  of  February,  one  thousand  si? 
hundred  and  eiglity-five,  the  merry  pensioner  and  servant 
of  the  King  of  France  fell  down  in  a  ht  of  apoplexy.  Bj 
the  Wednesday  his  case  was  hopeless,  and  on  the  Thursday 


378  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

he  was  told  so.  As  he  made  a  difficulty  about  taking  the 
sacrament  from  the  Protestant  Bishop  of  Bath,  the  Duke 
of  York  got  all  who  were  present  away  from  the  bed,  and 
asked  his  brother,  in  a  whisper,  if  he  should  send  for 
a  Catholic  priest?  The  King  replied,  "For  God's  sake, 
brother,  do !  "  The  duke  smuggled  in,  up  the  back  stairs, 
disguised  in  a  wig  and  gown,  a  priest  named  Huddleston, 
who  had  saved  the  King's  life  after  the  battle  of  Worces- 
ter :  telling  him  that  this  worthy  man  in  the  wig  had  once 
saved  his  body,  and  was  now  come  to  save  his  soul. 

The  Merry  Monarch  lived  through  that  night,  and  died 
before  noon  on  the  next  day,  which  was  Friday,  the  sixth. 
Two  of  the  last  things' he  said  were  of  a  human  sort,  and 
your  remembrance  will  give  him  the  full  benefit  of  them. 
When  the  Queen  sent  to  say  she  was  too  unwell  to  attend 
him  and  to  ask  his  pardon,  he  said,  "  Alas !  poor  woman, 
she  beg  my  pardon !  I  beg  hers  with  all  my  heart.  Take 
back  that  answer  to  her."  And  he  also  said,  in  reference 
to  Nell  Gwyn,  "  Do  not  let  poor  Nelly  starve." 

He  died  in  the  fifty-fifth  year  of  his  age,  and  the  twenty- 
fifth  of  his  reign. 


CHAPTER    XXXVI. 

ENGLAND   UNDER  JAMES  THE  SECOND. 

King  James  the  Second  was  a  man  so  very  disagree- 
able, that  even  the  best  of  historians  has  favoured  his 
brother  Charles,  as  becoming,  by  comparison,  quite  a  pleas- 
ant character.  The  one  object  of  his  short  reign  was  to 
re-establish  the  Catholic  religion  in  England ;  and  this  he 
doggedly  pursued  with  such  a  stupid  obstinacy,  that  his 
career  very  soon  came  to  a  close. 

The  first  thing  he  did,  was,  to  assure  his  Council  that  he 
would  make  it  his  endeavour  to  preserve  the  Government, 
both  in  Church  and  State,  as  it  was  by  law  established; 
and  that  he  would  always  take  care  to  defend  and  support 
the  Church.  Great  public  acclamations  were  raised  over 
this  fair  speech,  and  a  great  deal  was  said,  from  the  pul- 
pits and  elsewhere,  about  the  word  of  a  king  which  was 
never  broken,  by  credulous  people  who  little  supposed  that 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  379 

he  had  formed  a  secret  Council  for  Catholic  affairs,  of 
which  a  mischievous  Jesuit,  called  Father  Petre,  was 
one  of  the  chief  members.  With  tears  of  joy  in  his  eyes, 
he  received,  as  the  beginning  of  his  pension  from  the  King 
of  France,  five  hundred  thousand  livres ;  yet,  with  a  mix- 
ture of  meanness  and  arrogance  that  belonged  to  his  con- 
temptible character,  he  was  always  jealous  of  making  some 
show  of  being  independent  of  the  King  of  France,  while  he 
pocketed  his  money.  As- — notwithstanding  his  publishing 
two  papers  in  favour  of  Popery  (and  not  likely  to  do  it 
much  service,  I  should  think)  written  by  the  King,  his 
brother,  and  found  in  his  strong-box ;  and  his  open  display 
of  himself  attending  mass — the  Parliament  was  very  obse- 
quious, and  granted  him  a  large  sum  of  money,  he  began 
his  reign  with  a  belief  that  he  could  do  what  he  pleased, 
and  with  a  determination  to  do  it. 

Before  we  proceed  to  its  principal  events,  let  us  dispose 
of  Titus  Oates.  He  was  tried  for  perjury,  a  fortnight  af- 
ter tlie  coronation,  and  besides  being  very  heavily  fined, 
was  sentenced  to  stand  twice  in  the  pillory,  to  be  whipped 
from  Aldgate  to  Newgate  one  day,  and  from  Newgate  to 
Tyburn  two  days  afterwards,  and  to  stand  in  the  pillory 
five  times  a  year  as  long  as  he  lived.  This  fearful  sentence 
was  actually  inflicted  on  the  rascal.  Being  unable  to  stand 
after  his  first  flogging,  he  was  dragged  on  a  sledge  from 
Newgate  to  Tyburn,  and  flogged  as  he  was  drawn  along. 
He  was  so  strong  a  villain  that  he  did  not  die  under  the 
torture,  but  lived  to  be  afterwards  pardoned  and  rewarded, 
though  not  to  be  ever  believed  in  any  more.  Dangerfield, 
the  only  other  one  of  that  crew  left  alive,  was  not  so  fortu- 
nate. He  was  almost  killed  by  a  whipping  from  Newgate 
to  Tyburn,  and,  as  if  that  were  not  punishment  enough,  a 
ferocious  barrister  of  Gray's  Inn  gave  him  a  poke  in  the 
eye  with  his  cane,  which  caused  his  death ;  for  which  the 
ferocious  barrister  was  deservedly  tried  and  executed. 

As  soon  as  James  was  on  the  throne,  Argyle  and  Mon- 
mouth went  from  Brussels  to  Rotterdam,  and  attended  a 
meeting  of  Scottish  exiles  held  there,  to  concert  measures 
for  a  rising  in  England.  It  was  agreed  that  Argyle  should 
effect  a  landing  in  Scotland,  and  Monmouth  in  England; 
and  that  two  Englishmen  should  be  sent  with  Argyle  to  be 
in  his  confidence,  and  two  Scotchmen  with  the  Duke  of 
Monmouth. 


380  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

Argyle  was  the  first  to  act  upon  this  contract .  But,  two 
of  his  men  being  taken  prisoners  at  the  Orkney  Islands,  the 
Government  became  aware  of  his  intention,  and  was  able 
to  act  against  him  with  such  vigour  as  to  prevent  his  rais- 
ing more  than  two  or  three  thousand  Highlanders,  although 
he  sent  a  fiery  cross,  by  trusty  messengers,  from  clan  to 
clan  and  from  glen  to  glen,  as  the  custom  then  was  when 
those  wild  people  were  to  be  excited  by  their  chiefs.  As 
he  was  moving  towards  Glasgow  with  his  small  force,  he 
was  betrayed  by  some  of  his  followers,  taken,  and  carried, 
with  his  hands  tied  behind  his  back,  to  his  old  prison  in 
Edinburgh  Castle.  James  ordered  him  to  be  executed,  on 
his  old  shamefully  unjust  sentence,  within  three  days ;  and 
he  appears  to  have  been  anxious  that  his  legs  should  have 
been  pounded  with  his  old  favourite  the  boot.  Hov/ever, 
the  boot  was  not  applied ;  he  was  simply  beheaded,  and  his 
head  was  set  upon  the  top  of  Edinburgh  Jail.  One  of 
those  Englishmen  who  had  been  assigned  to  him  was  that 
old  soldier  Rumbold,  the  master  of  the  Rye  House.  He 
was  sorely  wounded,  and  within  a  week  after  Argyle  had 
suffered  with  great  courage,  was  brought  up  for  trial,  lest 
he  should  die  and  disappoint  the  King.  He,  too,  was  exe- 
cuted, after  defending  himself  with  great  spirit,  and  say- 
ing that  he  did  not  believe  that  God  had  made  the  greater 
part  of  mankind  to  carry  saddles  on  their  backs  and  bridles 
in  their  mouths,  and  to  be  ridden  by  a  few,  booted  and 
spurred  for  the  purpose — in  which  I  thoroughly  agree  with 
Rumbold. 

The  Duke  of  Monmouth,  partly  through  being  detained 
and  partly  through  idling  his  time  away,  was  five  or  six 
weeks  behind  his  friend  when  he  landed  at  Lyme,  in  Dor- 
set :  having  at  his  right  hand  an  unlucky  nobleman  called 
Lord  Grey  of  Werk,  who  of  himself  would  have  ruined 
a  far  more  promising  expedition.  He  immediately  set  up 
his  standard  in  the  market-place,  and  proclaimed  the  King 
a  tyrant,  and  a  Popish  usurper,  and  I  know  not  what  else ; 
charging  him,  not  only  with  what  he  had  done,  which  was 
bad  enough,  but  with  what  neither  he  nor  anybody  else 
had  done,  such  as  setting  fire  to  London,  and  poisoning 
the  late  King.  Raising  some  four  thousand  men  by  these 
means,  he  marched  on  to  Taunton,  where  there  were  many 
Protestant  dissenters  who  were  strongly  opposed  to  the 
Catholics.     Here,  both  the  rich   and  poor  turned  out  to 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  381 

receive  liiin,  ladies  waved  a  welcome  to  liiiu  from  all  the 
windows  as  he  passed  along  the  streets,  flowers  were 
strewu  in  his  way,  and  every  compliment  and  honour  that 
could  be  devised  was  showered  upon  him.  Among  the 
rest,  twenty  young  ladies  came  forward,  in  their  best 
clothes,  and  in  their  brightest  beauty,  and  gave  him  a  Bi- 
ble ornamented  with  their  own  fair  hands,  together  with 
other  presents. 

Encouraged  by  this  homage,  he  proclaimed  himself  King, 
and  went  on  to  Bridge  water.  But,  here  the  Government 
troops,  under  the  Eakl  of  Feversham,  were  close  at  hand ; 
and  he  was  so  dispirited  at  finding  that  he  made  but  few 
powerful  friends  after  all,  that  it  was  a  question  whether 
he  should  disband  his  army  and  endeavour  to  escape.  It 
was  resolved,  at  the  instance  of  that  unlucky  Lord  Grey,  to 
make  a  night  attack  on  the  King's  army,  as  it  lay  en- 
camped on  the  edge  of  a  morass  called  Sedgemoor.  The 
horsemen  were  commanded  by  the  same  unlucky  lord,  who 
was  not  a  brave  man.  He  gave  up  the  battle  almost  at  the 
first  obstacle — which  was  a  deep  drain ;  and  although  the 
poor  countrymen,  who  had  turned  out  for  Monmouth, 
fought  brav^ely  with  scythes,  poles,  pitchforks,  and  such 
poor  weapons  as  they  had,  they  were  soon  dispersed  by  the 
trained  soldiers,  and  fled  in  all  directions.  When  the 
Duke  of  Monmouth  himself  fled,  was  not  known  in  the  con- 
fusion ;  but  the  unlucky  Lord  Grey  was  taken  early  next 
day,  and  then  another  of  the  party  was  taken,  who  con- 
fessed that  he  had  parted  from  the  duke  only  four  hours 
before.  Strict  search  being  made,  he  was  found  disguised 
as  a  peasant,  hidden  in  a  ditch  under  fern  and  nettles,  with 
a  few  peas  in  his  pocket  which  he  had  gathered  in  the  fields 
to  eat.  The  only  other  articles  he  had  upon  him  were  a 
few  papers  and  little  books:  one  of  the  latter  being  a 
strange  jumble,  in  his  own  writing,  of  charms,  songs,  reci- 
pes, and  prayers.  He  was  completely  broken.  He  Avrote 
a  miserable  letter  to  the  King,  beseeching  and  entreating 
to  be  allowed  to  see  him.  When  he  was  taken  to  London, 
and  conveyed  bound  into  the  King's  presence,  he  crawled 
to  him  on  his  knees,  and  made  a  most  degrading  exhibi- 
tion .  As  James  never  forgave  or  relented  towards  anybody, 
he  was  not  likely  to  soften  towards  the  issuer  of  the  Lyme 
proclamation,  so  he  told  the  suppliant  to  prepare  for  death. 

On  the  fifteenth  of  July,  one  thousand  six  hundred  and 


382  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

eighty-five,  this  unfortunate  favourite  of  the  people  wag 
brought  out  to  die  on  Tower  Hill.  The  crowd  was  im- 
mense, and  the  tops  of  all  the  houses  were  covered  with 
gazers.  He  had  seen  his  wife,  the  daughter  of  the  Duke 
of  Buccleuch,  in  the  Tower,  and  had  talked  much  of  a  lady 
whom  he  loved  far  better — the  Lady  Harriet  Went- 
woRTH — who  was  one  of  the  last  persons  he  remembered  in 
this  life.  Before  laying  down  his  head  upon  the  block  he 
felt  the  edge  of  the  axe,  and  told  the  executioner  that  he 
feared  it  was  not  sharp  enough,  and  that  the  axe  Avas  not 
heavy  enough.  On  the  executioner  replying  that  it  was  of 
the  proper  kind,  the  duke  said,  "  I  pray  you  have  a  care, 
and  do  not  use  me  so  awkwardly  as  you  used  my  Lord 
Russell."  The  executioner,  made  nervous  by  this,  and 
trembling,  struck  once  and  merely  gashed  him  in  the  neck. 
Upon  this,  the  Duke  of  Monmouth  raised  his  head  and 
looked  the  man  reproachfully  in  the  face.  Then  he  struck 
twice,  and  then  thrice,  and  then  threw  down  the  axe,  and 
cried  out  in  a  voice  of  horror  that  he  could  not  finish  that 
work.  The  sheriffs,  however,  threatening  him  with  what 
should  be  done  to  himself  if  he  did  not,  he  took  it  up  again 
and  struck  a  fourth  time  and  a  fifth  time.  Then  the 
wretched  head  at  last  fell  off,  and  James,  Duke  of  Mon- 
mouth, was  dead,  in  the  thirty-sixth  year  of  his  age.  He 
was  a  showy  graceful  man,  with  many  popular  qualities, 
and  had  found  much  favour  in  the  open  hearts  of  the  Eng- 
lish. 

The  atrocities,  committed  by  the  Government,  which  fol- 
lowed this  Monmouth  rebellion,  form  the  blackest  and  most 
lamentable  page  in  English  history.  The  poor  peasants, 
having  been  dispersed  with  great  loss,  and  their  leaders 
having  been  taken,  one  would  think  that  the  implacable 
King  might  have  been  satisfied.  But  no ;  he  let  loose  upon 
them,  among  other  intolerable  monsters,  a  Colonel  Kirk, 
who  had  served  against  the  Moors,  and  whose  soldiers — 
called  by  the  people  Kirk's  lambs,  because  they  bore  a 
lamb  upon  their  flag,  as  the  emblem  of  Christianity — were 
worthy  of  their  leader.  The  atrocities  committed  by  these 
demons  in  human  shape  are  far  too  horrible  to  be  related 
here.  It  is  enough  to  say,  that  besides  most  ruthlessly 
murdering  and  robbing  them,  and  ruining  them  by  making 
them  buy  their  pardons  at  the  price  of  all  they  possessed, 
it  was  one  of  Kirk's  favourite  amusements,  as  he  and  hia 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  3»;i 

officers  sat  drinking  after  dinner,  and  toasting  the  King,  to 
have  batches  of  prisoners  hanged  outside  the  windows  for 
the  company's  diversion;  and  that  when  their  feet  quiv- 
ered in  the  convulsions  of  death,  he  used  to  swear  that 
they  should  have  music  to  their  dancing,  and  would  order 
the  drums  to  beat  and  the  trumpets  to  play.  The  detesta- 
ble King  informed  him,  as  an  acknowledgment  of  these 
services,  that  he  was  "  very  well  satisfied  with  his  proceed- 
ings." But  the  King's  great  delight  was  in  the  proceed- 
ings of  Jeffreys,  now  a  peer,  who  went  down  into  the  west, 
Avith  four  other  judges,  to  try  persons  accused  of  having 
had  any  share  in  the  rebellion.  The  King  pleasantly 
called  this  "  Jeffreys' s  campaign."  The  peopie  down  in 
that  part  of  the  country  remember  it  to  this  day  as  The 
Bloody  Assize. 

It  began  at  Winchester,  where  a  poor  deaf  old  lady, 
Mrs.  Alicia  Lisle,  the  widow  of  one  of  the  judges  of 
Charles  the  First  (who  had  been  murdered  abroad  by  some 
Royalist  assassins),  was  charged  with  having  given  shelter 
in  her  house  to  two  fugitives  from  Sedgemoor.  Three 
times  the  jury  refused  to  find  her  guilty,  until  Jeffreys 
bullied  and  frightened  them  into  that  false  verdict.  When 
he  had  extorted  it  from  them,  he  said,  "  Gentlemen,  if  I 
had  been  one  of  you,  and  she  had  been  my  own  mother,  I 
would  have  found  her  guilty ; " — as  I  dare  say  he  would. 
He  sentenced  her  to  be  burned  alive,  that  very  afternoon. 
The  clergy  of  the  cathedral  and  some  others  interfered  in 
her  favour,  and  she  was  beheaded  within  a  week.  As  a 
high  mark  of  his  approbation,  the  King  made  Jeffreys 
Lord  Chancellor ;  and  he  then  went  on  to  Dorchester,  to 
Exeter,  to  Taunton,  and  to  Wells.  It  is  astonishing,  when 
we  read  of  the  enormous  injustice  and  barbarity  of  this 
beast,  to  know  that  no  one  struck  him  dead  on  the  judg- 
ment-seat. It  was  enough  for  any  man  or  woman  to  be  ac- 
cused by  an  enemy,  before  Jeffreys,  to  be  found  guilty  of 
high  treason.  One  man  who  pleaded  not  guilty,  he  ordered 
to  be  taken  out  of  court  upon  the  instant,  and  hanged ;  and 
this  so  terrified  the  prisoners  in  general  that  they  mostly 
pleaded  guilty  at  once.  At  Dorchester  alone,  in  the  course 
of  a  few  days,  Jeffreys  hanged  eighty  people;  besides 
whipping,  transporting,  imprisoning,  and  selling  as  slaves, 
great  numbers.  He  executed,  in  all,  two  hundred  and 
fifty,  or  three  hundred. 


384  A   CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

These  executions  took  place,  among  the  neighbours  and 
friends  of  the  sentenced,  in  thirty-six  towns  and  villages. 
Their  bodies  were  mangled,  steeped  in  caldrons  of  boiling 
pitch  and  tar,  and  hung  up  by  the  roadsides,  in  the  streets, 
over  the  very  churches.  The  sight  and  smell  of  heads  and 
limbs,  the  hissing  and  bubbling  of  the  infernal  caldrons, 
and  the  tears  and  terrors  of  the  people,  were  dreadful  be- 
yond all  description.  One  rustic,  who  was  forced  to  steep 
the  remains  in  the  black  pot,  was  ever  afterwards  called 
"Tom  Boilman."  The  hangman  has  ever  since  been  called 
Jack  Ketch,  because  a  man  of  that  name  went  hanging  and 
hanging,  all  day  long,  in  the  train  of  Jeifreys.  You  will 
hear  much  of  the  horrors  of  the  great  French  Eevolution. 
Many  and  terrible  they  were,  there  is  no  doubt ;  but  I  know 
of  nothing  worse,  done  by  the  maddened  people  of  France 
in  that  awful  time,  than  was  done  by  the  higliest  judge  in 
England,  with  the  express  approval  of  the  King  of  England, 
in  The  Bloody  Assize. 

Nor  was  even  this  all.  Jeffreys  was  as  fond  of  money 
for  himself  as  of  misery  for  others,  and  he  sold  pardons 
wholesale  to  fill  his  pockets.  The  King  ordered,  at  one 
time,  a  thousand  prisoners  to  be  given  to  certain  of  his 
favourites,  in  order  that  they  might  bargain  with  them  for 
their  pardons.  The  young  ladies  of  Taunton  who  had  pre- 
sented the  Bible,  were  bestowed  upon  the  maids  of  honour 
at  court ;  and  those  precious  ladies  made  very  hard  bar- 
gains with  them  indeed.  When  The  Bloody  Assize  was  at 
its  most  dismal  height,  the  King  was  diverting  himself  with 
horse-races  in  the  very  place  where  Mrs.  Lisle  had  been 
executed.  When  Jeffreys  had  done  his  worst,  and  came 
home  again,  he  was  particularly  complimented  in  the  Royal 
Gazette;  and  when  the  King  heard  that  through  drunken- 
ness and  raging  he  was  very  ill,  his  odious  Majesty  re- 
marked that  such  another  man  could  not  easily  be  found 
in  England.  Besides  all  this,  a  former  sheriff  of  London, 
named  Cornish,  was  hanged  within  sight  of  his  own  house, 
after  an  abominably  conducted  trial,  for  having  had  a  share 
in  the  Rye  House  Plot,  on  evidence  given  by  Ramsey, 
which  that  villain  was  obliged  to  confess  was  directly 
opposed  to  the  evidence  he  had  given  on  the  trial  of  Lord 
Russell.  And  on  the  very  same  day,  a  worthy  widow, 
named  Elizabeth  Gaunt,  was  burned  alive  at  Tyburn,  for 
having  sheltered  a  wretch  who  himself  gave  evidence  a,gainst 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  385 

her.  She  settled  the  fuel  about  herself  with  her  own 
hands,  so  that  the  flames  should  reach  her  quickly;  and 
nobly  said,  with  her  last  breath,  that  she  had  obeyed  the 
sacred  command  of  God,  to  give  refuge  to  the  outcast,  and 
not  to  betray  the  wanderer. 

After  all  this  hanging,  beheading,  burning,  boiling,  mu- 
tilating, exposing,  robbing,  transporting,  and  selling  into 
slavery,  of  his  unhappy  subjects,  the  King  not  unnaturally 
thought  that  he  could  do  whatever  he  would.  So,  he  went 
to  work  to  change  the  religion  of  the  country  with  all  pos- 
sible speed ;  and  what  he  did  was  this.  • 

He  first  of  all  tried  to  get  rid  of  what  was  called  the 
Test  Act — which  prevented  the  Catholics  from  holding  pub- 
lic employments — by  his  own  power  of  dispensing  with  the 
penalties.  He  tried  it  in  one  case,  and,  eleven  of  the 
twelve  judges  deciding  in  his  favour,  he  exercised  it  in 
three  others,  being  those  of  three  dignitaries  of  University 
College,  Oxford,  who  had  become  Papists,  and  whom  he 
kept  in  their  places  and  sanctioned.  He  revived  the  hated 
Ecclesiastical  Commission,  to  get  rid  of  Compton,  Bishop 
of  London,  who  manfully  opposed  him.  He  solicited  the 
Pope  to  favour  England  with  an  ambassador,  which  the 
Pope  (who  was  a  sensible  man  then)  rather  unwillingly  did. 
He  flourished  Father  Petre  before  the  eyes  of  the  people 
on  all  possible  occasions.  He  favoured  the  establishment 
of  convents  in  several  parts  of  London.  He  was  delighted 
to  have  the  streets,  and  even  the  Court  itself,  filled  with 
Monks  and  Friars  in  the  habits  of  their  orders.  He  con- 
stantly endeavoured  to  make  Catholics  of  the  Protestants 
about  him.  He  held  private  interviews,  which  he  called 
"  closetings,"  with  those  Members  of  Parliament  who  held 
ofiices,  to  persuade  them  to  consent  to  the  design  he  had  in 
view.  When  they  did  not  consent,  they  were  removed, 
or  resigned  of  themselves,  and  their  places  were  given  to 
Catholics.  He  displaced  Protestant  officers  from  the  army, 
by  every  means  in  his  power,  and  got  Catholics  into  their 
places  too.  He  tried  the  same  thing  with  the  corporations, 
and  also  (though  not  so  successfully)  with  the  Lord  Lieu- 
tenants of  counties.  To  terrify  the  people  into  the  endur- 
ance of  all  these  measures,  he  kept  an  army  of  fifteen 
thousand  men  encamped  on  Hounslow  Heath,  where  mass 
was  openly  performed  in  the  General's  tent,  and  where 
priests  went  among  the  soldiers  endeavouring  to  persuade 
25 


386  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

them  to  become  Catholics.  For  circulating  a  paper  among 
those  men  advising  them  to  be  true  to  their  religion,  a 
Protestant  clergyman,  named  Johnson,  the  chaplain  of  the 
late  Lord  Russell,  was  actually  sentenced  to  stand  three 
times  in  the  pillory,  and  was  actually  whipped  from  New- 
gate to  Tyburn.  He  dismissed  his  own  brother-in-law 
from  his  Council  because  he  was  a  Protestant,  and  made  a 
Privy  Councillor  of  the  before-mentioned  Father  Petre. 
He  handed  Ireland  over  to  Richard  Talbot,  Earl  of 
Tyrconnell,  a  worthless,  dissolute  knave,  who  played 
the  same  game  there  for  his  master,  and  who  played  the 
deeper  game  for  himself  of  one  day  putting  it  under  the 
protection  of  the  French  King.  In  going  to  these  extremi- 
ties, every  man  of  sense  and  judgment  among  the  Catholics, 
from  the  Pope  to  a  porter,  knew  that  the  King  was  a  mere 
bigoted  fool,  who  would  undo  himself  and  the  cause  he 
sought  to  advance;  but  he  was  deaf  to  all  reason,  and, 
happily  for  England  ever  afterwards,  went  tumbling  off  his 
throne  in  his  own  blind  way. 

A  spirit  began  to  arise  in  the  country,  which  the  besotted 
blunderer  little  expected.  He  first  found  it  out  in  the 
University  of  Cambridge.  Having  made  a  Catholic,  a  dean , 
at  Oxford,  without  any  opposition,  he  tried  to  make  a  monk 
a  master  of  arts  at  Cambridge :  which  attempt  the  Univer- 
sity resisted,  and  defeated  him.  He  then  went  back  to  his 
favourite  Oxford.  On  the  death  of  the  President  of  Mag- 
dalen College,  he  commanded  that  there  should  be  elected 
to  succeed  him,  one  Mr.  Anthony  Farmer,  whose  only 
recommendation  was,  that  he  was  of  the  King's  religion. 
The  University  plucked  up  courage  at  last,  and  refused. 
The  King  substituted  another  man,  and  it  still  refused,  re- 
solving to  stand  by  its  own  election  of  a  Mr.  Hough.  The 
dull  tyrant,  upon  this,  punished  Mr.  Hough,  and  five-and- 
twenty  more,  by  causing  them  to  be  expelled  and  declared 
incapable  of  holding  any  church  preferment ;  then  he  pro- 
ceeded to  what  he  supposed  to  be  his  highest  step,  but  to 
what  was,  in  fact,  his  last  plunge  headforemost  in  his  tum- 
ble off  his  throne. 

He  had  issued  a  declaration  that  there  should  be  no  relig- 
ious tests  or  penal  laws,  in  order  to  let  in  the  Catholics 
more  easily ;  but  the  Protestant  dissenters,  unmindful  of 
themselves,  had  gallantly  joined  the  regular  church  in  op- 
posing it  tooth  and  nail.     The  King  and  Father  Petre  now 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  387 

resolved  to  have  this  read,  on  a  certain  Sunday,  in  all  the 
clmrehes,  and  to  order  it  to  be  circulated  for  that  purpose 
by  the  bishops.  The  latter  took  counsel  with  the  Arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury,  who  was  in  disgrace ;  and  they  re- 
solved that  the  declaration  should  not  be  read,  and  that 
they  would  petition  the  King  against  it.  The  Archbishop 
himself  wrote  out  the  petition,  and  six  bishops  went  into  the 
King's  bed-chamber  the  same  night  to  present  it,  to  his  in- 
finite astonishment.  Next  day  was  the  Sunday  fixed  for 
the  reading,  and  it  was  only  read  by  two  hundred  clergy- 
men out  of  ten  thousand.  The  King  resolved  against  all 
advice  to  prosecute  the  bishops  in  the  Court  of  King's 
Bench,  and  within  three  weeks  they  were  summoned  before 
the  Privy  Council,  and  committed  to  the  Tower.  As  the 
six  bishops  were  taken  to  that  dismal  place,  by  water,  the 
people  who  were  assembled  in  immense  numbers  fell  upon 
their  knees,  and  wept  for  them,  and  prayed  for  them. 
When  they  got  to. the  Tower,  the  officers  and  soldiers  on 
guard  besought  them  for  their  blessing.  While  they  were 
confined  there,  the  soldiers  every  day  drank  to  their  release 
with  loud  shouts.  When  they  were  brought  up  to  the 
Court  of  King's  Bench  for  their  trial,  which  the  Attorney- 
General  said  was  for  the  high  offence  of  censuring  the  Gov- 
ernment, and  giving  their  opinion  about  affairs  of  state, 
they  were  attended  by  similar  multitudes,  and  surrounded 
by  a  throng  of  noblemen  and  gentlemen.  When  the  jury 
went  out  at  seven  o'clock  at  night  to  consider  of  their  ver- 
dict, everybody  (except  the  King)  knew  that  they  would 
rather  starve  than  yield  to  the  King's  brewer,  who  was  one 
of  them,  and  wanted  a  verdict  for  his  customer.  When 
they  came  into  court  next  morning,  after  resisting  the 
brewer  all  night,  and  gave  a  verdict  of  not  guilty,  such  a 
shout  rose  up  in  Westminster  Hall  as  it  had  never  heard 
before ;  and  it  was  passed  on  among  the  people  away  to 
Temple  Bar,  and  away  again  to  the  Tower.  It  did  not  pass 
only  to  the  east,  but  passed  to  the  west  too,  until  it  reached 
the  camp  at  Hounslow,  where  the  fifteen  thousand  soldiers 
took  it  up  and  echoed  it.  And  still,  when  the  dull  King, 
who  was  then  with  Lord  Feversham,  heard  the  mighty  roar, 
asked  in  alarm  what  it  was,  and  was  told  that  it  was  "  noth- 
ing but  the  acquittal  of  the  bishops,"  he  said,  in  his  dogged 
way,  "  Call  you  that  nothing?  It  is  so  much  the  worse  for 
them." 


388  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

Between  the  petition  and  tlie  trial,  the  Queen  had  given 
birth  to  a  son,  which  Father  Petre  rather  thought  was  ow- 
ing to  Saint  Winifred.  But  I  doubt  if  Saint  Winifred  had 
much  to  do  with  it  as  the  King's  friend,  inasmuch  as  the 
entirely  new  prospect  of  a  Catholic  successor  (for  both  the 
King's  daughters  were  Protestants)  determined  the  Earls 
OF  Shrewsbury,  Danbt,  and  Devonshire,  Lord  Lumley, 
the  Bishop  of  London,  Admiral  Russell,  and  Colonel 
Sidney,  to  invite  the  Prince  of  Orange  over  to  England. 
The  Royal  Mole,  seeing  his  danger  at  last,  made,  in  his 
fright,  many  great  concessions,  besides  raising  an  army  of 
forty  thousand  men ;  but  the  Prince  of  Orange  was  not  a 
man  for  James  the  Second  to  cope  with.  His  preparations 
were  extraordinarily  vigorous,  and  his  mind  was  resolved. 

For  a  fortnight  after  the  Prince  was  ready  to  sail  for 
England,  a  great  wind  from  the  west  prevented  the  depart- 
ure of  his  fleet.  Even  when  the  wind  lulled,  and  it  did 
sail,  it  was  dispersed  by  a  storm,  and  was  obliged  to  put 
back  to  refit.  At  last,  on  the  first  of  November,  one  thou- 
sand six  hundred  and  eighty-eight,  the  Protestant  east 
wind,  as  it  was  long  called,  began  to  blow ;  and  on  the 
third,  the  people  of  Dover  and  the  people  of  Calais  saw  a 
fleet  twenty  miles  long  sailing  gallantly  by,  between  the 
two  places.  On  Monday,  the  fifth,  it  anchored  at  Torbay 
in  Devonshire,  and  the  Prince,  with  a  splendid  retinue  of 
officers  and  men,  marched  into  Exeter.  But  the  people  in 
that  western  part  of  the  country  had  suffered  so  much 
in  The  Bloody  Assize,  that  they  had  lost  heart.  Few 
people  joined  him ;  and  he  began  to  think  of  returning,  and 
publishing  the  invitation  he  had  received  from  those  lords, 
as  his  justification  for  having  come  at  all.  At  this  crisis, 
some  of  the  gentry  joined  him ;  the  Royal  army  began  to 
falter;  an  engagement  was  signed,  by  which  all  who  set 
their  hand  to  it  declared  that  they  would  support  one  an- 
other in  defence  of  the  laws  and  liberties  of  the  three  King- 
doms, of  the  Protestant  religion,  and  of  the  Prince  of 
Orange.  From  that  time,  the  cause  received  no  check ;  the 
greatest  towns  in  England  began,  one  after  another,  to  de- 
clare for  the  Prince ;  and  he  knew  that  it  was  all  safe  with 
him  when  the  University  of  Oxford  offered  to  melt  down 
its  plate,  if  he  wanted  any  money. 

By  this  time  the  King  was  running  about  in  a  pitiable 
way,  touching  people  for  the  King's  evil  in  one  place,  re- 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  389 

viewing  his  troops  in  another,  and  bleeding  from  the  nose 
in  a  third.  The  young  Prince  was  sent  to  Portsmouth, 
Father  Petre  went  off  like  a  shot  to  France,  and  there  was 
a  general  and  swift  dispersal  of  all  the  priests  and  friars. 
One  after  another,  the  King's  most  important  olficers  and 
friends  deserted  him  and  went  over  to  the  Prince.  In  the 
night,  his  daughter  Anne  fled  from  Whitehall  Palace ;  and 
the  Bishop  of  London,  who  had  once  been  a  soldier,  rode 
before  her  with  a  drawn  SAVord  in  his  hand,  and  pistols  at 
his  saddle.  "God  help  me,"  cried  the  miserable  King: 
"  my  very  children  have  forsaken  me !  "  In  his  wildness, 
after  debating  with  such  lords  as  were  in  London,  whether 
he  should  or  should  not  call  a  Parliament,  and  after  nam- 
ing three  of  them  to  negotiate  with  the  Prince,  he  resolved 
to  fly  to  France.  He  had  the  little  Prince  of  Wales  brought 
back  from  Portsmouth;  and  the  child  and  the  Queen 
crossed  the  river  to  Lambeth  in  an  open  boat,  on  a  miser- 
able wet  night,  and  got  safely  away.  This  was  on  the  night 
of  the  ninth  of  December. 

At  one  o'clock  on  the  morning  of  the  eleventh,  the 
King,  who  had,  in  the  meantime,  received  a  letter  from  the 
Prince  of  Orange,  stating  his  objects,  got  out  of  bed,  told 
Lord  Northumberland  who  lay  in  his  room  not  to  open 
the  door  until  the  usual  hour  in  the  morning,  and  went 
down  the  back  stairs  (the  same,  I  suppose,  by  which  the 
priest  in  the  wig  and  gown  had  come  up  to  his  brother)  and 
crossed  the  river  in  a  small  boat :  sinking  the  great  seal  of 
England  by  the  way.  Horses  having  been  provided,  he 
rode,  accompanied  by  Sir  Edward  Hales,  to  Feversham, 
where  he  embarked  in  a  Custom  House  Hoy.  The  master 
of  this  Hoy,  wanting  more  ballast,  ran  into  the  Isle  of 
Sheppy  to  get  it,  where  the  fishermen  and  smugglers  crowd- 
ed about  the  boat,  and  informed  the  King  of  their  suspi- 
cions that  he  was  a  "  hatchet- faced  Jesuit."  As  they  took 
his  money  and  would  not  let  him  go,  he  told  them  who  he 
was,  and  that  the  Prince  of  Orange  wanted  to  take  his  life ; 
and  he  began  to  scream  for  a  boat — and  then  to  cry,  be- 
cause he  had  lost  a  piece  of  wood  on  his  ride  which  he 
called  a  fragment  of  Our  Saviour's  cross.  He  put  himself 
into  the  hands  of  the  Lord  Lieutenant  of  the  county,  and 
his  detention  was  made  known  to  the  Prince  of  Orange  at 
Windsor — who,  only  wanting  to  get  rid  of  him,  and  not 
caring  where  he  went,  so  that  he  went  away,  was  very 


390  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

much  disconcerted  that  they  did  not  let  him  go.  However, 
there  was  nothing  for  it  but  to  have  him  brought  back, 
with  some  state  in  the  way  of  Life  Guards,  to  Whitehall. 
And  as  soon  as  he  got  there,  in  his  infatuation,  he  heard 
mass,  and  set  a  Jesuit  to  say  grace  at  his  public  dinner. 

The  people  had  been  thrown  into  the  strangest  state  of 
confusion  by  his  flight,  and  had  taken  it  into  their  heads 
that  the  Irish  part  of  the  army  were  going  to  murder  the 
Protestants.  Therefore,  they  set  the  bells  a  ringing,  and 
lighted  watch-fires,  and  burned  Catholic  Chapels,  and  looked 
about  in  all  directions  for  Father  Petre  and  the  Jesuits, 
while  the  Pope's  ambassador  was  running  away  in  the  dress 
of  a  footman.  They  found  no  Jesuits;  but  a  man,  who 
had  once  been  a  frightened  witness  before  Jeffreys  in 
court,  saw  a  swollen  drunken  face  looking  through  a  win- 
dow down  at  Wapping,  which  he  well  remembered.  The 
face  was  in  a  sailor's  dress,  but  he  knew  it  to  be  the  face 
of  that  accursed  Judge,  and  he  seized  him.  The  people, 
to  their  lasting  honour,  did  not  tear  him  to  pieces.  After 
knocking  him  about  a  little,  they  took  him,  in  the  basest 
agonies  of  terror,  to  the  Lord  Mayor,  who  sent  him,  at  his 
own  shrieking  petition,  to  the  Tower  for  safety.  There,  he 
died. 

Their  bewilderment  continuing,  the  people  now  lighted 
bonfires  and  made  rejoicings,  as  if  they  had  any  reason  to 
be  glad  to  have  the  King  back  again.  But,  his  stay  was 
very  short,  for  the  English  guards  were  removed  from 
Whitehall,  Dutch  guards  were  marched  up  to  it,  and  he 
was  told  by  one  of  his  late  ministers  that  the  Prince  would 
enter  London  next  day,  and  he  had  better  go  to  Ham. 
He  said,  Ham  was  a  cold  damp  place,  and  he  would  rather 
go  to  Rochester.  He  thought  himself  very  cunning  in  this, 
as  he  meant  to  escape  from  Rochester  to  France.  The 
Prince  of  Orange  and  his  friends  knew  that,  perfectly  well, 
and  desired  nothing  more.  So,  he  went  to  Gravesend,  in 
his  royal  barge,  attended  by  certain  lords,  and  watched  by 
Dutch  troops,  and  pitied  by  the  generous  people,  who  were 
far  more  forgiving  than  he  had  ever  been,  when  they  saw 
him  in  his  humiliation.  On  the  night  of  the  twenty-third 
of  December,  not  even  then  understanding  that  everybody 
wanted  to  get  rid  of  him,  he  went  out,  absurdly,  through 
his  Rochester  garden,  down  to  the  Medway,  and  got  away 
to  France,  where  he  rejoined  the  Queen. 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND.  391 

There  had  been  a  council  in  his  absence,  of  the  lords,  and 
the  authorities  of  London.  When  the  Prince  came,  on  the 
day  after  the  King's  departure,  he  summoned  the  lords  to 
meet  him,  and  soon  afterwards,  all  those  who  had  served 
in  any  of  the  Parliaments  of  King  Charles  the  Second.  It 
was  finally  resolved  by  these  authorities  that  the  throne 
was  vacant  by  the  conduct  of  King  James  the  Second ;  that 
it  was  inconsistent  with  the  safety  and  welfare  of  this  Prot- 
estant kingdom,  to  be  governed  by  a  Popish  prince ;  that 
the  Prince  and  Princess  of  Orange  should  be  King  and 
Queen  during  their  lives  and  the  life  of  the  survivor  of 
them ;  and  that  their  children  should  succeed  them,  if  they 
had  any.  That  if  they  had  none,  the  Princess  Anne  and 
her  children  should  succeed;  that  if  she  had  none,  the 
heirs  of  the  Prince  of  Orange  should  succeed. 

On  the  thirteenth  of  January,  one  thousand  six  hundred 
and  eighty-nine,  the  Prince  and  Princess,  sitting  on  a 
throne  in  Whitehall,  bouud  themselves  to  these  conditions. 
The  Protestant  religion  was  established  in  England,  and 
England's  great  and  glorious  Revolution  was  complete. 


CHAPTER   XXXVII. 

I  HAVE  now  arrived  at  the  close  of  my  little  history. 
The  events  which  succeeded  the  famous  Revolution  of 
one  thousand  six  hundred  and  eighty-eight,  would  neither 
be  easily  related  nor  easily  understood  in  such  a  book  as 
this. 

William  and  Mary  reigned  together,  five  years.  After 
the  death  of  his  good  wife,  William  occupied  the  throne, 
alone,  for  seven  years  longer.  During  his  reign,  on  the 
sixteenth  of  September,  one  thousand  seven  hundred  and 
one,  the  poor  weak  creature  who  had  once  been  James  the 
Second  of  England,  died  in  France.  In  the  meantime  he 
had  done  his  utmost  (which  was  not  much)  to  cause  Will- 
iam to  be  assassinated,  and  to  regain  his  lost  dominions. 
James's  son  was  declared,  by  the  French  King,  the  right- 
ful King  of  England;.and  was  called  in  France,  The  Chev- 
alier Saint  George,  and  in  England  The  Pretender. 
Some  infatuated  people  in  England,  and  particularly  in 


392  A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. 

Scotland,  took  up  the  Pretender's  cause  from  time  to  time — 
as  if  the  country  had  not  had  Stuarts  enough ! — and  many 
lives  were  sacrificed,  and  much  misery  was  occasioned. 
King  William  died  on  Sunday,  the  seventh  of  March,  one 
thousand  seven  hundred  and  two,  of  the  consequences  of  an 
accident  occasioned  by  his  horse  stumbling  with  him.  He 
was  always  a  brave  patriotic  Prince,  and  a  man  of  remark- 
able abilities.  His  manner  was  cold,  and  he  made  but  few 
friends ;  but  he  had  truly  loved  his  queen.  When  he  was 
dead,  a  lock  of  her  hair,  in  a  ring,  was  found  tied  with 
a  black  ribbon  round  his  left  arm. 

He  was  succeeded  by  the  Princess  Anne,  a  popular 
Queen,  who  reigned  twelve  years.  In  her  reign,  in  the 
month  of  May,  one  thousand  seven  hundred  and  seven,  the 
Union  between  England  and  Scotland  was  effected,  and 
the  two  countries  were  incorporated  under  the  name  of 
Great  Britain.  Then,  from  the  year  one  thousand  seven 
hundred  and  fourteen  to  the  year  one  thousand  eight  hun- 
dred and  thirty,  reigned  the  four  Georges. 

It  was  in  the  reign  of  George  the  Second,  one  thousand 
seven  hundred  and  forty-five,  that  the  Pretender  did  his 
last  mischief,  and  made  his  last  appearance.  Being  an  old 
man  by  that  time,  he  and  the  Jacobites — as  his  friends 
were  called — put  forward  his  son,  Charles  Edward, 
known  as  the  Young  Chevalier.  The  Highlanders  of  Scot- 
land, an  extremely  troublesome  and  wrong-headed  race  on 
the  subject  of  the  Stuarts,  espoused  his  cause,  and  he 
joined  them,  and  there  was  a  Scottish  rebellion  to  make 
him  king,  in  which  many  gallant  and  devoted  gentlemen 
lost  their  lives.  It  was  a  hard  matter  for  Charles  Edward 
to  escape  abroad  again,  with  a  high  price  on  his  head ;  but 
the  Scottish  people  Avere  extraordinarily  faithful  to  him, 
and,  after  undergoing  many  romantic  adventures,  not  un- 
like those  of  Charles  the  Second,  he  escaped  to  France.  A 
number  of  charming  stories  and  delightful  songs  arose  out 
of  the  Jacobite  feelings,  and  belong  to  the  Jacobite  times. 
Otherwise  I  think  the  Stuarts  were  a  public  nuisance  alto- 
gether. 

It  was  in  the  reign  of  George  the  Third  that  England  lost 
North  America,  by  persisting  in  taxing  her  without  her 
own  consent.  That  immense  country,  made  independent 
under  Washington  and  left  to  itself,  became  the  United 
States ;  one  of  the  greatest  nations  of  the  earth.     In  these 


A  CHILD'S  HISTORY  OP  ENGLAND.  393 

times  in  which  I  write,  it  is  honourably  remarkable  for 
protecting  its  subjects,  wherever  they  may  travel,  with  a 
dignity  and  a  determination  which  is  a  model  for  England. 
Between  you  and  me,  England  has  rather  lost  ground  in 
this  respect  since  the  days  of  Oliver  Cromwell. 

The  Union  of  Great  Britain  with  Ireland — which  had 
been  getting  on  very  ill  by  itself — took  place  in  the  reign 
of  George  the  Third,  on  the  second  of  July,  one  thousand 
seven  hundred  and  ninety-eight. 

William  the  Fourth  succeeded  George  the  Fourth, 
in  the  year  one  thousand  eight  hundred  and  thirty,  and 
reigned  seven  years.  Queen  Victoria,  his  niece,  the  only 
child  of  the  Duke  of  Kent,  the  fourth  son  of  George  the 
Third,  came  to  the  throne  on  the  twentieth  of  June,  one 
thousand  eight  hundred  and  thirty-seven.  She  was  mar- 
ried to  Prince  Albert  of  Saxe  Gotha  on  the  tenth  of  Feb- 
ruary, one  thousand  eight  hundred  and  forty.  She  is  very 
good,  and  much  beloved.     So  I  end,  like  the  crier,  with 

God  Save  the  Queen! 


THE  SMD. 


AMERICAN    NOTES. 


PREFACE. 


My  readers  have  opportunities  of  judging  for  themselves 
whether  the  influences  and  tendencies  which  I  distrusted 
in  America  had  any  existence  but  in  my  imagination.  They 
can  examine  for  themselves  whether  there  has  been  any- 
thing in  the  public  career  of  that  country  since,  at  home  or 
abroad,  which  suggests  that  those  influences  and  tendencies 
really  did  exist.  As  they  find  the  fact,  they  will  judge  me. 
If  they  discern  any  evidences  of  wrong-going,  in  any  direc*- 
tion  that  I  have  indicated,  they  will  acknowledge  that  I 
had  reason  in  what  I  wrote.  If  they  discern  no  such  thing, 
they  will  consider  me  altogether  mistaken — but  not  wilfully , 

Prejudiced  I  am  not,  and  never  have  been,  otherwise  than 
in  favor  of  the  United  States.  I  have  many  friends  in 
America,  I  feel  a  grateful  interest  in  the  country,  I  hope 
and  believe  it  will  successfully  work  out  a  problem  of  the 
highest  importance  to  the  whole  human  race.  To  represent 
me  as  viewing  America  with  ill-nature,  coldness,  or  ani- 
mosity, is  merely  to  do  a  very  foolish  thing,  which  is 
always  a  very  easy  one. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  PAOV 

I.  Going  Away, .      1 

II.  The  Passage  Out, 9 

III.  Boston 28 

IV.  An  American  Railroad — Lowell  and  its  Factory  System,     61 
V.  Worcester — The  Connecticut  River  —  Hartford — New 

Haven— To  New  York, 70 

VI.  New  York 78 

VII.  Philadelphia,  and  its  Solitary  Prison,     .        .        .        .96 
VIII.  Washington — The  Legislature  —  and  the  President's 

House, Ill 

IX.  A  Night  Steamer  on  the  Potomac  River — A  Virginia 
Road,  and  a  Black  Driver — Richmond — Baltimore — 
The  Harrisburgh  Mail,  and  a  Glimpse  of  the  City — A 

Canal -Boat 127 

X.  Some  further  Account  of  the  Canal-Boat,  its  Domestic 
Economy,  and  its  Passengers — Journey  to  Pittsburg 
across  the  Alleghany  Mountains — Pittsburg,      .         .  144 
XI.  PVom  Pittsburg  to  Cincinnati  in  a  Western  Steamboat 

— Cincinnati, 155 

XII.  Prom  Cincinnati  to  Louisville  in  another  Western  Steam- 
boat; and  from  Louisville  to  St.  Louis  in  another — 

St.  Louis, 164 

Xni.  A  Jaunt  to  the  Looking-Glass  Prairie  and  Back,     .  175 

XTV.  Return  to  Cincinnati — A  Stage-Coach  Ride  from  that 
City  to  Ctolumbus,  and  thence  to  Sandusky — So,  by 

Lake  Erie,  to  the  Falls  of  Niagara 183 

XV.  In  Canada;  Toronto;  Kingston;  Montreal;  Quebec; 
St.  John's — In  the  United  States  again;  Lebanon; 
TheShaker  Village;  and  West  Point,        .        .        .200 

XVI    The  Passage  Home, i        .  218 

XVII.  Slavery,  . 226 

XVIII.  Concluding  Remarks, 242 


1 


^^i; 
^^r; 


-iTvr:-^ 


45  tl- 


AMERICAN    NOTES. 


CHAPTER    THE    FIRST. 

GOING  AWAY. 

I  SHALL  never  forget  the  one-fourth  serious  and  three- 
fourths  comical  astonishment,  with  which,  on  the  morning 
of  the  third  of  January  eighteen-hundred-and-forty-two,  1 
opened  the  door  of,  and  put  my  head  into,  a  "  state-room  " 
on  board  the  Britannia  steam-packet,  twelve  hundred  tons 
burthen  per  register,  bound  for  Halifax  and  Boston,  and 
carrying  Her  Majesty's  mails. 

That  this  state-room  had  been  specially  engaged  for 
"Charles  Dickens,  Esquire,  and  Lady,"  was  rendered  suffi- 
ciently clear  even  to  my  scared  intellect  by  a  very  small 
manuscript,  announcing  the  fact,  which  was  pinned  on  a 
very  flat  quilt,  covering  a  very  thin  mattress,  spread  like  a 
surgical  plaster  on  a  most  inaccessible  shelf.  But  that  this 
was  the  state-room  concerning  which  Charles  Dickens, 
Esquire,  and  Lady,  had  held  daily  and  nightly  conferences 
for  at  least  four  months  preceding :  tliat  this  could  by  any 
possibility  be  that  small  snug  chamber  of  the  imagination, 
which  Charles  Dickens,  Esquire,  with  the  spirit  of  prophecy 
strong  upon  him,  had  always  foretold  would  contain  at 
least  one  little  sofa,  and  which  his  lady,  with  a  modest  yet 
most  magnificent  sense  of  its  limited  dimensions,  had  from 
the  first  opined  would  not  hold  more  than  two  enormous 
portmanteaus  in  some  odd  corner  out  of  sight  (portmanteaus 
which  could  now  no  more  be  got  in  at  the  door,  not  to  say 
stowed  away,  than  a  giraffe  could  be  persuaded  or  forced 
into  a  flower-pot) :  that  this  utterly  impracticable,  thor- 
oughly hopeless,  and  profoundly  preposterous  box,  had  the 
remotest  reference  to,  or  connection  with,  those  chaste  and 
pretty,  not  to  say  gorgeous  little  bowers,  sketched  by  a 


2  AMERICAN  K0TE8. 

masterly  hand,  in  the  highly  varnished  lithographic  plan 
hanging  up  in  the  agent's  counting-house  in  the  city  of 
London :  that  this  room  of  state,  in  short,  could  be  any- 
thing but  a  pleasant  fiction  and  cheerful  jest  of  the  cap- 
tain's, invented  and  put  in  practice  for  the  better  relish  and 
enjoyment  of  the  real  state-room  presently  to  be  disclosed : 
— ^these  were  truths  which  I  really  could  not,  for  the  mo- 
ment, bring  my  mind  at  all  to  bear  upon  or  comprehend. 
And  I  sat  down  upon  a  kind  of  horsehair  slab,  or  perch,  of 
which  there  were  two  within;  and  looked,  without  any  ex- 
pression of  countenance  whatever,  at  some  friends  who  had 
come  on  board  with  us,  and  who  were  crushing  their  faces 
into  all  manner  of  shapes  by  endeavouring  to  squeeze  them 
through  the  small  doorway. 

We  had  experienced  a  pretty  smart  shock  before  coming 
below,  which,  but  that  we  were  the  most  sanguine  people 
living,  might  have  prepared  us  for  the  worst.  The  imagi- 
native artist  to  whom  I  have  already  made  allusion,  has 
depicted  in  the  same  great  work,  a  chamber  of  almost  in- 
terminable perspective,  furnished,  as  Mr.  E-obins  would  say, 
in  a  style  of  more  than  Eastern  splendour,  and  filled  (but 
not  inconveniently  so)  with  groups  of  ladies  and  gentlemen, 
in  the  very  highest  state  of  enjoyment  and  vivacity.  Be- 
fore descending  into  the  bowels  of  the  ship,  we  had  passed 
from  the  deck  into  a  long  narrow  apartment,  not  unlike  a 
gigantic  hearse  with  windows  in  the  sides;  having  at  the 
upper  end  a  melancholy  stove,  at  which  three  or  four  chilly 
stewards  were  warming  their  hands;  while  on  either  side, 
extending  down  its  whole  dreary  length,  was  a  long,  long 
table,  over  each  of  which  a  rack,  fixed  to  the  low  roof,  and 
stuck  full  of  drinking-glasses  and  cruet-stands,  hinted  dis- 
mally at  rolling  seas  and  heavy  weather.  I  had  not  at  that 
time  seen  the  ideal  presentment  of  this  chamber  which  has 
since  gratified  me  so  much,  but  I  observed  that  one  of  our 
friends  who  had  made  the  arrangements  for  our  voyage, 
turned  pale  on  entering,  retreated  on  the  friend  behind 
him,  smote  his  forehead  involuntarily,  and  said,  below  his 
breath,  "  Impossible !  it  cannot  be ! "  or  words  to  that  effect. 
He  recovered  himself  however  by  a  great  effort,  and  after 
a  preparatory  cough  or  two,  cried,  with  a  ghastly  smile 
which  is  still  before  me,  looking  at  the  same  time  round  the 
walls,  "  Ha !  the  breakfast-room,  steward — eh?  "  We  all 
foresaw  what  the  answer  must  be  :  we  knew  the  agony  he 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  3 

suffered.  He  had  often  spoken  of  the  saloon;  had  taken  in 
and  lived  upon  the  pictorial  idea;  had  usually  given  us  to 
understand,  at  home,  that  to  form  a  just  conception  of  it, 
it  would  be  necessary  to  multiply  the  size  and  furniture  of 
an  ordinary  drawing-room  by  seven,  and  then  fall  short  of 
the  reality.  When  the  man  in  reply  avowed  the  truth;  the 
blunt,  remorseless,  naked  truth;  "This  is  the  saloon.  Sir" 
— he  actually  reeled  beneath  the  blow. 

In  persons  who  were  so  soon  to  part,  and  interpose  be- 
tween their  else  daily  communication  the  formidable  bar- 
rier of  many  thousand  miles  of  stormy  space,  and  who  were 
for  that  reason  anxious  to  cast  no  other  cloud,  not  even  the 
passing  shadow  of  a  moment's  disappointment  or  discomfit- 
ure, upon  the  short  interval  of  happy  companionship  that 
yet  remained  to  them — in  persons  so  situated,  the  natural 
transition  from  these  first  surprises  was  obviously  into  peals 
of  hearty  laughter;  and  I  can  report  that  I,  for  one,  being 
still  seated  upon  the  slab  or  perch  before-mentioned,  roared 
outright  until  the  vessel  rang  again.  Thus,  in  less  than 
two  minutes  after  coming  upon  it  for  the  first  time,  we  all 
by  common  consent  agreed  that  this  state-room  was  the 
pleasantest  and  most  facetious  and  capital  contrivance  pos- 
sible; and  that  to  have  had  it  one  inch  larger,  would  have 
been  quite  a  disagreeable  and  deplorable  state  of  things. 
And  with  this;  and  with  showing  how, — by  very  nearly 
closing  the  door,  and  twining  in  and  out  like  serpents,  and 
by  counting  the  little  washing-slab  as  standing-room, — we 
could  manage  to  insinuate  four  people  into  it,  all  at  one 
time;  and  entreating  each  other  to  observe  how  very  airy  it 
was  (in  dock),  and  how  there  was  a  beautiful  port-hole 
which  could  be  kept  open  all  day  (weather  permitting),  and 
how  there  was  quite  a  large  bull's-eye  just  over  the  look- 
ing-glass which  would  render  shaving  a  perfectly  easy  and 
delightful  process  (when  the  ship  didn't  roll  too  much); 
we  arrived,  at  last,  at  the  unanimous  conclusion  that  it  was 
rather  spacious  than  otherwise :  though  I  do  verily  believe 
that,  deducting  the  two  berths,  one  above  the  other,  than 
which  nothing  smaller  for  sleeping  in  was  ever  made  except 
coffins,  it  was  no  bigger  than  one  of  those  hackney  cabrio- 
lets which  have  the  door  behind,  and  shoot  their  fares  out, 
like  sacks  of  coals,  upon  the  pavement. 

Having  settled  this  point  to  the  perfect  satisfaction  of  all 
parties,  concerned  and  unconcerned,  we  sat  down  round  the 


4  American  I^totes. 

fire  in  the  ladies'  cabin — just  to  try  the  effect.  It  was 
rather  dark,  certainly;  but  somebody  said,  "of  course  it 
would  be  light,  at  sea,"  a  proposition  to  which  we  all  as- 
sented; echoing  "of  course,  of  course;  "  though  it  would 
be  exceedingly  difficult  to  say  why  we  thought  so.  I  re- 
member, too,  when  we  had  discovered  and  exhausted  an- 
other topic  of  consolation  in  the  circumstance  of  this  ladies' 
cabin  adjoining  our  state-room,  and  the  consequently  im- 
mense feasibility  of  sitting  there  at  all  times  and  seasons, 
and  had  fallen  into  a  momentary  silence,  leaning  oiir  faces 
on  our  hands  and  looking  at  the  fire,  one  of  our  party  said, 
with  the  solemn  air  of  a  man  who  had  made  a  discovery, 
"  What  a  relish  mulled  claret  will  have  down  here ! "  which 
appeared  to  strike  us  all  most  forcibly;  as  though  there 
were  something  spicy  and  high-flavoured  in  cabins,  which 
essentially  improved  that  composition,  and  rendered  it 
quite  incapable  of  perfection  anywhere  else. 

There  was  a  stewardess,  too,  actively  engaged  in  produc- 
ing clean  sheets  and  tablecloths  from  the  very  entrails  of 
the  sofas,  and  from  unexpected  lockers,  of  such  artful 
mechanism,  that  it  made  one's  head  ache  to  see  them  opened 
one  after  another,  and  rendered  it  quite  a  distracting  cir- 
cumstance to  follow  her  proceedings,  and  to  find  that  every 
nook  and  corner  and  individual  piece  of  furniture  was  some- 
thing else  besides  what  it  pretended  to  be,  and  was  a  mere 
trap  and  deception  and  place  of  secret  stowage,  whose  os- 
tensible purpose  was  its  least  useful  one. 

God  bless  that  stewardess  for  her  piously  fraudulent  ac- 
count of  January  voyages !  God  bless  her  for  her  clear 
recollection  of  the  companion  passage  of  last  year,  when 
nobody  was  ill,  and  everybody  danced  from  morning  to 
night,  and  it  was  "  a  run  "  of  twelve  days,  and  a  piece  of 
the  purest  frolic,  and  delight,  and  jollity  I  All  happiness 
be  with  her  for  her  bright  face  and  her  pleasant  Scotch 
tongue,  which  had  sounds  of  old  Home  in  it  for  my  fellow- 
traveller;  and  for  her  predictions  of  fair  winds  and  fine 
weather  (all  wrong,  or  I  shouldn't  be  half  so  fond  of  her) ; 
and  for  the  ten  thousand  small  fragments  of  genuine  wom- 
anly tact,  by  which,  without  piecing  them  elaborately  to- 
gether, and  patching  them  up  into  shape  and  form  and  case 
and  pointed  application,  she  nevertheless  did  plainly  show 
that  all  young  mothers  on  one  side  of  the  Atlantic  were 
near  and  close  at  hand  to  their  little  children  left  upon  the 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  6 

other;  and  that  what  seemed  to  the  uninitiated  a  serious 
journey,  was,  to  those  who  were  in  the  secret,  a  mere  frolic, 
to  be  sung  about  and  whistled  at !  Light  be  her  heart,  and 
gay  her  merry  eyes,  for  years ! 

The  state-room  had  grown  pretty  fast;  but  by  this  time 
it  had  expanded  into  something  quite  bulky,  and  almost 
boasted  a  bay-window  to  view  the  sea  from.  So  we  went 
upon  deck  again  in  high  spirits;  and  there,  everything  was 
in  such  a  state  of  bustle  and  active  preparation,  that  the 
blood  quickened  its  pace,  and  whirled  through  one's  veins 
on  that  clear  frosty  morning  with  involuntary  mirthfulness. 
For  every  gallant  ship  was  riding  slowly  up  and  down,  and 
every  little  boat  was  splashing  noisily  in  the  water;  and 
knots  of  people  stood  upon  the  wharf,  gazing  with  a  kind 
of  "  dread  delight "  on  the  far-famed  fast  American  steamer; 
and  one  party  of  men  were  "taking  in  the  milk,"  or,  in 
other  words,  getting  the  cow  on  board;  and  another  were 
filling  the  icehouses  to  the  very  throat  with  fresh  provi- 
sions; with  butchers '-meat  and  garden  stuff,  pale  sucking- 
pigs,  calves'  heads  in  scores,  beef,  veal,  and  pork,  and 
poultry  out  of  all  proportion;  and  others  were  coiling  ropes 
and  busy  with  oakum  yarns;  and  others  were  lowering 
heavy  packages  into  the  hold;  and  the  purser's  head  was 
barely  visible  as  it  loomed  in  a  state  of  exquisite  perplexity 
from  the  midst  of  a  vast  pile  of  passengers'  luggage;  and 
there  seemed  to  be  nothing  going  on  anywhere,  or  upper- 
most in  the  mind  of  anybody,  but  preparations  for  this 
mighty  voyage.  This,  with  the  bright  cold  sun,  the  brac- 
ing air,  the  crisply-curling  water,  the  thin  white  crust  of 
morning  ice  upon  the  decks  which  crackled  with  a  sharp  and 
cheerful  sound  beneath  the  lightest  tread,  was  irresistible. 
And  when,  again  upon  the  shore,  we  turned  and  saw  from 
the  vessel's  mast  her  name  signalled  in  flags  of  joyous  col- 
ours, and  fluttering  by  their  side  the  beautiful  American 
banner  with  its  stars  and  stripes, — the  long  three  thousand 
miles  and  more,  and,  longer  still,  the  six  whole  months  of 
absence,  so  dwindled  and  faded,  that  the  ship  had  gone  out 
and  come  home  again,  and  it  was  broad  spring  already  in 
the  Coburg  Dock  at  Liverpool. 

I  have  not  inquired  among  my  medical  acquaintance, 
whether  Turtle,  and  cold  Punch,  with  Hock,  Champagne, 
and  Claret,  and  all  the  slight  et  cetera  usually  included  in 
an  unlimited  order  for  a  good  dinner — especially  when  it 


«  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

is  left  to  the  liberal  construction  of  my  faultless  friend, 
Mr.  Radley,  of  the  Adelphi  Hotel — are  peculiarly  calcu- 
lated to  suffer  a  sea-change;  or  whether  a  plain  mutton- 
chop,  and  a  glass  or  two  of  sherry,  would  be  less  likely  of 
conversion  into  foreign  and  disconcerting  material.  My 
own  opinion  is,  that  whether  one  is  discreet  or  indiscreet 
in  these  particulars,  on  the  eve  of  a  sea-voyage,  is  a  matter 
of  little  consequence;  and  that,  to  use  a  common  phrase, 
"it  comes  to  very  much  the  same  thing  in  the  end."  Be 
this  as  it  may,  I  know  that  the  dinner  of  that  day  was  un- 
deniably perfect;  that  it  comprehended  all  these  items,  and 
a  great  many  more;  and  that  we  all  did  ample  justice  to 
it.  And  I  know  too,  that,  bating  a  certain  tacit  avoidance 
of  any  allusion  to  to-morrow;  such  as  may  be  supposed  to 
prevail  between  delicate-minded  turnkeys,  and  a  sensitive 
prisoner  who  is  to  be  hanged  next  morning;  we  got  on  very 
well,  and,  all  things  considered,  were  merry  enough. 

When  the  morning — the  morning — came,  and  we  met  at 
breakfast,  it  was  curious  to  see  how  eager  we  all  were  to 
prevent  a  moment's  pause  in  the  conversation,  and  how 
astoundingly  gay  everybody  was :  the  forced  spirits  of  each 
member  of  the  little  party  having  as  much  likeness  to  his 
natural  mirth,  as  hothouse  peas  at  five  guineas  the  quart, 
resemble  in  flavour  the  growth  of  the  dews,  and  air,  and 
rain  of  Heaven.  But  as  one  o'clock,  the  hour  for  going 
aboard,  drew  near,  this  volubility  dwindled  away  by  little 
and  little,  despite  the  most  persevering  efforts  to  the  con- 
trary, until  at  last,  the  matter  being  now  quite  desperate, 
we  threw  off  all  disguise;  openly  speculated  upon  where 
we  should  be  this  time  to-morrow,  this  time  next  day,  and 
so  forth;  and  entrusted  a  vast  number  of  messages  to  those 
who  intended  returning  to  town  that  night,  which  were  to 
be  delivered  at  home  and  elsewhere  without  fail,  within 
the  very  shortest  possible  space  of  time  after  the  arrival  of 
the  railway  train  at  Euston  Square.  And  commissions  and 
remembrances  do  so  crowd  upon  one  at  such  a  time,  that 
we  were  still  busied  with  this  employment  when  we  found 
ourselves  fused,  as  it  were,  into  a  dense  conglomeration  of 
passengers  and  passengers'  friends  and  passengers'  luggage, 
all  jumbled  together  on  the  deck  of  a  small  steamboat,  and 
panting  and  snorting  off  to  the  packet,  which  had  worked 
out  of  dock  yesterday  afternoon  and  was  now  lying  at  her 
moorings  in  the  river. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  7 

And  there  she  is !  all  eyes  are  turned  to  where  she  lies, 
dimly  discernible  through  the  gathering  fog  of  the  early 
winter  afternoon;  every  finger  is  pointed  in  the  same  direc- 
tion; and  murmurs  of  interest  and  admiration — as  "How 
beautiful  she  looks !  "  "  How  trim  she  is ! " — are  heard  on 
every  side.  Even  the  lazy  gentleman  with  his  hat  on  one 
side  and  his  hands  in  his  pockets,  who  has  dispensed  so 
much  consolation  by  inquiring  with  a  yawn  of  another  gen- 
tleman whether  he  is  "  going  across  " — as  if  it  were  a  ferry 
— even  he  condescends  to  look  that  way,  and  nod  his  head, 
as  who  should  say,  "No  mistake  about  that:"  and  not 
even  the  sage  Lord  Burleigh  in  his  nod,  included  half  so 
much  as  this  lazy  gentleman  of  might  who  has  made  the 
passage  (as  everybody  on  board  has  found  out  already;  it's 
impossible  to  say  how)  thirteen  times  without  a  single  ac- 
cident !  There  is  another  passenger  very  much  wrapped- 
up,  who  has  been  frowned  down  by  the  rest,  and  morally 
trampled  upon  and  crushed,  for  presuming  to  inquire  with 
a  timid  interest  how  long  it  is  since  the  poor  President 
went  down.  He  is  standing  close  to  the  lazy  gentleman, 
and  says  with  a  faint  smile  that  he  believes  She  is  a  very 
strong  Ship;  to  which  the  lazy  gentleman,  looking  first  in 
his  questioner's  eye  and  then  very  hard  in  the  wind's,  an- 
swers unexpectedly  and  ominously,  that  She  need  be.  Upon 
this  the  lazy  gentleman  instantly  falls  very  low  in  the  pop- 
ular estimation,  and  the  passengers,  with  looks  of  defiance, 
whisper  to  each  other  that  he  is  an  ass,  and  an  impostor, 
and  clearly  don't  know  anything  at  all  about  it. 

But  we  are  made  fast  alongside  the  packet,  whose  huge 
red  funnel  is  smoking  bravely,  giving  rich  promise  of  seri- 
ous intentions.  Packing-cases,  portmanteaus,  carpet-bags, 
and  boxes,  are  already  passed  from  hand  to  hand,  and 
hauled  on  board  with  breathless  rapidity.  The  officers, 
smartly  dressed,  are  at  the  gangway  handing  the  passen- 
gers up  the  side,  and  hurrying  the  men.  In  five  minutes' 
time,  the  little  steamer  is  utterly  deserted,  and  the  packet 
is  beset  and  over-run  by  its  late  freight,  who  instantly  per- 
vade the  whole  ship,  and  are  to  be  met  with  by  the  dozen 
in  every  nook  and  corner :  swarming  down  below  with  their 
own  baggage,  and  stumbling  over  other  people's;  disposing 
themselves  comfortably  in  wrong  cabins,  and  creating  a 
most  horrible  confusion  by  having  to  turn  out  again;  madly 
bent  upon  opening  locked  doors,  and  on  forcing  a  passage 


$  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

into  all  kinds  of  out-of-the-way  places  where  there  is  no 
thoroughfare;  sending  wild  stewards,  with  elfin  hair,  to  and 
fro  upon  the  breezy  decks  on  unintelligible  errands,  impos- 
sible of  execution :  and  in  short,  creating  the  most  extraor- 
dinary and  bewildering  tumult.  In  the  midst  of  all  this, 
the  lazy  gentleman,  who  seems  to  have  no  luggage  of  any 
kind — not  so  much  as  a  friend,  even — lounges  up  and  down 
the  hurricane-deck,  coolly  puffing  a  cigar;  and,  as  this  un- 
concerned demeanour  again  exalts  him  in  the  opinion  of 
those  who  have  leisure  to  observe  his  proceedings,  every 
time  he  looks  up  at  the  masts,  or  down  at  the  decks,  or 
over  the  side,  they  look  there  too,  as  wondering  whether  he 
sees  anything  wrong  anywhere,  and  hoping  that,  in  case  he 
should,  he  will  have  the  goodness  to  mention  it. 

What  have  we  here?  The  captain's  boat!  and  yonder 
the  captain  himself.  Now,  by  all  our  hopes  and  wishes, 
the  very  man  he  ought  to  be !  A  well-made,  tight- built, 
dapper  little  fellow;  with  a  ruddy  face,  which  is  a  letter 
of  invitation  to  shake  him  by  both  hands  at  once :  and  with 
a  clear,  blue  honest  eye,  that  it  does  one  good  to  see  one's 
sparkling  image  in.  "Ring  the  bell!"  "Ding,  ding, 
ding ! "  the  very  bell  is  in  a  hurry.  "  Now  for  the  shore — 
who's  for  the  shore?" — "These  gentlemen,  lam  sorry  to 
say."  They  are  away,  and  never  said.  Good  b'ye.  Ah! 
now  they  wave  it  from  the  little  boat.  "  Good  b'ye  I  Good 
b'ye!"  Three  cheers  from  them;  three  more  from  us; 
three  more  from  them :  and  they  are  gone. 

To  and  fro,  to  and  fro,  to  and  fro  again  a  hundred  times ! 
This  waiting  for  the  latest  mail-bags  is  worse  than  all.  If 
we  could  have  gone  off  in  the  midst  of  that  last  burst,  we 
should  have  started  triumphantly:  but  to  lie  here,  two 
hours  and  more  in  the  damp  fog,  neither  staying  at  home 
nor  going  abroad,  is  letting  one  gradually  down  into  the 
very  depths  of  dulness  and  low  spirits.  A  speck  in  the 
mist,  at  last!  That's  something.  It  is  the  boat  we  wait 
for!  That's  more  to  the  purpose.  The  captain  appears 
on  the  paddle-box  with  his  speaking  trumpet;  the  officers 
take  their  stations;  all  hands  are  on  the  alert;  the  flag- 
ging hopes  of  the  passengers  revive;  the  cooks  pause  in 
their  savoury  work,  and  look  out  with  faces  full  of  interest. 
The  boat  comes  alongside;  the  bags  are  dragged  in  anyhow, 
and  flung  down  for  the  moment  anywhere.  Three  -cheers 
more :  and  as  the  first  one  rings  upon  our  ears,  the  vessel 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  » 

throbs  like  a  strong  giant  that  has  just  received  the  breath 
of  life;  the  two  great  wheels  turn  fiercely  round  for  the 
first  time;  and  the  noble  ship,  with  wind  and  tide  astern, 
breaks  proudly  through  the  lashed  and  foaming  water. 


CHAPTER    THE    SECOND. 

THE  PASSAGE  OUT. 

We  all  dined  together  that  day;  and  a  rather  formidable 
party  we  were :  no  fewer  than  eighty-six  strong.  The  ves- 
sel being  pretty  deep  in  the  water,  with  all  her  coals  on 
board  and  so  many  passengers,  and  the  w(3ather  being  calm 
and  quiet,  there  was  but  little  motion;  so  that  before  the 
dinner  was  half  over,  even  those  passengers  who  were  most 
distrustful  of  themselves  plucked  up  amazingly;  and  those 
who  in  the  morning  had  returned  to  the  universal  question, 
"  Are  you  a  good  sailor? "  a  very  decided  negative,  now 
either  parried  the  inquiry  with  the  evasive  reply,  *'  Oh !  I 
suppose  I'm  no  worse  than  anybody  else;"  or,  reckless  of 
all  moral  obligations,  answered  boldly,  "  Yes : "  and  with 
some  irritation  too,  as  though  they  would  add,  "  I  should 
like  to  know  what  you  see  in  me,  Sir,  particularly,  to  jus- 
tify suspicion ! " 

Notwithstanding  this  high  tone  of  courage  and  confidence, 
I  could  not  but  observe  that  very  few  remained  long  over 
their  wine;  and  that  everybody  had  an  unusual  love  of  the 
open  air;  and  that  the  favourite  and  most  coveted  seats 
were  invariably  those  nearest  to  the  door.  The  tea-table, 
too,  was  by  no  means  as  well  attended  as  the  dinner- table; 
and  there  was  less  whist-playing  than  might  have  been  ex- 
pected. Still,  with  the  exception  of  one  lady,  who  had  re- 
tired with  some  precipitation  at  dinner-time,  immediately 
after  being  assisted  to  the  finest  cut  of  a  very  yellow  boiled 
leg  of  mutton  with  very  green  capers,  there  were  no  in- 
valids as  yet;  and  walking,  and  smoking,  and  drinking  of 
brandy-and- water  (but  always  in  the  open  air),  went  on 
with  unabated  spirit,  until  eleven  o'clock  or  thereabouts, 
when  '*  turning  in  " — no  sailor  of  seven  hours'  experience 
talks  of  going  to  bed — became  the  order  of  the  night 


10  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

The  perpetual  tramp  of  boot-heels  on  the  decks  gave  place 
to  a  heavy  silence,  and  the  whole  human  freight  was  stowed 
away  below,  excepting  a  very  few  stragglers,  like  myself, 
who  were  probably,  like  me,  afraid  to  go  there. 

To  one  unaccustomed  to  such  scenes,  this  is  a  very  strik- 
ing time  on  shipboard.  Afterwards,  and  when  its  novelty 
had  long  worn  off,  it  never  ceased  to  have  a  peculiar  inter- 
est and  charm  for  me.  The  gloom  through  which  the  great 
black  mass  holds  its  direct  and  certain  course;  the  rushing 
water,  plainly  heard,  but  dimly  seen;  the  broad,  white, 
glistening  track,  that  follows  in  the  vessel's  wake;  the  men 
on  the  look-out  forward,  who  would  be  scarcely  visible 
against  the  dark  sky,  but  for  their  blotting  out  some  score 
of  glistening  stars;  the  helmsman  at  the  wheel,  with  the  il- 
luminated card  before  him,  shining,  a  speck  of  light  amidst 
the  darkness,  like  something  sentient  and  of  Divine  intelli- 
gence; the  melancholy  sighing  of  the  wind  through  block, 
and  rope,  and  chain;  the  gleaming  forth  of  light  from  ev- 
ery crevice,  nook,  and  tiny  piece  of  glass  about  the  decks, 
as  though  the  ship  were  filled  with  fire  in  hiding,  ready  to 
burst  through  any  outlet,  wild  with  its  resistless  power  of 
death  and  ruin.  At  first,  too,  and  even  when  the  hour,  and 
all  the  objects  it  exalts,  have  come  to  be  familiar,  it  is  dif- 
cult,  alone  and  thoughtful,  to  hold  them  to  their  proper 
shapes  and  forms.  They  change  with  the  wandering  fancy; 
assume  the  semblance  of  things  left  far  away;  put  on  the 
well-remembered  aspect  of  favourite  places  dearly  loved; 
and  even  people  them  with  shadows.  Streets,  houses, 
rooms;  figures  so  like  their  usual  occupants,  that  they  have 
startled  me  by  their  reality,  which  far  exceeded,  as  it 
seemed  to  me,  all  power  of  mine  to  conjure  up  the  absent; 
have,  many  and  many  a  time,  at  such  an  hour,  grown  sud- 
denly out  of  objects  with  whose  real  look,  and  use,  and 
purpose,  I  was  as  well  acquainted  as  with  my  own  two 
hands. 

My  own  two  hands,  and  feet  likewise,  being  very  cold, 
however,  on  this  particular  occasion,  I  crept  below  at  mid- 
night. It  was  not  exactly  comfortable  below.  It  was  de- 
cidedly close;  and  it  was  impossible  to  be  unconscious  of 
the  presence  of  that  extraordinary  compound  of  strange 
smells,  which  is  to  be  found  nowhere  but  on  board  ship, 
and  which  is  such  a  subtle  perfume  that  it  seems  to  enter 
at  every  pore  of  the  skin,  and  whisper  of  the  hold.     Two 


AMERICAK  NOTES.  11 

passengers'  wives  (one  of  them  my  own)  lay  already  in 
silent  agonies  on  the  sofa;  and  one  lady's  maid  {my  lady's) 
was  a  mere  bundle  on  the  floor,  execrating  her  destiny,  and 
pounding  her  curl-papers  among  the  stray  boxes.  Every- 
thing sloped  the  wrong  way :  which  in  itself  was  an  aggra- 
vation scarcely  to  be  borne.  I  had  left  the  door  open,  a 
moment  before,  in  the  bosom  of  a  gentle  declivity,  and, 
when  I  turned  to  shut  it,  it  was  on  the  summit  of  a  lofty 
eminence.  Now  every  plank  and  timber  creaked,  as  if  the 
ship  were  made  of  wickerwork;  and  now  crackled,  like  an 
enormous  fire  of  the  driest  possible  twigs.  There  was 
nothing  for  it  but  bed;  so  I  went  to  bed. 

It  was  pretty  much  the  same  for  the  next  two  days,  with 
a  tolerably  fair  wind  and  dry  weather.  I  read  in  bed  (but 
to  this  hour  I  don't  know  what)  a  good  deal;  and  reeled  on 
deck  a  little;  drank  cold  brandy-and- water  with  an  un- 
speakable disgust,  and  ate  hard  biscuit  perseveringly :  not 
ill,  but  going  to  be. 

It  is  the  third  morning.  I  am  awakened  out  of  my  sleep 
by  a  dismal  shriek  from  my  wife,  who  demands  to  know 
whether  there's  any  danger.  I  rouse  myself,  and  look  out 
of  bed.  The  water-jug  is  plunging  and  leaping  like  a  lively 
dolphin;  all  the  smaller  articles  are  afloat,  except  my 
shoes,  which  are  stranded  on  a  carpet-bag,  high  and  dry, 
like  a  couple  of  coal-barges.  Suddenly  I  see  them  spring 
into  the  air,  and  behold  the  looking-glass,  which  is  nailed 
to  the  wall,  sticking  fast  upon  the  ceiling.  At  the  same 
time  the  door  entirely  disappears,  and  a  new  one  is  opened 
in  the  floor.  Then  I  begin  to  comprehend  that  the  state- 
room is  standing  on  its  head. 

Before  it  is  possible  to  make  any  arrangement  at  all  com- 
patible with  this  novel  state  of  things,  the  ship  rights. 
Before  one  can  say  "  Thank  Heaven ! "  she  wrongs  again. 
Before  one  can  cry  she  is  wrong,  she  seems  to  have  started 
forward,  and  to  be  a  creature  actively  running  of  its  own 
accord,  with  broken  knees  and  failing  legs,  through  every 
variety  of  hole  and  pitfall,  and  stumbling  constantly.  Be- 
fore one  can  so  "much  as  wonder,  she  takes  a  high  leap  into 
the  air.  Before  she  has  well  done  that,  she  takes  a  deep 
dive  into  the  water.  Before  she  has  gained  the  surface, 
she  throws  a  summerset.  The  instant  she  is  on  her  legs, 
she  rushes  backward.  And  so  she  goes  on  staggering,  heav- 
ing, wrestling,  leaping,  diving,  jumping,  pitching,  throb* 


12  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

bing,  rolling,  and  rocking:  and  going  through  all  these 
movements,  sometimes  by  turns,  and  sometimes  altogether : 
until  one  feels  disposed  to  roar  for  mercy. 

A  steward  passes.  "  Steward ! "  "  Sir?  "  "  What  is  the 
matter?  what  do  you  call  this?  "  "B-ather  a  heavy  sea  on, 
Sir,  and  a  head-wind." 

A  head- wind!  Imagine  a  human  face  upon  the  vessel's 
prow,  with  fifteen  thousand  Samsons  in  one  bent  upon 
driving  her  back,  and  hitting  her  exactly  between  the  eyes 
whenever  she  attempts  to  advance  an  inch.  Imagine  the 
ship  herself,  with  every  pulse  and  artery  of  her  huge  body 
swollen  and  bursting  under  this  maltreatment,  sworn  to  go 
on  or  die.  Imagine  the  wind  howling,  the  sea  roaring,  the 
rain  beating :  all  in  furious  array  against  her.  Picture  the 
sky  both  dark  and  wild,  and  the  clouds,  in  fearful  sympathy 
with  the  waves,  making  another  ocean  in  the  air.  Add  to 
all  this,  the  clattering  on  deck  and  down  below;  the  tread 
of  hurried  feet;  the  loud  hoarse  shouts  of  seamen;  the 
gurgling  in  and  out  of  water  through  the  scuppers;  with, 
every  now  and  then,  the  striking  of  a  heavy  sea  upon  the 
planks  above,  with  the  deep,  dead,  heavy  sound  of  thunder 
heard  within  a  vault; — and  there  is  the  head -wind  of  that 
January  morning. 

I  say  nothing  of  what  may  be  called  the  domestic  noises 
of  the  ship :  such  as  the  breaking  of  glass  and  crockery, 
the  tumbling  down  of  stewards,  the  gambols,  overhead,  of 
loose  casks  and  truant  dozens  of  bottled  porter,  and  the 
very  remarkable  and  far  from  exhilarating  sounds  raised  in 
their  various  state-rooms  by  the  seventy  passengers  who 
were  too  ill  to  get  up  to  breakfast.  I  say  nothing  of  them : 
for  although  I  lay  listening  to  this  concert  for  three  or  four 
days,  I  don't  think  I  heard  it  for  more  than  a  quarter  of  a 
minute,  at  the  expiration  of  which  term,  I  lay  down  again, 
excessively  sea-sick. 

Not  sea-sick,  be  it  understood,  in  the  ordinary  accepta- 
tion of  the  term :  I  wish  I  had  been :  but  in  a  form  which 
I  have  never  seen  or  heard  described,  though  I  have  no 
doubt  it  is  very  common.  I  lay  there,  all  the  day  long, 
quite  coolly  and  contentedly;  with  no  sense  of  weariness, 
with  no  desire  to  get  up,  or  get  better,  or  take  the  air; 
with  no  curiosity,  or  care,  or  regret,  of  any  sort  or  degree, 
saving  that  I  think  I  can  remember,  in  this  universal  in- 
difference, having  a  kind  of  lazy  joy — of  fiendish  delight, 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  13 

if  anything  so  lethargic  can  be  dignified  with  the  title — in 
the  fact  of  my  wife  being  too  ill  to  talk  to  me.  If  I  may 
be  allowed  to  illustrate  my  state  of  mind  by  such  an  exam- 
ple, I  should  say  that  I  was  exactly  in  the  condition  of  the 
elder  Mr.  Willet,  after  the  incursion  of  the  rioters  into  his 
bar  at  Chigwell.  Nothing  would  have  surprised  me.  If, 
in  the  momentary  illumination  of  any  ray  of  intelligence 
that  may  have  come  upon  me  in  the  way  of  thoughts  of 
Home,  a  goblin  postman,  with  a  scarlet  coat  and  bell,  had 
come  into  that  little  kennel  before  me,  broad  awake  in 
broad  day,  and,  apologising  for  being  damp  through  walk- 
ing in  the  sea,  had  handed  me  a  letter,  directed  to  myself 
in  familiar  characters,  I  am  certain  I  should  not  have  felt 
one  atom  of  astonishment :  I  should  have  been  perfectly 
satisfied.  If  Neptune  himself  had  walked  in,  with  a  toasted 
shark  on  his  trident,  I  should  have  looked  upon  the  event 
as  one  of  the  very  commonest  everyday  occurrences. 

Once — once — I  fovmd  myself  on  deck.  I  don't  know 
how  I  got  there,  or  what  possessed  me  to  go  there,  but  there 
I  was;  and  completely  dressed  too,  with  a.  huge  pea-coat 
on,  and  a  pair  of  boots  such  as  no  weak  man  in  his  senses 
could  ever  have  got  into.  I  found  myself  standing,  when 
a  gleam  of  consciousness  came  upon  me,  holding  on  to 
something.  I  don't  know  what.  I  think  it  was  the  boat- 
swain :  or  it  may  have  been  the  pump :  or  possibly  the  cow. 
I  can't  say  how  long  I  had  been  there;  whether  a  day  or  a 
minute.  I  recollect  trying  to  think  about  something  (about 
anything  in  the  whole  wide  world,  I  was  not  particular) 
without  the  smallest  effect.  I  could  not  even  make  out 
which  was  the  sea,  and  which  the  sky;  for  the  horizon 
seemed  drunk,  and  was  flying  wildly  about,  in  all  direc- 
tions. Even  in  that  incapable  state,  however,  I  recognised 
the  lazy  gentleman  standing  before  me :  nautically  clad  in 
a  suit  of  shaggy  blue,  with  an  oilskin  hat.  But  I  was  too 
imbecile,  although  I  knew  it  to  be  he,  to  separate  him  from 
his  dress;  and  tried  to  call  him,  I  remember.  Pilot.  After 
another  interval  of  total  unconsciousness,  I  found  he  had 
gone,  and  recognised  another  figure  in  its  place.  It  seemed 
to  wave  and  fluctuate  before  me  as  though  I  saw  it  re- 
flected in  an  unsteady  looking-glass;  but  I  knew  it  for  the 
captain;  and  such  was  the  cheerful  influence  of  his  face, 
that  I  tried  to  smile :  yes,  even  then  I  tried  to  smile.  I  saw 
by  his  gestures  that  he  addressed  me;  but  it  was  a  long 


14  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

time  before  I  could  make  out  that  he  remonstrated  against 
my  standing  up  to  my  knees  in  water — as  I  was;  of  course 
I  don't  know  why.  I  tried  to  thank  him,  but  couldn't.  I 
could  only  point  to  my  boots — or  wherever  I  supposed  my 
boots  to  be — and  say  in  a  plaintive  voice,  "  Cork  soles : " 
at  the  same  time  endeavouring,  I  am  told,  to  sit  down  in 
the  pool.  Finding  that  I  was  quite  insensible,  and  for  the 
time  a  maniac,  he  humanely  conducted  me  below. 

There  I  remained  imtil  I  got  better :  suffering,  whenever 
I  was  recommended  to  eat  anything,  an  amount  of  anguish 
only  second  to  that  which  is  said  to  be  endured  by  the  ap- 
parently, drowned,  in  the  process,  of  restoration  to  life. 
One  gentleman  on  board  had  a  letter  of  introduction  to  me 
from  a  mutual  friend  in  London.  He  sent  it  below  with  his 
card,  on  the  morning  of  the  head- wind;  and  I  was  long 
troubled  with  the  idea  that  he  might  be  up,  and  well,  and 
a  hundred  times  a  day  expecting  me  to  call  upon  him  in  the 
saloon.  I  imagined  him  one  of  those  cast-iron  images — I 
will  not  call  them  men — who  ask,  with  red  faces  and  lusty 
voices,  what  sea-sickness  means,  and  whether  it  really  is 
as  bad  as  it  is  represented  to  be.  This  was  very  torturing 
indeed;  and  I  don't  think  I  ever  felt  such  perfect  gratifica- 
tion and  gratitude  of  heart,  as  I  did  when  I  heard  from  the 
ship's  doctor  that  he  had  been  obliged  to  put  a  large  mus- 
tard poultice  on  this  very  gentleman's  stomach.  I  date  my 
recovery  from  the  receipt  of  that  intelligence. 

It  was  materially  assisted  though,  I  have  no  doubt,  by  a 
heavy  gale  of  wind,  which  came  slowly  up  at  sunset,  when 
we  were  about  ten  days  out,  and  raged  with  gradually  in- 
creasing fury  until  morning,  saving  that  it  lulled  for  an 
hour  a  little  before  midnight.  There  was  something  in  the 
imnatural  repose  of  that  hour,  and  in  the  after  gathering  of 
the  storm,  so  inconceivably  awful  and  tremendous,  that  its 
bursting  into  full  violence  was  almost  a  relief. 

The  labouring  of  the  ship  in  the  troubled  sea  on  this 
night  I  shall  never  forget.  "  Will  it  ever  be  worse  than 
this?  "  was  a  question  I  had  often  heard  asked,  when  ev- 
erything was  sliding  and  bumping  about,  and  when  it  cer- 
tainly did  seem  difficult  to  comprehend  the  possibility  of 
anything  afloat  being  more  disturbed,  without  toppling  over 
and  going  down.  But  what  the  agitation  of  a  steam-vessel 
is,  on  a  bad  winter's  night  in  the  wild  Atlantic,  it  is  im- 
possible for  the  most  vivid  imagination  to  conceive.     To 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  16 

say  that  she  is  flung  down  on  her  side  in  the  waves,  with 
her  masts  dipping  into  them,  and  that,  springing  up  again, 
she  rolls  over  on  the  other  side,  until  a  heavy  sea  strikes 
her  with  the  noise  of  a  hundred  great  guns,  and  hurls  her 
back — that  she  stops,  and  staggers,  and  shivers,  as  though 
stunned,  and  then,  with  a  violent  throbbing  at  her  heart, 
darts  onward  like  a  monster  goaded  into  madness,  to  be 
beaten  down,  and  battered,  and  crushed,  and  leaped  on  by 
the  angry  sea — that  thunder,  lightning,  hail,  and  rain,  and 
wind,  are  all  in  fierce  contention  for  the  mastery — that 
every  plank  has  its  groan,  every  nail  its  shriek,  and  every 
drop  of  water  in  the  great  ocean  its  howling  voice — is 
nothing.  To  say  that  all  is  grand,  and  all  appalling  and 
horrible  in  the  last  degree,  is  nothing.  Words  cannot  ex- 
press it.  Thoughts  cannot  convey  it.  Only  a  dream  can 
call  it  up  again,  in  all  its  fury,  rage,  and  passion. 

And  yet,  in  the  very  midst  of  these  terrors,  I  was  placed 
in  a  situation  so  exquisitely  ridiculous,  that  even  then  I 
had  as  strong  a  sense  of  its  absurdity  as  I  have  now;  and 
could  no  more  help  laughing  than  I  can  at  any  other  com- 
ical incident,  happening  under  circumstances  the  most  fa- 
vourable to  its  enjoyment.  About  midnight  we  shipped  a 
sea,  which  forced  its  way  through  the  skylights,  burst  open 
the  doors  above,  and  came  raging  and  roaring  down  into 
the  ladies'  cabin,  to  the  unspeakable  consternation  of  my 
wife  and  a  little  Scotch  lady — who,  by  the  way,  had  previ- 
ously sent  a  message  to  the  captain  by  the  stewardess,  re- 
questing him,  with  her  compliments,  to  have  a  steel  con- 
ductor immediately  attached  to  the  top  of  every  mast,  and 
to  the  chimney,  in  order  that  the  ship  might  not  be  struck 
by  lightning.  They,  and  the  handmaid  before-mentioned, 
being  in  such  ecstasies  of  fear  that  I  scarcely  knew  what 
to  do  with  them,  I  naturally  bethought  myself  of  some  re- 
storative or  comfortable  cordial;  and  nothing  better  occur- 
ring to  me,  at  the  moment,  than  hot  brandy-and-water,  I 
procured  a  tumbler-full  without  delay.  It  being  impossible 
to  stand  or  sit  without  holding  on,  they  were  all  heaped  to- 
gether in  one  corner  of  a  long  sofa — a  fixture  extending  en- 
tirely across  the  cabin — where  they  clung  to  each  other  in 
momentary  expectation  of  being  drowned.  When  I  ap- 
proached this  place  with  my  specific,  and  was  about  to  ad- 
minister it,  with  many  consolatory  expressions,  to  the 
nearest  sufferer,  what  was  my  dismay  to  see  them  all  roll 


16  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

slowly  down  to  the  other  end !  And  when  I  staggered  to 
that  end,  and  held  out  the  glass  once  more,  how  immensely 
baffled  were  my  good  intentions  by  the  ship  giving  another 
lurch,  and  their  all  rolling  back  again !  I  suppose  I  dodged 
them  up  and  down  this  sofa,  for  at  least  a  quarter  of  an 
hour,  without  reaching  them  once;  and  by  the  time  I  did 
catch  them,  the  brandy-and- water  was  diminished,  by  con- 
stant spilliag,  to  a  teaspoonful.  To  complete  the  group,  it 
is  necessary  to  recognise  in  this  disconcerted  dodger,  a  very 
pale  individual,  who  had  shaved  his  b&ard  and  brushed  his 
hair,  last,  at  Liverpool:  and  whose  only  article  of  dress 
(linen  not  included)  were  a  pair  of  dreadnaught  trousers;  a 
blue  jacket,  formerly  admired  upon  the  Thames  at  Rich- 
mond; no  stockings;  and  one  slipper. 

Of  the  outrageous  antics  performed  by  that  ship  next 
morning;  which  made  bed  a  practical  joke,  and  getting  up, 
by  any  process  short  of  falling  out,  an  impossibility;  I  say 
nothing.  But  an^^thing  like  the  utter  dreariness  and  deso- 
lation that  met  my  eyes  when  I,  literally,  "  tumbled  up " 
on  deck  at  noon,  I  never  saw.  Ocean  and  sky  were  all  of 
one  dull,  heavy,  uniform,  lead  colour.  There  was  no  ex- 
tent of  prospect  even  over  the  dreary  waste  that  lay  around 
us,  for  the  sea  ran  high,  and  the  horizon  encompassed  us 
like  a  large  black  hoop.  Viewed  from  the  air,  or  some  tall 
bluff  on  shore,  it  would  have  been  imposing  and  stupendous, 
no  doubt;  but  seen  from  the  wet  and  rolling  decks,  it  only 
impressed  one  giddily  and  painfully.  In  the  gale  of  last 
night  the  life-boat  had  been  crushed  by  one  blow  of  the  sea 
like  a  walnut-shell;  and  there  it  hung  dangling  in  the  air: 
a  mere  faggot  of  crazy  boards.  The  planking  of  the  pad- 
dle-boxes had  been  torn  sheer  away.  The  wheels  were  ex- 
posed and  bare;  and  they  whirled  and  dashed  their  spray 
about  the  decks  at  random.  Chimney,  white  with  crusted 
salt;  topmasts  struck;  stormsails  set;  rigging  all  knotted, 
•tangled,  wet,  and  drooping :  a  gloomier  picture  it  would  be 
hard  to  look  upon. 

I  was  now  comfortably  established  by  courtesy  in  the  la- 
dies' cabin,  where,  besides  ourselves,  there  were  only  four 
other  passengers.  First,  the  little  Scotch  lady  before-men- 
tioned, on  her  way  to  join  her  husband  at  New  York,  who 
had  settled  there  thi-ee  years  before.  Secondly  and  thirdly, 
an  honest  young  Yorkshireman,  connected  with  some  Amer- 
ican  house;    domiciled  in  that  same   city,   and   carrying 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  17 

thither  his  beautiful  young  wife  to  whom  he  had  been 
married  but  a  fortnight,  and  who  was  the  fairest  specimen 
of  a  comely  English  country  girl  I  have  ever  seen.  Fourth- 
ly, fifthly,  and  lastly,  another  couple :  newly  married  too, 
if  one  might  judge  from  the  endearments  they  frequently 
interchanged:  of  whom  I  know  no  more  than  that  they 
were  rather  a  mysterious,  runaway  kind  of  couple;  that  the 
lady  had  great  personal  attractions  also;  and  that  the  gen- 
tleman carried  more  guns  with  him  than  Robinson  Crusoe, 
wore  a  shooting-coat,  and  had  two  great  dogs  on  board. 
On  further  consideration,  I  remember  that  he  tried  hot 
roast  pig  and  bottled  ale  as  a  cure  for  sea-sickness;  and 
that  he  took  these  remedies  (usually  in  bed)  day  after  day, 
with  astonishing  perseverance.  I  may  add,  for  the  infor- 
mation of  the  curious,  that  they  decidedly  failed. 

The  weather  continuing  obstinately  and  almost  unprece- 
dentedly  bad,  we  usually  straggled  into  this  cabin,  more  or 
less  faint  and  miserable,  about  an  hour  before  noon,  and 
lay  down  on  the  sofas  to  recover;  during  which  interval, 
the  captain  would  look  in  to  communicate  the  state  of  the 
wind,  the  moral  certainty  of  its  changing  to-morrow  (the 
weather  is  always  going  to  improve  to-morrow,  at  sea),  the 
.vessel's  rate  of  sailing,  and  so  forth.  Observations  there 
were  none  to  tell  us  of,  for  there  was  no  sun  to  take  them 
by.  But  a  description  of  one  day  will  serve  for  all  the 
rest.     Here  it  is. 

The  captain  being  gone,  we  compose  ourselves  to  read,  if 
the  place  be  light  enough;  and  if  not,  we  doze  and  talk  al- 
ternately. At  one,  a  bell  rings,  and  the  stewardess  comes 
down  with  a  steaming  dish  of  baked  potatoes,  and  another 
of  roasted  apples;  and  plates  of  pig's  face,  cold  ham,  salt 
beef;  or  perhaps  a  smoking  mess  of  rare  hot  collops.  We 
fall  to  upon  these  dainties;  eat  as  much  as  we  can  (we 
have  great  appetites  now);  and  are  as  long  as  possible 
about  it.  If  the  fire  will  burn  (it  will  sometimes)  we  are 
pretty  cheerful.  If  it  won't,  we  all  remark  to  each  other 
that  it's  very  cold,  rub  our  hands,  cover  ourselves  with 
coats  and  cloaks,  and  lie  down  again  to  doze,  talk,  and  read 
(provided  as  aforesaid),  until  dinner-time.  At  five,  an- 
other bell  rings,  and  the  stewardess  reappears  with  another 
dish  of  potatoes — boiled  this  time — and  store  of  hot  meat 
of  various  kinds :  not  forgetting  the  roast  pig,  to  be  taken 
medicinally.  We  sit  down  at  table  again  (rather  moj*© 
2 


18  A3IERICAN  NOTES, 

cheerfully  than  before) ;  prolong  the  meal  with  a  rather 
mouldy  dessert  of  apples,  grapes,  and  oranges;  and  drink 
our  wine  and  brandy-and- water.  The  bottles  and  glasses 
are  still  upon  the  table,  and  the  oranges  and  so  forth  are 
rolling  about  according  to  their  fancy  and  the  ship's  way, 
when  the  doctor  comes  down,  by  special  nightly  invitation, 
to  join  our  evening  rubber :  immediately  on  whose  arrival 
we  make  a  party  at  whist,  and  as  it  is  a  rough  night  and 
the  cards  will  not  lie  on  the  cloth,  we  put  the  tricks  in  our 
pockets  as  we  take  them.  At  whist  we  remain  with  exem- 
plary gravity  (deducting  a  short  time  for  tea  and  toast)  un- 
til eleven  o'clock,  or  thereabouts;  when  the  captain  comes 
down  again,  in  a  sou' -wester  hat  tied  under  his  chin,  and 
a  pilot-coat :  making  the  ground  wet  where  he  stands.  By 
this  time  the  card-playing  is  over,  and  the  bottles  and 
glasses  are  again  upon  the  table;  and  after  an  hour's  pleas- 
ant conversation  about  the  ship,  the  passengers,  and  things 
in  general,  the  captain  (M'ho  never  goes  to  bed,  and  is  never 
out  of  humour)  turns  up  his  coat  collar  for  the  deck  again; 
shakes  hands  all  round;  and  goes  laughing  out  into  the 
weather  as  merrily  as  to  a  birthday  party. 

As  to  daily  news,  there  is  no  dearth  of  that  commodity. 
This  passenger  is  reported  to  have  lost  fourteen  pounds  at 
Vingt-et-un  in  the  saloon  yesterday;  and  that  passenger 
drinks  his  bottle  of  champagne  every  day,  and  how  he  does 
it  (being  only  a  clerk),  nobody  knows.  The  head  engineer 
has  distinctly  said  that  there  never  was  such  times — mean- 
ing weather — and  four  good  hands  are  ill,  and  have  given 
in,  dead  beat.  Several  berths  are  full  of  water,  and  all  the 
cabins  are  leaky.  The  ship's  cook,  secretly  swigging  dam- 
aged whiskey,  has  been  found  drunk;  and  has  been  played 
upon  by  the  fire-engine  until  quite  sober.  All  the  stew- 
ards have  fallen  down  stairs  at  various  dinner-times,  and 
go  about  with  plasters  in  various  places.  The  baker  is  ill, 
and  so  is  the  pastry-cook.  A  new  man,  horribly  indis- 
posed, has  been  required  to  fill  the  place  of  the  latter  offi- 
cer; and  has  been  propped  and  jammed  up  with  empty 
casks  in  a  little  house  upon  deck,  and  commanded  to  roll 
out  pie-crust,  which  he  protests  (being  highly  bilious)  it  is 
death  to  him  to  look  at.  News!  A  dozen  murders  on 
shore  would  lack  the  interest  of  these  slight  incidents  at 
sea. 

Divided  between  our  rubber  and  such  topics  as  these,  we 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  19 

were  running  (as  we  thought)  into  Halifax  Harbour,  on  the 
fifteenth  night,  with  little  wind  and  a  bright  moon — in- 
deed, we  had  made  the  Light  at  its  outer  entrance,  and  put 
the  pilot  in  charge — when  suddenly  the  ship  struck  upon  a 
bank  of  mud.  An  immediate  rush  on  deck  took  place  of 
course;  the  sides  were  crowded  in  an  instant;  and  for  a 
few  minutes  we  were  in  a?  lively  a  state  of  confusion  as  the 
greatest  lover  of  disorder  would  desire  to  see.  The  pas- 
sengers, and  guns,  and  water-casks,  and  other  heavy  mat- 
ters, being  all  huddled  together  aft,  however,  to  lighten 
her  in  the  head,  she  was  soon  got  off;  and  after  some  driv- 
ing on  towards  an  uncomfortable  line  of  objects  (whose  vi- 
cinity had  been  announced  very  early  in  the  disaster  by  a 
loud  cry  of  "  Breakers  a-head !  ")  and  much  backing  of  pad- 
dles and  heaving  of  the  lead  into  a  constantly  decreasing 
depth  of  water,  we  dropped  anchor  in  a  strange  outlandish- 
looking  nook  which  nobody  on  board  could  recognise,  al- 
though there  was  land  all  about  us,  and  so  close  that  we 
could  plainly  see  the  waving  branches  of  the  trees. 

It  was  strange  enough,  in  the  silence  of  midnight,  and 
the  dead  stillness  that  seemed  to  be  created  by  the  sudden 
and  unexpected  stoppage  of  the  engine  which  had  been 
clanking  and  blasting  in  our  ears  incessantly  for  so  many 
days,  to  watch  the  look  of  blank  astonishment  expressed 
in  every  face:  beginning  with  the  officers,  tracing  it 
through  all  the  passengers,  and  descending  to  the  very 
stokers  and  furnacemen,  who  emerged  from  below,  one  by 
one,  and  clustered  together  in  a  smoky  group  about  the 
hatchway  of  the  engine-room,  comparing  notes  in  whispers. 
After  throwing  up  a  few  rockets  and  firing  signal  guns  in 
the  hope  of  being  hailed  from  the  land,  or  at  least  of  see- 
ing a  light — but  without  any  other  sight  or  sound  present- 
ing itself — it  was  determined  to  send  a  boat  on  shore.  It 
was  amusing  to  observe  how  very  kind  some  of  the  passen- 
gers were,  in  volunteering  to  go  ashore  in  this  same  boat : 
for  the  general  good,  of  course :  not  by  any  means  because 
they  thought  the  ship  in  an  unsafe  position,  or  contemplated 
the  possibility  of  her  heeling  over  in  case  the  tide  were  run- 
ning out.  Nor  was  it  less  amusing  to  remark  how  desper- 
ately unpopular  the  poor  pilot  became  in  one  short  minute. 
He  had  had  his  passage  out  from  Liverpool,  and  during  the 
whole  voyage  had  been  quite  a  notorious  character,  as  a 
teller  of  anecdotes  and  cracker  of  jokes.    Yet  here  were  the 


20  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

very  men  who  had  laughed  the  loudest  at  his  jests,  now 
flourishing  their  fists  in  his  face,  loading  him  with  impre- 
cations, and  defying  him  to  his  teeth  as  a  villain ! 

The  boat  soon  shoved  off,  with  a  lantern  and  sundry  blue 
lights  on  board;  and  in  less  than  an  hour  returned;  the 
officer  in  command  bringing  with  him  a  tolerably  tall  young 
tree,  which  he  had  plucked  up  by  the  roots,  to  satisfy  cer- 
tain distrustful  j)assengers  whose  minds  misgave  them  that 
they  were  to  be  imposed  upon  and  shipwrecked,  and  who 
would  on  no  other  terms  believe  that  he  had  been  ashore, 
or  had  done  anything  but  fraudulently  row  a  little  way 
into  the  mist,  specially  to  deceive  them  and  compass  their 
deaths.  Our  captain  had  foreseen  from  the  first  that  we 
must  be  in  a  place  called  the  Eastern  Passage;  and  so  we 
were.  It  was  about  the  last  place  in  the  world  in  which 
we  had  any  business  or  reason  to  be,  but  a  sudden  fog,  and 
some  error  on  the  pilot's  part,  were  the  cause.  We  were 
surrounded  by  banks,  and  rocks,  and  shoals  of  all  kinds, 
but  had  happily  drifted,  it  seemed,  upon  the  only  safe 
speck  that  was  to  be  found  thereabouts. .  Eased  by  this  re- 
port, and  by  the  assurance  that  the  tide  was  past  the  ebb, 
we  turned  in  at  three  o'clock  in  the  morning. 

I  was  dressing  about  half-past  nine  next  day,  when  the 
noise  above  hurried  me  on  deck.  When  I  had  left  it  over- 
night, it  was  dark,  foggy,  and  damp,  and  there  were  bleak 
hills  all  round  us.  Now,  we  were  gliding  down  a  smooth, 
broad  stream,  at  the  rate  of  eleven  miles  an  hour :  our  col- 
ours flying  gaily;  our  crew  rigged  out  in  their  smartest 
clothes;  our  officers  in  uniform  again;  the  sun  shining  as 
on  a  brilliant  April  day  in  England;  the  land  stretched  out 
on  either  side,  streaked  with  light  patches  of  snow;  white 
wooden  houses;  people  at  their  doors;  telegraphs  working; 
flags  hoisted;  wharfs  appearing;  ships;  quays  crowded 
with  people;  distant  noises;  shouts;  men  and  boys  running 
down  steep  places  towards  the  pier;  all  more  bright  and 
gay  and  fresh  to  our  unused  eyes  than  words  can  paint 
them.  We  came  to  a  wharf,  paved  with  uplifted  faces: 
got  alongside,  and  were  made  fast,  after  some  shouting  and 
straining  of  cables;  darted,  a  score  of  us  along  the  gang- 
way, almost  as  soon  as  it  was  thrust  out  to  meet  us,  and 
before  it  had  reached  the  ship — and  leaped  upon  the  firm 
glad  earth  again ! 

I  suppose  this  Halifax  would  have  appeared  an  Elysium, 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  21 

thougli  it  had  been  a  curiosity  of  ugly  dulness.  But  I  car- 
ried away  with  me  a  most  pleasant  impression  of  the  town 
and  its  inhabitants,  and  have  preserved  it  to  this  hour. 
Nor  was  it  without  regret  that  I  came  home,  without  hav- 
ing found  an  opportunity  of  returning  thither,  and  once 
more  shaking  hands  with  the  friends  I  made  that  day. 

It  happened  to  be  the  opening  of  the  Legislative  Council 
and  General  Assembly,  at  which  ceremonial  the  forms  ob- 
served on  the  commencement  of  a  new  Session  of  Parlia- 
ment in  England  were  so  closely  copied,  and  so  gravely 
presented  on  a  small  scale,  that  it  was  like  looking  at 
Westminster  through  the  wrong  end  of  a  telescope.  The 
Governor,  as  Her  Majesty's  representative,  delivered  what 
may  be  called  the  Speech  from  the  Throne.  He  said  what 
he  had  to  say  manfully  and  well.  The  military  band  out- 
side the  building  struck  up  "  God  save  the  Queen "  with 
great  vigour  before  his  Excellency  had  quite  finished;  the 
people  shouted;  the  in's  rubbed  their  hands;  the  out's 
shook  their  heads;  the  Government  party  said  there  never' 
was  such  u  good  speech;  the  Opposition  declared  there 
never  was  such  a  bad  one;  the  Speaker  and  members  of  the 
House  of  Assembly  withdrew  from  the  bar  to  say  a  great 
deal  among  themselves  and  do  a  little;  and,  in  short,  every- 
thing went  on,  and  promised  to  go  on,  just  as  it  does  at 
home  upon  the  like  occasions. 

The  town  is  built  on  the  side  of  a  hill,  the  highest  point 
being  commanded  by  a  strong  fortress,  not  yet  quite  fin- 
ished. Several  streets  of  good  breadth  and  appearance  ex- 
tend from  its  summit  to  the  water-side,  and  are  intersected 
by  cross  streets  running  parallel  with  the  river.  The 
houses  are  chiefly  of  wood.  The  market  is  abundantly  sup- 
plied; and  provisions  are  exceedingly  cheap.  The  weather 
being  unusually  mild  at  that  time  for  the  season  of  the 
year,  there  was  no  sleighing:  but  there  were  plenty  of 
those  vehicles  in  yards  and  by-places,  and  some  of  them, 
from  the  gorgeous  quality  of  their  decorations,  might  have 
"  gone  on  "  without  alteration  as  triumphal  cars  in  a  melo- 
drama at  Astley's.  The  day  was  uncommonly  fine;  the 
air  bracing  and  healthful;  the  whole  aspect  of  the  town 
cheerful,  thriving,  and  industrious. 

We  lay  there  seven  hours,  to  deliver  and  exchange  the 
mails.  At  length,  having  collected  all  our  bags  and  all 
our  passengers  (including  two  or  three  choioe  spirits,  who, 


22  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

having  indulged  too  freely  in  oysters  and  champagne,  were 
found  lying  insensible  on  their  backs  in  unfrequented 
streets),  the  engines  were  again  put  in  motion,  and  we 
stood  off  for  Boston. 

Encountering  squally  weather  again  in  the  Bay  of  Fundy, 
we  tumbled  and  rolled  about  as  usual  all  that  night  and  all 
next  day.  On  the  next  afternoon,  that  is  to  say,  on  Satur- 
day, the  twenty-second  of  January,  an  American  pilot-boat 
came  alongside,  and  soon  afterwards  the  Britannia  steam- 
packet,  from  Liverpool,  eighteen  days  out,  was  telegraphed 
at  Boston. 

The  indescribable  interest  with  which  I  strained  my  eyes, 
as  the  first  patches  of  American  soil  peeped  like  molehills 
from  the  green  sea,  and  followed  them,  as  they  swelled, 
by  slow  and  almost  imperceptible  degrees,  into  a  continuous 
line  of  coast,  can  hardly  be  exaggerated.  A  sharp  keen 
wind  blew  dead  against  us;  a  hard  frost  prevailed  on  shore; 
and  the  cold  was  most  severe.  Yet  the  air  was  so  intensely 
clear,  and  dry,  and  bright,  that  the  temperature  was  not 
only  endurable,  but  delicious. 

How  I  remained  on  deck,  staring  about  me,  until  we 
came  alongside  the  dock,  and  how,  though  I  had  had  as 
many  eyes  as  Argus,  I  should  have  had  them  all  wide 
open,  and  all  employed  on  new  objects — are  topics  which  I 
will  not  prolong  this  chapter  to  discuss.  Neither  will  I 
more  than  hint  at  my  foreigner-like  mistake,  in  supposing 
that  a  party  of  most  active  persons,  who  scrambled  on 
board  at  the  peril  of  their  lives  as  we  approached  the 
wharf,  were  newsmen,  answering  to  that  industrious  class 
at  home;  whereas,  despite  the  leathern  wallets  of  news 
slung  about  the  necks  of  some,  and  the  broad  sheets  in  the 
hands  of  all,  they  were  Editors,  who  boarded  ships  in  per- 
son (as  one  gentleman  in  a  worsted  comforter  informed 
me),  "because  they  liked  the  excitement  of  it."  Sufl&ce  it 
in  this  place  to  say,  that  one  of  these  invaders,  with  a 
ready  courtesy  for  which  I  thank  him  here  most  gratefully, 
went  on  before  to  order  rooms  at  the  hotel;  and  that  when 
I  followed,  as  I  soon  did,  I  found  myself  rolling  through 
the  long  passages  with  an  involuntary  imitation  of  the  gait 
of  Mr.  T.  P.  Cooke,  in  a  new  nautical  melodrama. 

"Dinner,  if  you  please,"  said  I  to  the  waiter^ 

"  When?  "  said  the  waiter. 

"As  quick  as  possible,"  said  I. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  23 

"  Right  away?  "  said  the  waiter. 

After  a  moment's  hesitation,  I  answered  "No,"  at 
hazard. 

"Not  right  away?"  cried  the  waiter,  with  an  amount  of 
surprise  that  made  me  start. 

I  looked  at  him  doubtfully,  and  returned,  "No;  I 
would  rather  have  it  in  this  private  room.  I  like  it  very 
much." 

At  this,  I  really  thought  the  waiter  must  have  gone  out 
of  his  mind :  as  I  believe  he  would  have  done,  but  for  the 
interposition  of  another  man,  who  whispered  in  his  ear, 
"Directly." 

"Well!  and  that's  a  fact!"  said  the  waiter,  looking 
helplessly  at  me :  "  Right  away. " 

I  saw  now  that  "  Right  away  "  and  "  Directly  "  were  one 
and  the  same  thing.  So  I  reversed  my  previous  answer, 
and  sat  down  to  dinner  in  ten  minutes  afterwards;  and  a 
capital  dinner  it  was. 

The  hotel  (a  very  excellent  one)  is  called  the  Tremont 
House.  It  has  more  galleries,  colonnades,  piazzas,  and 
passages  than  I  can  remember,  or  the  reader  would  believe; 
and  is  some  trifle  smaller  than  Bedford  Square. 


CHAPTER    THE    THIRD. 

BOSTON. 

Isr  all  the  public  establishments  of  America,  the  utmost 
courtesy  prevails.  Most  of  our  Departments  are  susceptible 
of  considerable  improvement  in  this  respect,  but  the  Cus- 
tom-house above  all  others  would  do  well  to  take  example 
from  the  United  States  and  render  itself  somewhat  less 
odious  and  offensive  to  foreigners.  The  servile  rapacity  of 
the  French  officials  is  sufficiently  contemptible;  but  there 
is  a  surly  boorish  incivility  about  our  men,  alike  disgusting 
to  all  persons  who  fall  into  their  hands,  and  discreditable 
to  the  nation  that  keeps  such  ill-conditioned  curs  snarling 
about  its  gates. 

When  I  landed  in  America,  I  could  not  help  being 
strongly  impressed  with  the  contrast  their  Custom-house 


24  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

presented,  and  the  attention,  politeness,  and  good  humour 
with  which  its  officers  discharged  their  duty. 

As  we  did  not  land  at  Boston,  in  consequence  of  some 
detention  at  the  wharf,  until  after  dark,  I  received  my  first 
impressions  of  the  city  in  walking  down  to  the  Custom- 
house on  the  morning  after  our  arrival,  which  was  Sunday. 
I  am  afraid  to  say,  by  the  way,  how  many  offers  of  pews 
and  seats  in  church  for  that  morning  were  made  to  us,  by 
formal  note  of  invitation,  before  we  had  half  finished  our 
first  dinner  in  America,  but  if  I  may  be  allowed  to  make  a 
moderate  guess,  without  going  into  nicer  calculation,  I 
should  say  that  at  least  as  many  sittings  were  proffered  us, 
as  would  have  accommodated  a  score  or  two  of  grown-up 
families.  The  number  of  creeds  and  forms  of  religion  to 
which  the  pleasure  of  our  company  Avas  requested,  was  in 
very  fair  proportion, 

Not  being  able,  in  the  absence  of  any  change  of  clothes, 
to  go  to  church  that  day,  we  were  compelled  to  decline 
these  kindnesses,  one  and  all;  and  I  was  reluctantly  obliged 
to  forego  the  delight  of  hearing  Dr.  Channiug,  who  hap- 
pened to  preach  that  morning  for  the  first  time  in  a  very 
long  interval.  I  mention  the  name  of  this  distinguished 
and  accomplished  man  (with  whom  I  soon  afterwards  had 
the  pleasure  of  becoming  personally  acquainted),  that  I 
may  have  the  gratification  of  recording  my  humble  tribute 
of  admiration  and  respect  for  his  high  abilities  and  char- 
acter; and  for  the  bold  philanthropy  with  which  he  has 
ever  opposed  himself  to  that  most  hideous  blot  and  foul 
disgrace — Slavery, 

To  return  to  Boston.  When  I  got  into  the  streets  upon 
this  Sunday  morning,  the  air  was  so  clear,  the  houses  were 
so  bright  and  gay;  the  signboards  were  painted  in  such 
gaudy  coloiirs;  the  gilded  letters  were  so  very  golden;  the 
bricks  were  so  very  red,  the  stone  was  so  very  white,  the 
blinds  and  area  railings  were  so  very  green,  the  knobs  and 
plates  upon  the  street  doors  so  marvellously  bright  and 
twinkling;  and  all  so  slight  and  unsubstantial  in  appear- 
ance— that  every  thoroughfare  in  the  city  looked  exactly 
like  a  scene  in  a  pantomime.  It  rarely  happens  in  the 
business  streets  that  a  tradesman,  if  I  may  venture  to  call 
anybody  a  tradesman,  where  everybody  is  a  merchant,  re- 
sides above  his  store;  so  that  many  occupations  are  often 
carried  on  in  one  house,  and  the  whole  front  is  covered 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  26 

with  boards  and  iuscriptions.  As  I  walked  along,  I  kept 
glancing  up  at  these  boards,  confidently  expecting  to  see  a 
few  of  them  change  into  something;  and  I  never  turned  a 
corner  suddenly  without  looking  out  for  the  clown  and  pan- 
taloon, who,  I  had  no  doubt,  were  hiding  in  a  doorway  or 
behind  some  pillar  close  at  hand.  As  to  Harlequin  and 
Columbine,  I  discovered  immediately  that  they  lodged  (they 
are  always  looking  after  lodgings  in  a  pantomime)  at  a  very 
small  clockmaker's  one  story  high,  near  the  hotel;  which, 
in  addition  to  various  symbols  and  devices,  almost  cover- 
ing the  whole  front,  had  a  great  dial  hanging  out — to  be 
jumped  through,  of  course.' 

The  suburbs  are,  if  possible,  even  more  unsubstantial- 
looking  than  the  city.  The  white  wooden  houses  (so  white 
that  it  makes  one  wink  to  look  at  them),  with  their  green 
jalousie  blinds,  are  so  sprinkled  and  dropped  about  in  all 
directions,  without  seeming  to  have  any  root  at  all  in  the 
ground;  and  the  small  churches  and  chapels  are  so  prim, 
and  bright,  and  highly  varnished;  that  1  almost  believed 
the  whole  affair  could  be  taken  up  piecemeal  like  a  child's 
toy,  and  crammed  into  a  little  box. 

The  city  is  a  beautiful  one,  and  cannot  fail,  I  should  im- 
agine, to  impress  all  strangers  very  favourably.  The  pri- 
vate dwelling-houses  are,  ior  the  most  part,  large  and  ele- 
gant; the  shops  extremely  good;  and  the  public  buildings 
handsome.  The  State  House  is  built  upon  the  summit  of 
a  hill,  which  rises  gradually  at  first,  and  afterwards  by  a 
steep  ascent,  almost  from  the  water's  edge.  In  front  is  a 
green  enclosure,  called  the  Common.  The  site  is  beautiful: 
and  from  the  top  there  is  a  charming  panoramic  view  of  the 
whole  town  and  neighbourhood.  In  addition  to  a  variety 
of  commodious  offices,  it  contains  two  handsome  chambers; 
in  one  the  House  of  Representatives  of  the  State  hold  their 
meetings;  in  the  other,  the  Senate.  Such  proceedings  as 
I  saw  here,  were  conducted  with  perfect  gravity  and  de- 
corum; and  were  certainly  calculated  to  inspire  attention 
and  respect. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  much  of  the  intellectual  refine- 
ment and  superiority  of  Boston,  is  referable  to  the  quiet  in- 
fluence of  the  University  of  Cambridge,  which  is  within 
three  or  four  miles  of  the  city.  The  resident  professors  at 
that  university  are  gentlemen  of  learning  and  varied  attain- 
ments; and  are,  without  one  exception  that  I  can  call  to 


26  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

mind,  men  who  would  shed  a  grace  upon,  and  do  honour 
to,  any  society  in  the  civilised  world..  Many  of  the  resi- 
dent gentry  in  Boston  and  its  neighbourhood,  and  I  think 
I  am  not  mistaken  in  adding,  a  large  majority  of  those  who 
are  attached  to  the  liberal  professions  there,  have  been 
educated  at  this  same  school.  Whatever  the  defects  of 
American  universities  may  be,  they  disseminate  no  preju- 
dices; rear  no  bigots;  dig  up  the  buried  ashes  of  no  old 
superstitions;  never  interpose  between  the  people  and  their 
improvement ;  exclude  no  man  because  of  his  religious  opin- 
ions ;  above  all,  in  their  whole  course  of  study  and  instruc- 
tion, recognise  a  world,  and  a  broad  one  too,  lying  beyond 
the  college  walls. 

It  was  a  source  of  inexpressible  pleasure  to  me  to  observe 
the  almost  imperceptible,  but  not  less  certain  effect,  wrought 
by  this  institution  among  the  small  community  of  Boston ; 
and  to  note  at  every  turn  the  humanising  tastes  aiid  desires 
it  has  engendered ;  the  affectionate  friendships  to  which  it 
has  given  rise ;  the  amount  of  vanity  and  prejudice  it  has 
dispelled.  The  golden  calf  they  worship  at  Boston  is  a 
pigmy  compared  with  the  giant  effigies  set  up  in  other  parts 
of  that  vast  counting-house  which  lies  beyond  the  Atlantic; 
and  the  almighty  dollar  sinks  into  something  comparatively 
insignificant,  amidst  a  whole  Pantheon  of  better  gods. 

Above  all,  I  sincerely  believe  that  the  public  institutions 
and  charities  of  this  capital  of  Massachusetts  are  as  nearly 
perfect,  as  the  most  considerate  wisdom,  benevolence,  and 
humanity,  can  make  them.  I  never  in  my  life  was  more 
affected  by  the  contemplation  of  happiness,  under  circum- 
stances of  privation  and  bereavement,  than  in  my  visits  to 
these  establishments. 

It  is  a  great  and  pleasant  feature  of  all  such  institutions 
in  America,  that  they  are  either  supported  by  the  State  or 
assisted  by  the  State;  or  (in  the  event  of  their  not  needing 
its  helping  hand)  that  they  act  in  concert  with  it,  and  are 
emphatically  the  people's.  I  cannot  but  think,  with  a  view 
to  the  principle  and  its  tendency  to  elevate  or  depress  the 
character  of  the  industrious  classes,  that  a  Public  Charity 
is  immeasurably  better  than  a  Private  Foundation,  no  mat- 
ter how  munificently  the  latter  may  be  endowed.  In  our 
own  country,  where  it  has  not,  until  within  these  later 
days,  been  a  very  popular  fashion  with  governments  to  dis- 
play any  extraordinary  regard  for  the  great  mass  of  the 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  37 

people  or  to  recognise  their  existence  as  improvable  creat- 
ures, private  charities,  unexampled  in  the  history  of  the 
earth,  have  arisen,  to  do  an  incalculable  amount  of  good 
among  the  destitute  and  afflicted.  But  the  government  of 
the  country,  having  neither  act  nor  part  in  them,  is  not  in 
the  receipt  of  any  portion  of  the  gratitude  they  inspire ; 
and,  offering  very  little  shelter  or  relief  beyond  that  which 
is  to  be  found  in  the  workhouse  and  the  jail,  has  come,  not 
unnaturally,  to  be  looked  upon  by  the  poor  rather  as  a  stern 
master,  quick  to  correct  and  punish,  than  a  kind  protector, 
merciful  and  vigilant  in  their  hour  of  need. 

The  maxim  that  out  of  evil  cometh  good,  is  strongly 
illustrated  by  these  establishments  at  home;  as  the  records 
of  the  Prerogative  Office  in  Doctors'  Commons  can  abun- 
dantly prove.  Some  immensely  rich  old  gentleman  or  lady, 
surrounded  by  needy  relatives,  makes,  upon  a  low  average, 
a  will  a-week.  The  old  gentleman  or  lady,  never  very  re- 
markable in  the  best  of  times  for  good  temper,  is  full  of 
aches  and  pains  from  head  to  foot;  full  of  fancies  and  ca- 
prices; full  of  spleen,  distrust,  suspicion,  and  dislike.  To 
cancel  old  wills,  and  invent  new  ones,  is  at  last  the  sole 
business  of  such  a  testator's  existence ;  and  relations  and 
friends  (some  of  whom  have  been  bred  up  distinctly  to  in- 
herit a  large  share  of  the  property,  and  have  been,  from 
their  cradles,  specially  disqualified  from  devoting  them- 
selves to  any  useful  pursuit,  on  that  account)  are  so  often 
and  so  unexpectedly  and  summarily  cut  off,  and  re-instated, 
and  cut  off  again,  that  the  whole  family,  down  to  the  re- 
motest cousin,  is  kept  in  a  perpetual  fever.  At  length  it 
becomes  plain  that  the  old  lady  or  gentleman  has  not  long 
to  live;  and  the  plainer  this  becomes,  the  more  clearly  the 
old  lady  or  gentleman  perceives  that  everybody  is  in  a  con- 
spiracy against  their  poor  old  dying  relative;  wherefore  the 
old  lady  or  gentleman  makes  another  last  will — positively 
the  last  this  time — conceals  the  same  in  a  china  teapot,  and 
expires  next  day.  Then  it  turns  out,  that  the  whole  of  the 
real  and  personal  estate  is  divided  between  half-a-dozen 
charities;  and  that  the  dead  and  gone  testator  has  in  pure 
spite  helped  to  do  a  great  deal  of  good,  at  the  cost  of  an  im- 
mense amount  of  evil  passion  and  misery. 

The  Perkins  Institution  and  Massachusetts  Asylum  for 
the  Blind,  at  Boston,  is  superintended  by  a  body  of  trustees 
who  make  an  annual  report  to  the  corporation.     The  in- 


28  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

digent  blind  of  that  State  are  admitted  gratuitously.  Those 
from  the  adjoining  State  of  Connecticut,  or  from  the  States 
of  Maine,  Vermont,  or  New  Hampshire,  are  a,^mitted  by  a 
warrant  from  the  State  to  which  they  respectively  belong; 
or,  failing  that,  must  find  security  among  their  friends,  for 
the  payment  of  about  twenty  pounds  English  for  their  first 
year's  board  and  instruction,  and  ten  for  the  second. 
"  After  the  first  year,"  say  the  trustees,  "an  account  cur- 
rent will  be  opened  with  each  pupil;  he  will  be  charged 
with  the  actual  cost  of  his  board,  which  will  not  exceed 
two  dollars  per  week;  "  a  trifle  more  than  eight  shillings 
English;  "and  he  will  be  credited  with  the  amount  paid 
for  him  by  the  State,  or  by  his  friends ;  also  with  his  earn- 
ings over  and  above  the  cost  of  the  stock  which  he  uses;  so 
that  all  his  earnings  over  one  dollar  per  week  will  be  his 
own.  By  the  third  year  it  will  be  known  whether  his  earn- 
ings will  more  than  pay  the  actual  cost  of  his  board ;  if 
they  should,  he  will  have  it  at  his  option  to  remain  and  re- 
ceive his  earnings,  or  not.  Those  who  prove  unable  to  earn 
their  own  livelihood  will  not  be  retained;  as  it  is  not  desir- 
able to  convert  the  establishment  into  an  almshouse,  or  to 
retain  any  but  working  bees  in  the  hive.  Those  who  by 
physical  or  mental  imbecility  are  disqualified  from  work, 
are  thereby  disqualified  from  being  members  of  an  indus- 
trious community;  and  they  can  be  better  provided  for  in 
establishments  fitted  for  the  infirm." 

I  went  to  see  this  place  one  very  fine  winter  morning :  an 
Italian  sky  above,  and  the  air  so  clear  and  bright  on  every 
side,  that  even  my  eyes,  which  are  none  of  the  best,  could 
follow  the  minute  lines  and  scraps  of  tracery  in  distant 
buildings.  Like  most  other  public  institutions  in  America, 
of  the  same  class,  it  stands  a  mile  or  two  without  the  town, 
in  a  cheerful  healthy  spot;  and  is  an  airy,  spacious,  hand- 
some edifice.  It  is  built  upon  a  height,  commanding  the 
harbour.  When  I  paused  for  a  moment  at  the  door,  and 
marked  how  fresh  and  free  the  whole  scene  was — what 
sparkling  bubbles  glanced  upon  the  waves,  and  welled  up 
every  moment  to  the  surface,  as  though  the  world  below, 
like  that  above,  were  radiant  with  the  bright  day,  and 
gushing  over  in  its  fulness  of  light :  when  I  gazed  from 
sail  to  sail  away  upon  a  ship  at  sea,  a  tiny  speck  of  shining 
white,  the  only  cloud  upon  the  still,  deep,  distant  blue — 
and,. turning,  saw  a  blind  boy  with  his  sightless  face  ad- 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  29 

dressed  that  way,  as  though  he  too  had  some  sense  within 
him  of  the  glorious  distance:  I  felt  a  kind  of  sorrow  that 
the  place  should  be  so  very  light,  and  a  strange  wish  that 
for  his  sake  it  were  darker.  It  was  but  momentary,  of 
course,  and  a  mere  fancy,  but  I  felt  it  keenly  for  all 
that. 

The  children  were  at  their  daily  tasks  in  different  rooms, 
except  a  few  who  were  already  dismissed,  and  were  at  play. 
Here,  as  in  many  institutions,  no  uniform  is  worn;  and  1 
was  very  glad  of  it,  for  two  reasons.  Firstly,  because  I  am 
sure  that  nothing  but  senseless  custom  and  want  of  thought 
would  reconcile  us  to  the  liveries  and  badges  we  are  so  fond 
of  at  home.  Secondly,  because  the  absence  of  these  things 
presents  each  child  to  the  visitor  in  his  or  her  own  proper 
character,  with  its  individuality  unimpaired ;  not  lost  in  a 
dull,  ugly,  monotonous  repetition  of  the  same  unmeaning 
garb:  which  is  really  an  important  consideration.  The 
wisdom  of  encouraging  a  little  harmless  pride  in  personal 
appearance  even  among  the  blind,  or  the  whimsical  absurd- 
ity of  considering  charity  and  leather  breeches  inseparable 
companions,  as  we  do,  requires  no  comment. 

Good  order,  cleanliness,  and  comfort,  pervaded  every  cor- 
ner of  the  building.  The  various  classes,  who  were  gath- 
ered round  their  teachers,  answered  the  questions  put  to 
them  with  readiness  and  intelligence,  and  in  a  spirit  of 
cheerful  contest  for  precedence  which  pleased  me  very 
much.  Those  who  were  at  play,  were  gleesome  and  noisy 
as  other  children.  More  spiritual  and  affectionate  friend- 
ships appeared  to  exist  among  them,  than  would  be  found 
among  other  young  persons  suffering  under  no  deprivation ; 
but  this  I  expected  and  was  prepared  to  find.  It  is  a  part 
of  the  great  scheme  of  Heaven's  merciful  consideration  for 
the  afflicted. 

In  a  portion  of  the  building,  set  apart  for  that  purpose, 
are  workshops  for  blind  persons  whose  education  is  finished, 
and  who  have  acquired  a  trade,  but  who  cannot  pursue  it 
in  an  ordinary  manufactory  because  of  their  deprivation. 
Several  people  were  at  work  here ;  making  brushes,  mat- 
tresses, and  so  forth ;  and  the  cheerfulness,  industry,  and 
good  order  discernible  in  every  other  part  of  the  building, 
extended  to  this  department  also. 

On  the  ringing  of  a  bell,  the  pupils  all  repaired,  without 
any  guide  or  leader,  to  a  spacious  music-hall,  where  they 


^  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

took  their  seats  in  an  orchestra  erected  for  that  purpose, 
and  listened  with  manifest  delight  to  a  voluntary  on  the 
organ,  played  by  one  of  themselves.  At  its  conclusion,  the 
performer,  a  boy  of  nineteen  or  twenty,  gave  place  to  a 
girl;  and  to  her  accompaniment  they  all  sang  a  hymn,  and 
afterwards  a  sort  of  chorus.  It  was  very  sad  to  look  upon 
and  hear  them,  happy  though  their  condition  unquestion- 
ably was ;  and  I  saw  that  one  blind  girl,  who  (being  for  the 
time  deprived  of  the  use  of  her  limbs,  by  illness)  sat  close 
beside  me  with  her  face  towards  them,  wept  silently  the 
while  she  listened. 

It  is  strange  to  watch  the  faces  of  the  blind,  and  see  how 
free  they  are  from  all  concealment  of  what  is  passing  in 
their  thoughts;  observing  which,  a  man  with  eyes  may 
blush  to  contemplate  the  mask  he  wears.  Allowing  for 
one  shade  of  anxious  expression  which  is  never  absent  from 
their  countenances,  and  the  like  of  which  we  may  readily 
detect  in  our  own  faces  if  we  try  to  feel  our  way  in  the 
dark,  every  idea,  as  it  rises  within  them,  is  expressed  with 
the  lightning's  spefed  and  nature's  truth.  If  the  company 
at  a  rout,  or  drawing-room  at  Court,  could  only  for  one 
time  be  as  unconscious  of  the  eyes  upon  them  as  blind  men 
and  women  are,  what  secrets  would  come  out,  and  what  a 
worker  of  hypocrisy  this  sight,  the  loss  of  which  we  so 
much  pity,  would  appear  to  be ! 

The  thought  occurred  to  me  as  I  sat  down  in  another 
room,  before  a  girl,  blind,  deaf,  and  dumb;  destitute  of 
smell;  and  nearly  so,  of  taste :  before  a  fair  young  creature 
with  every  human  faculty,  and  hope,  and  power  of  good- 
ness and  affection,  inclosed  within  her  delicate  frame,  and 
but  one  outward  sense — the  sense  of  touch.  There  she  was, 
before  me ;  built  up,  as  it  were,  in  a  marble  cell,  impervi- 
ous to  any  ray  of  light,  or  particle  of  sound ;  with  hev  poor 
white  hand  peeping  through  a  chink  in  the  wall,  beckoning 
to  some  good  man  for  help,  that  an  immortal  soul  might 
be  awakened. 

Long  before  I  looked  upon  her,  the  help  had  come.  Her 
face  was  radiant  with  intelligence  and  pleasure.  Her  hair, 
braided  by  her  own  hands,  was  bound  about  a  head,  whose 
intellectual  capacity  and  development  were  beautifully  ex- 
pressed in  its  graceful  outline,  and  its  broad  open  brow ; 
her  dress,  arranged  by  herself,  was  a  pattern  of  neatness 
and  simplicity;  the  work  she  had  knitted,  lay  beside  her; 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  31 

her  writing-book  was  on  the  desk  she  leaned  upon. — From 
the  mournful  ruin  of  such  bereavement,  there  had  slowly 
risen  up  this  gentle,  tender,  guileless,  grateful-hearted 
being. 

Like  other  inmates  of  that  house,  she  had  a  green  ribbon 
bound  round  her  eyelids.  A  doll  she  had  dressed  lay  near 
upon  the  ground.  I  took  it  up,  and  saw  that  she  had  made 
a  green  fillet  such  as  she  wore  herself,  and  fastened  it  about 
its  mimic  eyes. 

She  was  seated  in  a  little  enclosure,  made  by  school- 
desks  and  forms,  writing  her  daily  journal.  But  soon 
finishing  this  pursuit,  she  engaged  in  an  animated  commu- 
nication with  a  teacher  who  sat  beside  her.  This  was  a 
favourite  mistress  with  the  poor  pupil.  If  she  could  see  the 
face  of  her  fair  instructress,  she  would  not  love  her  less,  I 
am  sure. 

I  have  extracted  a  few  disjointed  fragments  of  her  his- 
tory, from  an  account,  written  by  that  one  man  who  has 
made  her  what  she  is.  It  is  a  very  beautiful  and  touching 
narrative;  and  I  wish  I  could  present  it  entire. 

Her  name  is  Laura  Bridgman.  "  She  was  born  in  Han- 
over, New  Hampshire,  on  the  twenty-first  day  of  Decem- 
ber, 1829.  She  is  described  as  having  been  a  very  sprightly 
and  pretty  infant,  with  bright  blue  eyes.  She  was,  how- 
ever, so  puny  and  feeble  until  she  was  a  year  and  a  half 
old,  that  her  parents  hardly  hoped  to  rear  her.  She  was 
subject  to  severe  fits,  which  seemed  to  rack  her  frame  al- 
most beyond  her  power  of  endurance :  and  life  was  held  by 
the  feeblest  tenure :  but  when  a  year  and  a  half  old,  she 
seemed  to  rally;  the  dangerous  symptoms  subsided;  and  at 
twenty  months  old,  she  was  perfectly  well. 

"Then  her  mental  powers,  hitherto  stinted  in  their 
growth,  rapidly  developed  themselves;  and  during  the  four 
months  of  health  which  she  enjoyed,  she  appears  (making 
due  allowance  for  a  fond  mother's  account)  to  have  dis- 
played a  considerable  degree  of  intelligence. 

"But  suddenly  she  sickened  again;  her  disease  raged 
with  great  violence  during  five  weeks,  when  her  eyes  and 
ears  were  inflamed,  suppurated,  and  their  contents  were 
discharged.  But  though  sight  and  hearing  were  gone  for 
ever,  the  poor  child's  sufferings  were  not  ended.  The  fever 
raged  during  seven  weeks ;  for  five  months  she  was  kept  in 
bed  in  a  darkened  room ;  it  was  a  year  before  she  could 


32  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

walk  uji  supported,  and  two  years  before  she  could  sit  up  all 
day.  It  was  now  observed  that  her  sense  of  smell  was  al- 
most entirely  destroyed ;  and,  consequently,  that  her  taste 
was  much  blunted. 

"  It  was  not  until  four  years  of  age  that  the  poor  child's 
bodily  health  seemed  restored,  and  she  was  able  to  enter 
upon  her  apprenticeship  of  life  and  the  world. 

"  But  what  a  situation  was  hers !  The  darkness  and  the 
silence  of  the  tomb  were  around  her :  no  mother's  smile 
called  forth  her  answering  smile,  no  father's  voice  taught 
her  to  imitate  his  sounds: — they,  brothers  and  sisters,  were 
but  forms  of  matter  which  resisted  her  touch,  but  which 
diifered  not  from  the  furniture  of  the  house,  save  in 
warmth,  and  in  the  power  of  locomotion;  and  not  even  in 
these  respects  from  the  dog  and  the  cat. 

"But  the  immortal  spirit  which  had  been  implanted 
within  her  could  not  die,  nor  be  maimed  nor  mutilated; 
and  though  most  of  its  avenues  of  communication  with  the 
world  were  cut  off,  it  began  to  manifest  itself  through  the 
others.  As  soon  as  she  could  walk,  she  began  to  explore 
the  room,  and  then  the  house;  she  became  familiar  with 
the  form,  density,  weight,  and  heat,  of  every  article  she 
could  lay  her  hands  upon.  She  followed  her  mother,  and 
felt  her  hands  and  arms,  as  she  was  occupied  about  the 
house ;  and  her  disposition  to  imitate,  led  her  to  repeat  ev- 
erything herself.  She  even  learned  to  sew  a  little,  and  to 
knit." 

The  reader  will  scarcely  need  to  be  told,  however,  that 
the  opportunities  of  communicating  with  her,  were  very, 
very  limited ;  and  that  the  moral  effects  of  her  wretched 
state  soon  began  to  appear.  Those  who  cannot  be  enlight- 
ened by  reason,  can  only  be  controlled  by  force ;  and  this, 
coupled  with  her  great  privations,  must  soon  have  reduced 
her  to  a  worse  condition  than  that  of  the  beasts  that  perish, 
but  for  timely  and  unhoped-for  aid. 

"  At  this  time,  I  was  so  fortunate  as  to  hear  of  the  child, 
and  immediately  hastened  to  Hanover  to  see  her.  I  found 
her  with  a  well- formed  figure ;  a  strongly-marked,  nervous- 
sanguine  temperament;  a  large  and  beautifully-shaped 
head ;  and  the  whole  system  in  healthy  action.  The  parents 
were  easily  induced  to  consent  to  her  coming  to  Boston,  and 
on  the  4th  of  October,  1837,  they  brought  her  to  the  Insti- 
tution. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  33 

"  For  a  while,  she  was  much  bewildered ;  and  after  wait- 
ing about  two  weeks,  until  she  became  acquainted  with  her 
new  locality,  and  somewhat  familiar  with  the  inmates,  the 
attempt  was  made  to  give  her  knowledge  of  arbitrary  signs, 
by  which  she  could  interchange  thoughts  with  others. 

"  There  was  one  of  two  ways  to  be  adopted :  either  to  go 
on  to  build  up  a  language  of  signs  on  the  basis  of  the  nat- 
ural language  which  she  had  already  commenced  herself, 
or  to  teach  her  the  purely  arbitrary  language  in  common 
use :  that  is,  to  give  her  a  sign  for  every  individual  thing, 
or  to  give  her  a  knowledge  of  letters  by  combinations  of 
which  she  might  express  her  idea  of  the  existence,  and  the 
mode  and  condition  of  existence,  of  any  thing.  The  former 
would  have  been  easy,  but  very  ineffectual;  the  latter 
seemed  very  difficult,  but,  if  accomplished,  very  effectual. 
I  determined  therefore  to  try  the  latter. 

"The  first  experiments  were  made  by  taking  articles  in 
common  use,  such  as  knives,  forks,  spoons,  keys,  &c.,  and 
pasting  upon  them  labels  with  their  names  printed  in  raised 
letters.  These  she  felt  very  carefully,  and  soon,  of  course, 
distinguished  that  the  crooked  lines  spoon,  differed  as 
much  from  the  crooked  lines  key,  as  the  spoon  differed 
from  the  key  in  form. 

"  Then  small  detached  labels,  with  the  same  words  printed 
upon  them,  were  put  into  her  hands;  and  she  soon  observed 
that  they  were  similar  to  the  ones  pasted  on  the  articles. 
She  showed  her  perception  of  this  similarity  by  laying  the 
label  key  upon  the  key,  and  the  label  spoon  upon  the 
spoon.  She  was  encouraged  here  by  the  natural  sign  of 
approbation,  patting  on  the  head. 

"  The  same  process  was  then  repeated  with  all  the  arti- 
cles which  she  could  handle;  and  she  very  easily  learned  to 
place  the  proper  labels  upon  them.  It  was  evident,  how- 
ever, that  the  only  intellectual  exercise  was  that  of  imita- 
tion and  memory.  She  recollected  that  the  label  book  was 
placed  upon  a  book,  and  she  repeated  the  process  first  from 
imitation,  next  from  memory,  with  only  the  motive  of  love 
of  approbation,  but  apparently  without  the  intellectual  per- 
ception of  any  relation  between  the  things. 

"  After  a  while,  instead  of  labels,  the  individual  letters 
were  given  to  her  on  detached  bits  of  paper :  they  were  ar- 
ranged side  by  side  so  as  to  spell  book,  key,  &c.;  then 
they  were  mixed  up  in  a  heap  and  a  sign  v/as  made  for  her 
3 


84  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

to  arrange  them  herself,  so  as  to  express  the  words  book, 
key,  &c. ;  and  she  did  so. 

"Hitherto,  the  process  had  been  mechanical,  and  the 
success  about  as  great  as  teaching  a  very  knowing  dog  a 
variety  of  tricks.  The  poor  child  had  sat  in  mute  amaze- 
ment, and  patiently  imitated  everything  her  teacher  did; 
but  now  the  truth  began  to  flash  upon  her :  her  intellect 
began  to  work :  she  perceived  that  here  was  a  way  by  which 
she  could  herself  make  up  a  sign  of  anything  that  was  in 
her  own  mind,  and  show  it  to  another  mind;  and  at  once 
her  countenance  lighted  up  with  a  human  expression :  it 
was  no  longer  a  dog,  or  parrot :  it  was  an  immortal  spirit, 
eagerly  seizing  upon  a  new  link  of  union  with  other  spirits ! 
I  could  almost  fix  upon  the  moment  when  this  truth  dawned 
upon  her  mind,  and  spread  its  light  to  her  countenance ;  I 
saw  that  the  great  obstacle  was  overcome ;  and  that  hence- 
forward nothing  but  patient  and  persevering,  but  plain  and 
straightforward,  efforts  were  to  be  used. 

"  The  result  thus  far,  is  quickly  related,  and  easily  con- 
ceived; but  not  so  was  the  process;  for  many  weeks  of  ap- 
parently unprofitable  labour  were  passed  before  it  was 
effected. 

"  When  it  was  said  above,  that  a  sign  was  made,  it  was 
intended  to  say,  that  the  action  was  performed  by  her 
teacher,  she  feeling  his  hands,  and  then  imitating  the  mo- 
tion. 

"  The  next  step  was  to  procure  a  set  of  metal  types,  with 
the  different  letters  of  the  alphabet  cast  upon  their  ends; 
also  a  board,  in  which  were  square  holes,  into  which  holes 
she  could  set  the  types;  so,  that  the  letters  on  their  ends 
could  alone  be  felt  above  the  surface. 

"  Then,  on  any  article  being  handed  to  her,  for  instance, 
a  pencil,  or  a  watch,  she  would  select  the  component  let- 
ters, and  arrange  them  on  her  board,  and  read  them  with 
apparent  pleasure. 

"  She  was  exercised  for  several  weeks  in  this  way,  until 
her  vocabulary  became  extensive ;  and  then  the  important 
step  was  taken  of  teaching  her  how  to  represent  the  differ- 
ent letters  by  the  position  of  her  fingers,  instead  of  the 
cumbrous  apparatus  of  the  board  and  types.  She  accom- 
plished this  speedily  and  easily,  for  her  intellect  had  begun 
to  work  in  aid  of  her  teacher,  and  her  progress  was  rapid. 

'*  This  was  the  period,  about  three  months  after  she  had 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  35 

commenced,  that  the  first  report  of  her  case  was  made,  in 
which  it  is  stated  that  '  she  has  just  learned  the  manual 
alphabet,  as  used  by  the  deaf  mutes,  and  it  is  a  subject  of 
delight  and  wonder  to  see  how  rapidly,  correctly,  and  ea- 
gerly, she  goes  on  with  her  labours.  Her  teacher  gives  her 
a  new  object,  for  instance,  a  pencil,  fii'st  lets  her  examine 
it,  and  get  an  idea  of  its  use,  then  teaches  her  how  to  spell 
it  by  making  the  signs  for  the  letters  with  her  own  fingers : 
the  child  grasps  her  hand,  and  feels  her  fingers,  as  the  dif- 
ferent letters  are  formed;  she  turns  her  head  a  little  on  one 
side,  like  a  person  listening  closely;  her  lips  are  apart;  she 
seems  scarcely  to  breathe;  and  her  countenance,  at  first 
anxious,  gradually  changes  to  a  smile,  as  she  comprehends 
the  lesson.  She  then  holds  up  her  tiny  fingers,  and  spells 
the  word  in  the  manual  alphabet ;  next,  she  takes  her  types 
and  arranges  her  letters ;  and  last,  to  make  sure  that  she  is 
right,  she  takes  the  whole  of  the  types  composing  the  word, 
and  places  them  upon  or  in  contact  with  the  pencil,  or 
whatever  the  object  may  be.' 

"  The  whole  of  the  succeeding  year  was  passed  in  grati- 
fying her  eager  inquiries  for  the  names  of  every  object 
which  she  could  *  possibly  handle;  in  exercising  her  in  the 
use  of  the  manual  alphabet ;  in  extending  in  every  possible 
way  her  knowledge  of  the  physical  relations  of  things ;  and 
in  proper  care  of  her  health. 

"  At  the  end  of  the  year  a  report  of  her  case  was  made, 
from  which  the  following  is  an  extract. 

"  'It  has  been  ascertained  beyond  the  possibility  of  doubt, 
that  she  cannot  see  a  ray  of  light,  cannot  hear  the  least 
sound,  and  never  exercises  her  sense  of  smell,  if  she  have 
any.  Thus  her  mind  dwells  in  darkness  and  gtillness,  as 
profound  as  that  of  a  closed  tomb  at  midnight.  Of  beau- 
tiful sights,  and  sweet  sounds,  and  pleasant  odours,  she 
has  no  conception;  nevertheless,  she  seems  as  happy  and 
playful  as  a  bird  or  a  lamb ;  and  the  employment  of  her  in- 
tellectual faculties,  or  the  acqiurement  of  a  new  idea,  gives 
her  a  vivid  pleasure,  which  is  plainly  marked  in  her  ex- 
pressive features.  She  never  seems  to  repine,  but  has  all 
the  buoyancy  and  gaiety  of  childhood.  She  is  fond  of  fun 
and  frolic,  and  when  playing  with  the  rest  of  the  children, 
her  shrill  laugh  sounds  loudest  of  the  group. 

"  *  When  left  alone,  she  seems  very  happy  if  she  have 
her  knitting  or  sewing,  and  will  busy  herself  for  hours :  if 


36  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

she  have  no  occupation,  she  evidently  amuses  herself  by 
imaginary  dialogues,  or  by  recalling  past  impressions ;  she 
coimts  with  her  fingers,  or  spells  out  names  of  things  which 
she  has  recently  learned,  in  the  manual  alphabet  of  the 
deaf  mutes.  In  this  lonely  self-communion  she  seems  to 
reason,  reflect,  and  argue :  if  she  spell  a  word  wrong  with 
the  fingers  of  her  right  hand,  she  instantly  strikes  it  with 
her  left,  as  her  teacher  does,  in  sign  of  disapprobation ;  if 
right,  then  she  pats  herself  upon  the  head,  and  looks 
pleased.  She  sometimes  purposely  spells  a  word  wrong 
with  the  left  hand,  looks  roguish  for  a  moment  and  laughs, 
and  then  with  the  right  hand  strikes  the  left,  as  if  to  cor- 
rect it. 

"  '  During  the  year  she  has  attained  great  dexterity  in  the 
use  of  the  manual  alphabet  of  the  deaf  mutes;  and  she 
spells  out  the  words  and  sentences  which  she  knows,  so 
fast  and  so  deftly,  that  only  those  accustomed  to  this  lan- 
guage can  follow  with  the  eye  the  rapid  motions  of  her 
fingers. 

"  *  But  wonderful  as  is  the  rapidity  with  which  she  writes 
her  thoughts  upon  the  air,  still  more  so  is  the  ease  and  ac- 
curacy with  which  she  reads  the  words  thus  written  by  an- 
other; grasping  their  hands  in  hers,  and  following  every 
movement  of  their  fingers,  as  letter  after  letter  conveys 
their  meaning  to  her  mind.  It  is  in  this  way  that  she  con- 
verses with  her  blind  playmates,  and  nothing  can  more 
forcibly  show  the  power  of  mind  in  forcing  matter  to  its 
purpose,  than  a  meeting  between  them.  For  if  great  talent 
and  skill  are  necessary  for  two  pantomimes  to  paint  their 
thoughts  and  feelings  by  the  movements  of  the  body,  and 
the  expression  of  the  countenance,  how  much  greater  the 
difficulty  when  darkness  shrouds  them  both,  and  the  one 
can  hear  no  sound ! 

"  *  When  Laura  is  walking  through  a  passage-way,  with 
her  hands  spread  before  her,  she  knows  instantly  every 
one  she  meets,  and  passes  them  with  a  sign  of  recognition : 
but  if  it  be  a  girl  of  her  own  age,  and  especially  if  it  be 
one  of  her  favourites,  there  is  instantly  a  bright  smile  of 
recognition,  and  a  twining  of  arms,  a  grasping  of  hands, 
and  a  swift  telegraphing  upon  the  tiny  fingers ;  whose  rapid 
evolutions  convey  the  thoughts  and  feelings  from  the  out- 
posts of  one  mind  to  those  of  the  other.  There  are  ques- 
tions and  answers,  exchanges  of  joy  or  sorrow,  there  are 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  37 

kissings  and  partings,  just  a^  between  little  children  with 
all  their  senses.' 

"  During  this  year,  and  six  months  after  she  had  left 
home,  lier  mother  came  to  visit  her,  and  the  scene  of  their 
meeting  was  an  interesting  one. 

"  The  mother  stood  some  time,  gazing  with  overflowing 
eyes  upon  her  unfortun:.te  child,  who,  all  unconscious  of 
her  presence,  was  playing  abuut  the  room.  Presently  Laura 
ran  against  her,  and  at  once  began  feeling  her  hands,  ex- 
amining her  dress,  and  trying  to  find  out  if  she  knew  her; 
but  not  succeeding  in  this,  she  turned  away  as  from  a 
stranger,  and  the  poor  woman  could  not  conceal  the  pang 
she  felt,  at  finding  that  her  beloved  child  did  not  know 
her. 

"  She  then  gave  Laura  a  string  of  beads  which  she  used 
to  wear  at  home,  winch  were  recognized  by  the  child  at 
once,  who,  with  much  joy,  put  them  around  her  neck,  and 
sought  me  eagerly  to  say  she  understood  the  string  was 
from  her  home. 

"  The  mother  now  tried  to  caress  her,  but  poor  Laura  re- 
pelled her,  preferring  to  be  with  her  acquaintances. 

"  Another  article  from  home  was  now  given  her,  and  she 
began  to  look  much  interested;  she  examined  the  stranger 
much  closer,  and  gave  me  to  understand 'that  she  knew  she 
came  from  Hanover;  she  even  endured  her  caresses,  but 
would  leave  her  with  indifference  at  the  slightest  signal. 
The  distress  of  the  mother  was  now  painful  to  behold ;  for, 
although  she  had  feared  that  she  should  not  be  recognized, 
the  painful  reality  of  being  treated  with  cold  indifference 
by  a  darling  child,  was  too  much  for  woman's  nature  to 
bear. 

"  After  a  while,  on  the  mother  taking  hold  of  her  again, 
a  vague  idea  seemed  to  flit  across  Laura's  mind,  that  this 
could  not  be  a  stranger;  she  therefore  felt  her  hands  very 
eagerly,  while  her  countenance  assumed  an  expression  of 
intense  interest ;  she  became  very  pale ;  and  then  suddeulj' 
red ;  hope  seemed  struggling  with  doubt  and  anxiety,  and 
never  were  contending  emotions  more  strongly  painted  vipon 
the  human  face :  at  this  moment  of  painful  uncertainty,  the 
mother  drew  her  close  to  her  side,  and  kissed  her  fondly, 
when  at  once  the  truth  flashed  upon  the  child,  and  all  mis- 
trust and  anxiety  disappeared  from  her  face,  as  with  an 
expression  of  exceeding  joy  she  eagerly  nestled  to  the 


38  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

bosom  of  lier  parent,  and  yielfied  herself  to  her  fond  em- 
braces. 

"After  this,  the  beads  were  all  unheeded;  the  playthings 
which  were  offered  to  her  were  utterly  disregarded;  her 
playmates,  for  whom  but  a  moment  before  she  gladly  left 
the  stranger,  now  vainly  strove  to  pull  her  from  her  mother; 
and  though  she  yielded  her  usual  instantaneous  obedience 
to  my  signal  to  follow  me,  it  was  evidently  with  painful 
reluctance.  She  clung  close  to  me,  as  if  bewildered  and 
fearful;  and  when,  after  a  moment,  I  took  her  to  her 
mother,  she  sprang  to  her  arms,  and  clung  to  her  with 
eager  joy. 

"The  subsequent  parting  between  them,  showed  alike 
the  affection,  the  intelligence,  and  the  resolution  of  the 
child. 

"  Laura  accompanied  her  mother  to  the  door,  clinging 
close  to  her  all  the  way,  until  they  arrived  at  the  threshold, 
where  she  paused,  and  felt  around,  to  ascertain  who  was 
near  her.  Perceiving  the  matron,  of  whom  she  is  very 
fond,  she  grasped  her  with  one  hand,  holding  on  convul- 
sively to  her  mother  with  the  other;  and  thus  she  stood  for 
a  moment:  then  she  dropped  her  mother's  hand;  put  her 
handkerchief  to  her  eyes;  and  turning  round,  clung  sobbing 
to  the  matron;  while  her  mother  departed,  with  emotions 
as  deep  as  those  of  her  child. 


"  It  has  been  remarked  in  former  reports,  that  she  can 
distinguish  different  degrees  of  intellect  in  others,  and  that 
she  soon  regarded,  almost  with  contempt,  a  newcomer, 
when,  after  a  few  days,  she  discovered  her  weakness  of 
mind.  This  unamiable  part  of  her  character  has  been  more 
strongly  developed  during  the  past  year. 

"  She  chooses  for  her  friends  and  companions,  those  chil- 
dren who  are  intelligent,  and  can  talk  best  with  her;  and 
she  evidently  dislikes  to  be  with  those  who  are  deficient  in 
intellect,  unless,  indeed,  she  can  make  them  serve  her  pur- 
poses, which  she  is  evidently  inclined  to  do.  She  takes  ad- 
vantage of  them,  and  makes  them  wait  upon  her,  in  a  man- 
ner that  she  knows  she  could  not  exact  of  others;  and  in 
various  ways  she  shows  her  Saxon  blood. 

"  She  is  fond  of  having  other  children  noticed  and  ca- 
ressed by  the  teachers,  and  those  whom  she  respects;  but 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  89 

this  must  not  be  carried  too  far,  or  she  becomes  jealous. 
She  wants  to  have  her  share,  which,  if  not  the  lion's,  is 
the  greater  part;  and  if  she  does  not  get  it,  she  says,  ^My 
rnother  will  love  wie.' 

"  Her  tendency  to  imitation  is  so  strong,  that  it  leads 
her  to  actions  which  must  be  entirely  incomprehensible  to 
her,  and  which  can  give  her  no  other  pleasure  than  the 
gratification  of  an  internal  faculty.  She  has  been  known 
to  sit  for  half  an  hour,  holding  a  book  before  her  sightless 
eyes,  and  moving  her  lips,  as  she  has  observed  seeing  peo- 
ple do  when  reading. 

"  She  one  day  pretended  that  her  doll  was  sick;  and  went 
through  all  the  motions  of  tending  it,  and  giving  it  medi- 
cine; she  then  put  it  carefully  to  bed,  and  placed  a  bottle 
of  hot  water  to  its  feet,  laughing  all  the  time  most  heartily. 
When  I  came  home,  she  insisted  upon  my  going  to  see  it, 
and  feel  its  pulse;  and  when  I  told  her  to  put  a  blister  on 
its  back,  she  seemed  to  enjoy  it  amazingly,  and  almost 
screamed  with  delight. 

"  Her  social  feelings,  and  her  affections,  are  very  strong; 
and  when  she  is  sitting  at  work,  or  at  her  studies,  by  the 
side  of  one  of  her  little  friends,  she  will  break  off  from  her 
task  every  few  moments,  to  hug  and  kiss  them  with  an 
earnestness  and  warmth  that  is  touching  to  behold. 

"  When  left  alone,  she  occupies  and  apparently  amuses 
herself,  and  seems  quite  contented;  and  so  strong  seems 
to  be  the  natural  tendency  of  thought  to  put  on  the  garb  of 
language,  that  she  often  soliloquizes  in  \]xq  finger  language, 
slow  and  tedious  as  it  is.  But  it  is  only  when  alone,  that 
she  is  quiet :  for  if  she  becomes  sensible  of  the  presence  of 
any  one  near  her,  she  is  restless  until  she  can  sit  close 
beside  them,  hold  their  hand,  and  converse  with  them  by 
signs. 

"  In  her  intellectual  character  it  is  pleasing  to  observe  an 
insatiable  thirst  for  knowledge,  and  a  quick  perception  of 
the  relations  of  things.  In  her  moral  character,  it  is  beau- 
tiful to  behold  her  continual  gladness,  her  keen  enjoyment 
of  existence,  her  expansive  love,  her  unhesitating  confi- 
dence, her  sympathy  with  suffering,  her  conscientiousness, 
truthfulness,  and  hopefulness." 

Such  are  a  few  fragments  from  the  simple  but  most  in- 
teresting and  instructive  history  of  Laura  Bridgman.  The 
name  of  her  great  benefactor  and  friend,  who  writes  it,  is 


40  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

Doctor  Howe.  There  are  not  many  persons,  I  hope  and 
believe,  who,  after  reading  these  passages,  can  ever  hear 
that  name  with  indifference. 

A  further  account  has  been  published  by  Dr.  Howe,  since 
the  report  from  which  I  have  just  quoted.  It  describes  her 
rapid  mental  growth  and  improvement  during  twelve  months 
more,  and  brings  her  little  history  down  to  the  end  of  last 
year.  It  is  very  remarkable,  that  as  we  dream  in  words, 
and  carry  on  imaginary  conversations,  in  which  we  speak 
both  for  ourselves  and  for  the  shadows  who  appear  to  us  in 
those  visions  of  the  night,  so  she,  having  no  words,  uses 
her  finger  alphabet  in  her  sleep.  And  it  has  been  ascer- 
tained that  when  her  slumber  is  broken,  and  is  much  dis- 
turbed by  dreams,  she  expresses  her  thoughts  in  an  irregu- 
lar and  confused  manner  on  her  fingers :  just  as  we  should 
murmur  and  mutter  them  indistinctly,  in  the  like  circum- 
stances. 

I  turned  over  the  leaves  of  her  Diary,  and  found  it  writ- 
ten in  a  fair  legible  square  hand,  and  expressed  in  terms 
which  were  quite  intelligible  without  any  explanation.  On 
my  saying  that  I  should  like  to  see  her  write  again,  the 
teacher  who  sat  beside  her,  bade  her,  in  their  language, 
sign  her  name  upon  a  slip  of  paper,  twice  or  thrice.  In 
doing  so,  I  observed  that  she  kept  her  left  hand  always 
touching,  and  following  up,  her  right,  in  which,  of  course, 
she  held  the  pen.  No  line  was  indicated  by  any  contriv- 
ance, but  she  wrote  straight  and  freely. 

She  had,  until  now,  been  quite  unconscious  of  the  pres- 
ence of  visitors;  but,  having  her  hand  placed  in  that  of  the 
gentleman  who  accompanied  me,  she  immediately  expressed 
his  name  upon  her  teacher's  palm.  Indeed  her  sense  of 
touch  is  now  so  exquisite,  that  having  been  acquainted 
with  a  person  once,  she  can  recognise  him  or  her  after  al- 
most any  interval.  This  gentleman  had  been  in  her  com- 
pany, I  believe,  but  very  seldom,  and  certainly  had  not 
seen  her  for  many  months.  My  hand  she  rejected  at  once, 
as  she  does  that  of  any  man  who  is  a  stranger  to  her.  But 
she  retained  my  wife's  with  evident  pleasure,  kissed  her, 
and  examined  her  dress  with  a  girl's  curiosity  and  interest. 

She  was  merry  and  cheerful,  and  showed  much  innocent 
playfulness  in  her  intercourse  with  her  teacher.  Her  de- 
light on  recognising  a  favourite  playfellow  and  companion 
— herself  a  blind  girl — who  silently,  and  with  an  equal 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  41 

enjoymeut  of  the  coming  surprise,  took  a  seat  beside  her, 
was  beautiful  to  witness.  It  elicited  from  her  at  first,  as 
other  slight  circumstances  did  twice  or  thrice  during  my 
visit,  an  uncouth  noise  which  was  rather  painful  to  hear. 
But  on  her  teacher  touching  her  lips,  she  immediately  de- 
sisted, and  embraced  her  laughingly  and  affectionately. 

I  had  previously  been  into  another  chamber,  where  a 
number  of  blind  boys  were  swinghig,  and  climbing,  and  en- 
gaged in  various  sports.  They  all  clamoured,  as  we  en- 
tered, to  the  assistant-master,  who  accompanied  us,  "  Look 
at  me,  Mr,  Hart !  Please,  Mr.  Hart,  look  at  me ! "  evin- 
cing, I  thought,  even  in  this,  an  anxiety  peculiar  to  their 
condition,  that  their  little  feats  of  agility  should  be  seen. 
Among  them  was  a  small  laughing  fellow,  who  stood  aloof, 
entertaining  himself  with  a  gymnastic  exercise  for  bringing 
the  arms  and  chest  into  play;  which  he  enjoyed  mightily; 
especially  when,  in  thrusting  out  his  right  arm,  he  brought 
it  into  contact  with  another  boy.  Like  Laura  Bridgman, 
this  young  child  was  deaf,  and  dumb,  and  blind. 

Dr.  Howe's  account  of  this  pupil's  first  instruction  is  so 
very  striking,  and  so  intimately  connected  Avith  Laura  her- 
self, that  I  cannot  refrain  from  a  short  extract.  I  may 
premise  that  the  poor  boy's  name  is  Oliver  Caswell;  that 
he  is  thirteen  years  of  age;  and  that  he  was  in  full  posses- 
sion of  all  his  faculties,  until  three  years  and  four  months 
old.  He  was  then  attacked  by  scarlet  fever :  in  four  weeks 
became  deaf;  in  a  few  weeks  more,  blind;  in  six  months, 
dumb.  He  showed  his  anxious  sense  of  this  last  depriva- 
tion, by  often  feeling  the  lips  of  other  persons  when  they 
were  talking,  and  then  putting  his  hand  upon  his  own,  as 
if  to  assure  himself  that  he  had  them  in  the  right  posi- 
tion. 

"  His  thirst  for  knowledge,"  says  Dr.  Howe,  "proclaimed 
itself  as  soon  as  he  entered  tlie  house,  by  his  eager  exami- 
nation of  everything  he  could  feel  or  smell  in  his  new  loca- 
tion. For  instance,  treading  upon  the  register  of  a  furnace, 
he  instantly  stooped  down,  and  began  to  feel  it,  and  soon 
discovered  the  way  in  which  the  -upper  plate  moved  upon 
the  lower  one;  but  this  was  not  enough  for  him,  so  lying 
down  upon  his  face,  he  applied  his  tongue  first  to  one,  then 
to  the  other,  and  seemed  to  discover  that  they  were  of  differ- 
ent kinds  of  metal. 

**  His  signs  were  expressive :  and  the  strictly  natural  Ian- 


42  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

guage,  laughing,  crying,  sighing,  kissing,  embracing,  &c., 
was  perfect. 

"  Some  of  the  analogical  signs  which  (guided  by  his  fac- 
ulty of  imitation)  he  had  contrived,  were  comprehensible; 
such  as  the  waving  motion  of  his  hand  for  the  motion  of  a 
boat,  the  circular  one  for  a  wheel,  &c. 

"  The  first  object  was  to  break  up  the  use  of  these  signs, 
and  to  substitute  for  them  the  use  of  purely  arbitrary  ones. 

"  Profiting  by  the  experience  I  had  gained  in  the  other 
cases,  I  omitted  several  steps  of  the  process  before  em- 
ployed, and  commenced  at  once  with  the  finger  language. 
Taking  therefore,  several  articles  having  short  names, 
such  as  key,  cup,  mug,  &c.,  and  with  Laura  for  an  auxil- 
iary, I  sat  down,  and  taking  his  hand,  placed  it  upon  one 
of  them,  and  then  with  my  own,  made  the  letters  key. 
He  felt  my  hands  eagerly  with  both  of  his,  and  on  my  re- 
peating the  process,  he  evidently  tried  to  imitate  the  mo- 
tions of  my  fingers.  In  a  few  minutes  he  contrived  to  feel 
the  motions  of  my  fingers  with  one  hand,  and  holding  out 
the  other  he  tried  to  imitate  them,  laughing  most  heartily 
when  he  succeeded.  Laura  was  by,  interested  even  to  agi- 
tation; and  the  two  presented  a  singular  sight:  her  face 
was  flushed  and  anxious,  and  her  fingers  twined  in  among 
ours  so  closely  as  to  follow  every  motion,  but  so  lightly  as 
not  to  embarrass  them;  while  Oliver  stood  attentive,  his 
head  a  little  aside,  his  face  turned  up,  his  left  hand  grasp- 
ing mine,  and  his  right  held  out :  at  every  motion  of  my 
fingers  his  countenance  betokened  keen  attention;  there 
was  an  expression  of  anxiety  as  he  tried  to  imitate  the 
motions;  then  a  smile  came  stealing  out  as  he  thought  he 
could  do  so,  and  spread  into  a  joyous  laugh  the  moment  he 
succeeded,  and  felt  me  pat  his  head,  and  Laura  clap  him 
heartily  upon  the  back,  and  jump  up  and  down  in  her  joy. 

"  He  learned  more  than  a  half-dozen  letters  in  half  an 
hour,  and  seemed  delighted  with  his  success,  at  least  in 
gaining  approbation.  His  attention  then  began  to  flag,  and 
I  commenced  playing  with  him.  It  was  evident  that  in  all 
this  he  had  merely  been  -  imitating  the  motions  of  my  fin- 
gers, and  placing  his  hand  upon  the  key,  cup,  &c.,  as  part 
of  the  process,  without  any  perception  of  the  relation  be- 
tween the  sign  and  the  object. 

"  When  he  was  tired  with  play  I  took  him  back  to  the 
table,  and  he  was  quite  ready  to  begin  again  his  process  of 


AMERICAN  NOTEa  43 

imitation.  He  soon  learned  to  make  the  letters  for  key^ 
pen,  pin;  and  by  having  the  object  repeatedly  placed  in  his 
hand,  he  at  last  perceived  the  relation  I  wished  to  establish 
between  them.  This  was  evident,  because,  when  I  made 
the  letters  pin,  or  p  e  n,  or  c  u  p,  he  would  select  the 
article. 

"  The  perception  of  this  relation  was  not  accompanied  by 
that  radiant  flash  of  intelligence,  and  that  glow  of  joy, 
which  marked  the  delightful  moment  when  Laura  first  per- 
ceived it.  I  then  placed  all  the  articles  on  the  table,  and 
going  away  a  little  distance  with  the  children,  placed  Oli- 
ver's fingers  in  the  positions  to  spell  ke?/,  on  which  Laura 
went  and  brought  the  article :  the  little  fellow  seemed  to  be 
much  amused  by  this,  and  looked  very  attentive  and  smil- 
ing. I  then  caused  him  to  make  the  letters  bread,  and 
in  an  instant  Laura  went  and  brought  him  a  piece:  he 
smelled  at  it;  put  it  to  his  lips;  cocked  up  his  head  with 
a  most  knowing  look;  seemed  to  reflect  a  moment;  and 
then  laughed  outright,  as  much  as  to  say,  *Aha !  I  under- 
stand now  how  something  may  be  made  out  of  this.* 

"  It  was  now  clear  that  he  had  the  capacity  and  inclina- 
tion to  learn,  that  he  was  a  proper  subject  for  instruction, 
and  needed  only  persevering  attention.  I  therefore  put 
him  in  the  hands  of  an  intelligent  teacher,  nothing  doubt- 
ing of  his  rapid  progress." 

Well  may  this  gentleman  call  that  a  delightful  moment, 
in  which  some  distant  promise  of  her  present  state  fii'st 
gleamed  upon  the  darkened  mind  of  Laura  Bridgman. 
Throughout  his  life,  the  recollection  of  that  moment  will 
be  to  him  a  source  of  pure,  unfading  happiness;  nor  will  it 
shine  least  brightly  on  the  evening  of  his  days  of  Noble 
Usefulness. 

The  affection  that  exists  between  these  two — the  master 
and  the  pupil — is  as  far  removed  from  all  ordinary  care  and 
regard,  as  the  circumstances  in  which  it  has  had  its  growth, 
are  apart  from  the  common  occurrences  of  life.  He  is  oc- 
cupied now,  in  devising  means  of  imparting  to  her,  higher 
knowledge;  and  of  conveying  to  her  some  adequate  idea  of 
the  Great  Creator  of  that  universe  in  which,  dark  and  si- 
lent and  scentless  though  it  be  to  her,  she  has  such  deep 
delight  and  glad  enjoyment. 

Ye  who  have  eyes  and  see  not,  and  have  ears  ajid  hear 
not  J  ye  who  are  as  the  hypocrites  of  sad  countenances,  and 


44  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

disfigure  your  faces  that  ye  may  seem  unto  men  to  fast; 
learn  healthy  cheerfulness,  and  mild  contentment,  from  the 
deaf,  and  dumb,  and  blind!  Self -elected  saints  with 
gloomy  brows,  this  sightless,  earless,  voiceless  child  may 
teach  you  lessons  you  will  do  well  to  follow.  Let  that  poor 
hand  of  hers  lie  gently  on  your  hearts;  for  there  may  be 
something  in  its  healing  touch  akin  to  that  of  the  Great 
Master  whose  precepts  you  misconstrue,  whose  lessons  you 
pervert,  of  whose  charity  and  sympathy  with  all  the 
world,  not  one  among  you  in  his  daily  practice  knows  as 
much  as  many  of  the  worst  among  those  fallen  sinners,  to 
whom  you  are  liberal  in  nothing  but  the  preachment  of 
perdition ! 

As  I  rose  to  quit  the  room,  a  pretty  little  child  of  one  of 
the  attendants  came  running  in  to  greet  its  father.  For 
the  moment,  a  child  with  eyes,  among  the  sightless  crowd, 
impressed  me  almost  as  painfully  as  the  blind  boy  in  the 
porch  had  done,  two  hours  ago.  All !  how  much  brighter 
and  more  deeply  blue,  glowing  and  rich  though  it  had  been 
before,  was  the  scene  without,  contrasting  with  the  dark- 
ness of  so  many  youthful  lives  within ! 

At  South  Boston",  as  it  is  called,  in  a  situation  excel- 
lently adapted  for  the  purpose,  several  charitable  institu- 
tions are  clustered  together.  One  of  these,  is  the  State 
Hospital  for  the  insane;  admirably  conducted  on  those  en- 
lightened principles  of  conciliation  and  kindness,  which 
twenty  years  ago  would  have  been  worse  than  heretical, 
and  which  have  been  acted  upon  with  so  much  success  in 
our  own  pauper  Asylum  at  Han  well.  '''Evince  a  desire  to 
show  some  confidence,  and  repose  some  trust,  even  in  mad 
people," — said  the  resident  physician,  as  we  walked  along 
the  galleries,  his  patients  flocking  round  us  unrestrained. 
Of  those  who  deny  or  doubt  the  wisdom  of  this  maxim 
after  witnessing  its  effects,  if  there  be  such  people  still 
alive,  I  can  only  say  that  I  hope  I  may  never  be  summoned 
as  a  Juryman  on  a  Commission  of  Lunacy  whereof  they  are 
the  subjects;  for  I  should  certainly  find  them  out  of  their 
senses,  on  such  evidence  alone. 

Each  ward  in  this  institution  is  shaped  like  a  long  gal- 
lery or  hall,  with  the  dormitories  of  the  patients  opening 
from  it  on  either  hand.  Here  they  work,  read,  play  at 
skittles,  and  other  games;  and  when  the  weather  does  not 
admit  of  their  taking  exercise  out  of  doors,  pass  the  day 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  46 

together.  In  one  of  these  rooms,  seated,  calmly,  and  quite 
as  a  matter  of  course,  among  a  throng  of  madwomen,  black 
and  white,  were  the  physician's  wife  and  another  lady, 
with  a  couple  of  children.  These  ladies  were  graceful  and 
handsome;  and  it  was  not  difficult  to  perceive  at  a  glance 
that  even  their  presence  there,  had  a  highly  beneficial  in- 
fluence on  the  patients  who  were  grouped  about  them. 

Leaning  her  head  against  the  chimney-piece,  with  a  great 
assumption  of  dignity  and  refinement  of  manner,  sat  an 
elderly  female,  in  as  many  scraps  of  finery  as  Madge  Wild- 
fire herself.  Her  head  in  particular  was  so  strewn  with 
scraps  of  gauze  and  cotton  and  bits  of  paper,  and  had  so 
many  queer  odds  and  ends  stuck  all  about  it,  that  it  looked 
like  a  bird's-nest.  She  was  radiant  with  imaginary  jewels; 
wore  a  rich  pair  of  undoubted  gold  spectacles;  and  grace- 
fully dropped  upon  her  lap,  as  we  approached,  a  very  old 
greasy  newspaper,  in  which  I  dare  say  she  had  been  read- 
ing an  account  of  her  own  presentation  at  some  Foreign 
Court. 

I  have  been  thus  particular  in  describing  her,  because 
she  will  serve  to  exemplify  the  physician's  manner  of  ac- 
quiring and  retaining  the  confidence  of  his  patients. 

"Tliis,"  he  said  aloud,  taking  me  by  the  hand,  and  ad- 
vancing to  the  fantastic  figure  with  great  politeness — not 
raising  her  suspicions  by  the  slightest  look  or  whisper,  or 
any  kind  of  aside,  to  me :  "  This  lady  is  the  hostess  of  this 
mansion.  Sir.  It  belongs  to  her.  Nobody  else  has  any- 
thing whatever  to  do  with  it.  It  is  a  large  establishment, 
as  you  see,  and  requires  a  great  number  of  attendants.  She 
lives,  you  observe,  in  the  very  first  style.  She  is  kind 
enough  to  receive  my  visits,  and  to  permit  my  wife  and 
family  to  reside  here;  for  which,  it  is  hardly  necessary  to 
say,  we  are  much  indebted  to  her.  She  is  exceedingly 
courteous,  you  perceive,"  on  this  hint  she  bowed  conde- 
scendingly, "and  will  permit  me  to  have  the  pleasure  of 
introducing  you:  a  gentleman  from  England,  Ma'am: 
newly  arrived  from  England,  after  a  very  tempestuous 
passage :  Mr.  Dickens — the  lady  of  the  house !  " 

We  exchanged  the  most  dignified  salutations  with  pro- 
found gravity  and  respect,  and  so  went  on.  The  rest  of 
the  madwomen  seemed  to  understand  the  joke  perfectly 
(not  only  in  this  case,  but  in  all  the  others,  except  their 
own),  and  to  be  highly  amused  by  it.     The  nature  of  theii 


4e  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

several  kinds  of  insanity  was  made  known  to  me  in  the 
same  way,  and  we  left  each  of  them  in  high  good  humour. 
Not  only  is  a  thorough  confiderce  established,  by  these 
means,  between  physician  and  patient,  in  respect  of  the  na- 
ture and  extent  of  their  hallucinations,  but  it  is  easy  to  un- 
derstand that  opportunities  are  afforded  for  seizing  any 
moment  of  reason,  to  startle  them  by  placing  their  own 
delusion  before  them  in  its  most  incongruous  and  ridiculous 
light. 

Every  patient  in  this  asylum  sits  down  to  dinner  every 
day  with  a  knife  and  fork ;  and  in  the  midst  of  them  sits 
the  gentleman,  whose  manner  of  dealing  with  his  charges, 
I  have  just  described.  At  every  meal,  moral  influence 
alone  restrains  the  more  violent  among  them  from  cutting 
the  throats  of  the  rest;  but  the  effect  of  that  influence  is 
reduced  to  an  absolute  certainty,  and  is  found,  even  as  a 
means  of  restraint,  to  say  nothing  of  it  as  a  means  of  cure, 
a  hundred  times  more  efficaciovis  than  all  the  strait- waist- 
coats, fetters,  and  handcuffs,  that  ignorance,  prejudice, 
and  cruelty  have  manufactured  since  the  creation  of  the 
world. 

In  the  labour  department,  every  patient  is  as  freely 
trusted  with  the  tools  of  his  trade  as  if  he  were  a  sane 
man.  In  the  garden,  and  on  the  farm,  they  work  with 
spades,  rakes,  and  hoes.  For  amusement,  they  walk,  run, 
fish,  paint,  read,  and  ride  out  to  take  the  air  in  carriages 
provided  for  the  purpose.  They  have  among  themselves  a 
sewing  society  to  make  clothes  for  the  poor,  which  holds 
meetings,  passes  resolutions,  never  comes  to  fistycuffs  or 
bowie-knives  as  sane  assemblies  have,  been  known  to  do 
elsewhere ;  and  conducts  all  its  proceedings  with  the  great- 
est decorum.  The  irritability,  which  would  otherwise  be 
expended  on  their  own  flesh,  clothes,  and  furniture,  is  dis- 
sipated in  these  pursuits.  They  are  cheerful,  tranquil,  and 
healthy. 

Once  a  week  they  have  a  ball,  in  which  the  Doctor  and 
his  family,  with  all  the  nurses  and  attendants,  take  an  ac- 
tive part.  Dances  and  marches  are  performed  alternately, 
to  the  enlivening  strains  of  a  piano;  and  now  and  then 
some  gentleman  or  lady  (whose  proficiency  has  been  previ- 
ously ascertained)  obliges  the  company  with  a  song:  nor 
does  it  ever  degenerate,  at  a  tender  crisis,  into  a  screech  or 
howl;  wherein,  I  must  eonfess,  I  should  have  thought  the 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  47 

danger  lay.  At  an  early  hour  they  all  meet  together  for 
these  festive  purposes;  at  eight  o'clock  refreshments  are 
served;  and  at  nine  they  separate. 

Immense  politeness  and  good-breeding  are  observed 
throughout.  They  all  take  their  tone  from  the  Doctor;  and 
he  moves  a  very  Chesterfield  among  the  company.  Like 
other  assemblies,  these  entertainments  afford  a  fruitful 
topic  of  conversation  among  the  ladies  for  some  days;  and 
the  gentlemen  are  so  anxious  to  shine  on  these  occasions, 
that  they  have  been  sometimes  found  "practising  their 
steps  "  in  private,  to  cut  a  more  distinguished  figure  in  the 
dance. 

It  is  obvious  that  one  great  feature  of  this  system,  is  the 
inculcation  and  encouragement,  even  among  such  unhappy 
persons,  of  a  decent  self-respect.  Something  of  the  same 
spirit  pervades  all  the  Institutions  at  South  Boston. 

There  is  the  House  of  Industry.  In  '  that  branch  of  it, 
which  is  devoted  to  the  reception  of  old  or  otherwise  help- 
less paupers,  these  words  are  painted  on  the  walls: 
"Worthy  of  Notice.  Self-Government,  Quietude, 
AND  Peace,  are  Blessings."  It  is  not  assumed  and  taken 
for  granted  that  being  there  they  must  be  evil-disposed  and 
wicked  people,  before  whose  vicious  eyes  it  is  necessary  to 
flourish  threats  and  harsh  restraints.  They  are  met  at  the 
very  threshold  with  this  mild  appeal.  All  within-doors  is 
very  plain  and  simple,  as  it  ought  to  be,  but  arranged  with 
a  view  to  peace  and  comfort.  It  costs  no  more  than  any 
other  plan  of  arrangement,  but  it  speaks  an  amount  of 
consideration  for  those  who  are  reduced  to  seek  a  shelter 
there,  which  puts  them  at  once  upon  their  gratitude  and 
good  behaviour.  Instead  of  being  parcelled  out  in  great, 
long,  rambling  wards,  where  a  certain  amount  of  weazen  life 
may  mope,  and  pine,  and  shiver,  all  day  long,  the  building 
is  divided  into  separate  rooms,  each  with  its  share  of  light 
and  air.  In  these,  the  better  kind  of  paupers  live.  They 
have  a  motive  for  exertion  and  becoming  pride,  in  the 
desire  to  make  these  little  chambers  comfortable  and  de- 
cent. 

I  do  not  remember  one  but  it  was  clean  and  neat,  and 
had  its  plant  or  two  upon  the  window-sill,  or  row  of  crock- 
ery upon  the  shelf,  or  small  display  of  coloured  prints  upon 
the  whitewashed  wall,  or,  perhaps,  its  wooden  clock  behind 
the  door. 


48  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

The  orphans  and  young  children  are  in  an  adjoining 
building;  separate  from  this,  but  a  part  of  the  same  Insti- 
tution. Some  are  such  little  creatures,  that  the  stairs  are 
of  Lilliputian  measurement,  fitted  to  their  tiny  strides. 
The  same  consideration  for  their  years  and  weakness  is  ex- 
pressed in  their  very  seats,  which  are  perfect  curiosities, 
and  look  like  articles  of  furniture  for  a  pauper  doll's-house. 
I  can  imagine  the  glee  of  our  Poor  Law  Commissioners  at 
the  notion  of  these  seats  having  arms  and  backs;  but  small 
spines  being  of  older  date  than  their  occupation  of  the 
Board-room  at  Somerset  House,  I  thought  even  this  provi- 
sion very  merciful  and  kind. 

Here  again,  I  was  greatly  pleased  with  the  inscriptions 
on  the  wall,  which  were  scraps  of  plain  morality,  easily  re- 
membered and  understood :  such  as  "  Love  one  another  " — 
*'  God  remembers  the  smallest  creature  in  his  creation : " 
and  straightforward  advice  of  that  nature.  The  books  and 
tasks  of  these  smallest  of  scholars,  were  adapted,  in  the 
same  judicious  manner,  to  their  childish  powers.  When 
we  had  examined  these  lessons,  four  morsels  of  girls  (of 
whom  one  was  blind)  sang  a  little  song,  about  the  merry 
month  of  May,  which  I  thought  (being  extremely  dismal) 
would  have  suited  an  English  November  better.  That 
done,  we  went  to  see  their  sleeping-rooms  on  the  floor 
above,  in  which  the  arrangements  were  no  less  excellent 
and  gentle  than  those  we  had  seen  below.  And  after  ob- 
serving that  the  teachers  were  of  a  class  and  character  well 
suited  to  the  spirit  of  the  place,  I  took  leave  of  the  infants 
with  a  lighter  heart  than  ever  I  have  taken  leave  of  pauper 
infants  yet. 

Connected  with  the  House  of  Industry,  there  is  also  a 
Hospital,  which  was  in  the  best  order,  and  had,  I  am  glad 
to  say,  many  beds  unoccupied.  It  had  one  fault,  however, 
which  is  common  to  all  American  interiors :  the  presence  of 
the  eternal,  accursed,  suffocating,  red-hot  demon  of  a  stove, 
whose  breath  would  blight  the  purest  air  under  Heaven. 

There  are  two  establishments  for  boys  in  this  same  neigh- 
bourhood. One  is  called  the  Boylston  School,  and  is  an 
asylum  for  neglected  and  indigent  boys  who  have  commit- 
ted no  crime,  but  who  in  the  ordinary  course  of  things 
would  very  soon  be  purged  of  that  distinction  if  they  were 
not  taken  from  the  hungry  streets  and  sent  here.  The 
other  is  a  House  of  Reformation  for  Juvenile  Offenders. 


AMERICAN.  NOTES.  49 

They  are  both  under  the  same  roof,  but  the  two  classes  of 
boys  never  come  in  contact. 

The  Boylston  boys,  as  may  be  readily  supposed,  have 
very  much  the  advantage  of  the  others  in  point  of  personal 
appearance.  They  were  in  their  school-room  when  I  came 
upon  them,  and  answered  correctly,  without  book,  such 
questions  as  where  was  England;  how  far  was  it;  what  was 
its  population;  its  capital  city;  its  form  of  government; 
and  so  forth.  They  sang  a  song  too,  about  a  farmer  sow- 
ing his  seed :  with  corresponding  action  at  such  parts  as 
"'tis  thus  he  sows,"  "he  turns  him  round,"  "he  claps  his 
hands;"  which  gave  it  greater  interest  for  them,  and  accus- 
tomed them  to  act  together,  in  an  orderly  manner.  They 
appeared  exceedingly  well  taught,  and  not  better  taught 
than  fed;  for  a  more  chubby-looking,  full-waistcoated  set 
of  boys,  I  never  saw. 

The  juvenile  offenders  had  not  such  pleasant  faces  by  a 
great  deal,  and  in  this  establishment  there  were  many  boys 
of  colour,  I  saw  them  first  at  their  work  (basket-making, 
and  the  manufacture  of  palm-leaf  hats),  afterwards  in  theii 
school,  where  they  sang  a  chorus  in  praise  of  Liberty :  ait 
odd,  and,  one  would  think,  rather  aggravating,  theme  foi: 
prisoners.  These  boys  are  divided  into  four  classes,  each 
denoted  by  a  numeral,  worn  on  a  badge  upon  the  arm.  On 
the  arrival  of  a  newcomer,  he  is  put  into  the  fourth  or  low- 
est class,  and  left,  by  good  behaviour,  to  work  his  way  up 
into  the  first.  The  design  and  object  of  this  Institution  is 
to  reclaim  the  youthfiil  criminal  by  firm  but  kind  and  judi- 
cious treatment;  to  make  his  prison  a  place  of  purification 
and  improvement,  not  of  demoralisation  and  corruption;  to 
impress  upon  him  that  there  is  but  one  path,  and  that  one 
sober  industry,  which  can  ever  lead  him  to  happiness;  to 
teach  him  how  it  may  be  trodden,  if  his  footsteps  have 
never  yet  been  led  that  way;  and  to  lure  him  back  to  it  if 
they  have  strayed:  in  a  word,  to  snatch  him  from  destruc- 
tion, and  restore  him  to  society  a  penitent  and  useful  mem- 
ber. The  importance  of  such  an  establishment,  in  every 
pouit  of  view,  and  with  reference  to  every  consideration  of 
humanity  and  social  policy,  requires  no  comment. 

One  other  establishment  closes  the  catalogue.     It  is  the 

House  of  Correction  for  the  State,  in  which  silence  is  strictly 

maintained,  but  where  the  prisoners  have  the  comfort  and 

mental  relief  of  seeing  each  other,  and  of  working  together. 

4 


60  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

This  is  the  improved  system  of  Prison  Discipline  which  we 
have  imported  into  England,  and  which  has  been  in  suc- 
cessful operation  among  us  for  some  years  past. 

America,  as  a  new  and  not  over-populated  country,  has, 
in  all  her  prisons,  the  one  great  advantage,  of  being  enabled 
to  find  useful  and  profitable  work  for  the  inmates;  whereas, 
with  us,  the  prejudice  against  prison  labour  is  naturally 
very  strong,  and  almost  insurmountable,  when  honest  men, 
who  have  not  offended  against  the  laws,  are  frequently'' 
doomed  to  seek  employment  in  vain.  Even  in  the  United 
States,  the  principle  of  bringing  convict  labour  and  free 
labour  into  a  competition  which  must  obviously  be  to  the 
disadvantage  of  the  latter,  has  already  found  may  oppo- 
nents, whose  number  is  not  likely  to  diminish  with  access  of 
years. 

For  this  very  reason  though,  our  best  prisons  would  seem 
at  the  first  glance  to  be  better  conducted  than  those  of 
America.  The  treadmill  is  conducted  with  little  or  no 
noise;  five  hundred  men  may  pick  oakum  in  the  same  room, 
without  a  sound;  and  both  kinds  of  labour  admit  of  such 
keen  and  vigilant  superintendence,  as  will  render  even  a 
word  of  personal  communication  among  the  prisoners  al- 
most impossible.  On  the  other  hand,  the  noise  of  the 
loom,  the  forge,  the  carpenter's  hammer,  or  the  stone- 
mason's saw,  greatly  favour  those  opportunities  of  inter- 
course— hurried  and  brief  no  doubt,  but  opportunities  still 
— which  these  several  kinds  of  work,  by  rendering  it  neces- 
sary for  men  to  be  employed  very  near  to  each  other,  and 
often  side  by  side,  without  any  barrier  or  partition  between 
them,  in  their  very  nature  present.  A  visitor,  too,  requires 
to  reason  and  reflect  a  little,  before  the  sight  of  a  number 
of  men  engaged  in  ordinary  labour,  such  as  he  is  accus- 
tomed to  out  of  doors,  will  impress  him  half  as  strongly  as 
the  contemplation  of  the  same  persons  in  the  same  place 
and  garb  would,  if  they  were  occupied  in  some  task,  marked 
and  degraded  everywhere  as  belonging  only  to  felons  in 
jails.  In  an  American  state  prison  or  house  of  correction, 
I  found  it  difficult  at  first  to  persuade  myself  that  I  was 
really  in  a  jail :  a  place  of  ignominious  punishment  and  en- 
dur9.nce.  And  to  this  hour  I  very  much  question  whether 
the  humane  boast  that  it  is  not  like  one,  has  its  root  in  the 
true  wisdom  or  philosophy  of  the  matter. 

I  hope  I  may  not  be  misunderstood  on  this  subject,  for  it 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  51 

is  one  in  which  I  take  a  strong  and  deep  interest.  I  in- 
cline as  little  to  the  sickly  feeling  which  makes  every  cant- 
ing lie  or  maudlin  speech  of  a  notorious  criminal  a  subject 
of  newspaper  report  and  general  sympathy,  as  I  do  to  those 
good  old  customs  of  the  good  old  times  which  made  Eng- 
land, even  so  recently  as  in  the  reign  of  the  Third  King 
George,  in  respect  of  her  criminal  code  and  her  prison  reg- 
ulations, one  of  the  most  bloody-minded  and  barbarous 
countries  on  the  earth.  If  I  thouglit  it  would  do  any  good 
to  the  rising  generation,  I  would  cheerfully  give  my  con- 
sent to  the  disinterment  of  the  bones  of  any  genteel  high- 
wayman (the  more  genteel,  the  more  cheerfully),  and  to 
their  exposure,  piecemeal,  on  any  signpost,  gate,  or  gibbet, 
-that  might  be  deemed  a  good  elevation  for  the  purpose. 
My  reason  is  as  well  convinced  that  these  gentry  were  ut- 
terly worthless  and  debauched  villains,  as  it  is  that  the 
laws  and  jails  hardened  them  in  their  evil  course,  or  that 
their  wonderful  escapes  were  effected  by  the  prison-turn- 
keys who,  in  those  admirable  days,  had  always  been  felons 
themselves,  and  were,  to  the  last,  their  bosom  friends  and 
pot-companions.  At  the  same  time  I  know,  as  all  men  do 
or  should,  that  the  subject  of  Prison  Discipline  is  one  of 
the  highest  importance  to  any  community;  and  that  in  her 
sweeping  reform  and  bright  example  to  other  countries  on 
this  head,  America  has  shown  great  wisdom,  great  benevo- 
lence, and  exalted  policy.  In  contrasting  her  system  with 
that  which  we  have  modelled  upon  it,  I  merely  seek  to 
show  that  with  all  its  drawbacks,  ours  has  some  advantages 
of  its  own.* 

The  House  of  Correction  which  has  led  to  these  remarks, 
is  not  walled,  like  other  prisons,  but  is  palisaded  round 
about  with  tall  rough  stakes,  something  after  the  manner 

*  Apart  from  profit  made  by  the  useful  labour  of  prisoners,  which 
we  can  never  hope  to  realize  to  any  great  extent,  and  which  it  is 
perhaps  not  expedient  for  us  to  try  to  gain,  there  are  two  prisons 
in  London,  in  all  respects  equal,  and  in  some  decidedly  superior,  to 
any  I  saw  or  have  ever  heard  or  read  of  in  America.  One  is  the 
Tothill  Fields  Bridewell,  conducted  by  Lieutenant  A.  F.  Tracey, 
R.N. ;  the  other  is  the  Middlesex  House  of  Correction,  superintended 
by  Mr.  Chesterton.  This  gentleman  also  holds  an  appointment  in 
the  Public  Service.  Both  are  enlightened  and  superior  men;  and  it 
would  be  as  difficult  to  find  persons  better  qualified  for  the  func- 
tions they  discharge  with  firmness,  zeal,  intelligence,  and  humanity, 
as  it  would  be  to  exceed  the  perfect  order  and  arrangemeut  of  the 
institutions  they  govern. 


52  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

of  an  enclosure  for  keeping  elephants  in,  as  we  see  it  rep- 
resented in  Eastern  prints  and  pictures.  The  prisoners 
wear  a  parti-coloured  dress;  and  those  who  are  sentenced 
to  hard  labour,  work  at  nail-making,  or  stone-cutting. 
When  I  was  there,  the  latter  class  of  labourers  were  em- 
ployed upon  the  stone  for  a  new  Custom-house  in  course  of 
erection  at  Boston.  They  appeared  to  shape  it  skilfully 
and  with  expedition,  though  there  were  very  few  among 
them  (if  any)  who  had  not  acquired  the  art  within  the 
prison  gates. 

The  women,  all  in  one  large  room,  were  employed  in 
making  light  clothing,  for  New  Orleans  and  the  Southern 
States.  They  did  their  work  in  silence,  like  the  men; 
and  like  them,  were  overlooked  by  the  person  contracting 
for  their  labour,  or  by  some  agent  of  his  appointment.  In,,:" 
addition  to  this,  they  are  every  moment  liable  to  be  visited 
by  the  prison  officers  appointed  for  that  purpose. 

The  arrangements  for  cooking,  washing  of  clothes,  and, . 
so  forth,  are  much  upon  the  plan  of  those  I  have  seen  at  • 
home.  Their  mode  of  bestowing  the  prisoners  at  night 
(which  is  of  general  adoption)  differs  from  ours,  and  is  both 
simple  and  effective.  In  the  centre  of  a  lofty  area,  lighted 
by  windows  in  the  four  walls,  are  five  tiers  of  cells,  one 
above  the  other;  each  tier  having  before  it  a  light  iron  gal- 
lery, attainable  by  stairs  of  the  same  construction  and  ma- 
terial :  excepting  the  lower  one,  which  is  on  the  ground. 
Behind  these,  back  te  back  with  them  and  facing  the  op- 
posite wall,  are  five  corresponding  rows  of  cells,  accessible 
by  similar  means :  so  that  supposing  the  prisoners  locked 
up  in  their  cells,  an  officer  stationed  on  the  ground,  with 
his  back  to  the  wall,  has  half  their  number  under  his  eye 
at  once;  the  remaining  half  being  equally  under  the  ob- 
servation of  another  officer  on  the  opposite  side;  and  all  in 
one  great  apartment.  Unless  this  watch  be  corrupted  or 
sleeping  on  his  post,  it  is  impossible  for  a  man  to  escape; 
for  even  in  the  event  of  his  forcing  the  iron  door  of  his  cell 
without  noise  (which  is  exceedingly  improbable),  the  mo- 
ment he  appears  outside,  and  steps  into  that  one  of  the  five 
galleries  on  which  it  is  situated,  he  must  be  plainly  and 
fully  visible  to  the  officer  below.  Each  of  these  cells  holds 
a  small  truckle-bed,  in  which  one  prisoner  sleeps;  never 
more.  It  is  small,  of  course;  and  the  door  being  not  solid, 
but  grated,  and  without  blind  or  curtain,  the  prisoner  within 


AMERICAN  NOTES  63 

is  at  all  times  exposed  to  the  observation  and  inspection  of 
any  guard  who  may  pass  along  that  tier  at  any  hour  or 
minute  of  the  night.  Every  day,  the  prisoners  receive  their 
dinner,  singly,  through  a  trap  in  the  kitchen  wall;  and 
each  man  carries  his  to  his  sleeping-cell  to  eat  it,  where  he 
is  locked  up,  alone,  for  that  purpose,  one  hour.  The  whole 
of  this  arrangement  struck  mo  as  being  admirable;  and  I 
hope  that  the  next  new  prison  we  erect  in  England  may  be 
built  on  this  plan. 

I  was  given  to  understand  that  in  this  prison  no  swords 
or  firearms,  or  even  cudgels,  are  kept;  nor  is  it  probable 
that,  so  long  as  its  present  excellent  management  continues, 
any  weapon,  offensive  or  defensive,  will  ever  be  required 
within  its  bounds. 

Such  are  the  Institutions  at  South  Boston !  In  all  of 
them,  the  unfortunate  or  degenerate  citizens  of  the  State 
are  carefully  instructed  in  their  duties  both  to  God  and 
man;  are  surrounded  by  all  reasonable  means  of  comfort 
and  happiness  that  their  condition  will  admit  of;  are  ap- 
pealed to,  as  members  of  the  great  human  family,  however 
afflicted,  indigent,  or  fallen;  are  ruled  by  the  strong  Heart, 
and  not  by  the  strong  (though  immeasurably  weaker)  Hand. 
I  have  described  them  at  some  length :  firstly,  because  their 
worth  demanded  it;  and  secondly,  because  I  mean  to  take 
them  for  a  model,  and  to  content  myself  with  saying  of 
others  we  may  come  to,  whose  design  and  purpose  are  the 
same,  that  in  this  or  that  respect  they  practically  fail,  or 
differ. 

I  wish  by  this  account  of  them,  imperfect  in  its  execu- 
tion, but  in  its  just  intention,  honest,  I  could  hope  to  con- 
vey to  my  readers  one-hundredth  part  of  the  gratification, 
the  sights  I  have  d-escribed,  afforded  me. 

To  an  Englishman,  accustomed  to  the  paraphernalia  of 
Westminster  Hall,  an  American  Court  of  Law  is  as  odd  a 
sight  as,  I  suppose,  an  English  Court  of  Law  would  be  to  an 
American.  Except  in  the  Supreme  Court  at  Washington 
(where  the  judges  wear  a  plain  black  robe),  there  is  no 
such  thing  as  a  wig  or  gown  connected  with  the  administra- 
tion of  justice.  The  gentlemen  of  the  bar  being  barristers 
and  attorneys  too  (for  there  is  no  division  of  those  functions 
as  in  England)  are  no  more  removed  from  their  clients  than 
attorneys  in  our  Court  for  the  Relief  of  Insolvent  Debtors 


54  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

are,  from  theirs.  The  jury  are  quite  at  home,  and  make 
themselves  as  comfortable  as  circumstances  will  permit. 
The  witness  is  so  little  elevated  above,  or  put  aloof  from, 
the  crowd  in  the  court,  that  a  stranger  entering  during  a 
pause  in  the  proceedings  would  find  it  difficult  to  pick  him 
out  from  the  rest.  And  if  it  chanced  to  be  a  criminal  trial, 
his  eyes,  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten,  would  wander  to  the  dock 
in  search  of  the  prisoner,  in  vain ;  for  that  gentleman  would 
most  likely  be  lounging  among  the  most  distinguished  orna- 
ments of  the  legal  profession,  whispering  suggestions  in 
his  counsel's  ear,  or  making  a  toothpick  out  of  an  old  quill 
with  his  penknife. 

I  could  not  but  notice  these  differences,  when  I  visited 
the  courts  at  Boston.  I  was  much  surprised  at  first,  too, 
to  observe  that  the  counsel  who  interrogated  the  witness 
under  examination  at  the  time,  did  so  sitting.  But  seeing 
that  he  was  also  occupied  in  writing  down  the  answers,  and 
remembering  that  he  was  alone  and  had  no  "junior,"  I 
quickly  consoled  myself  with  the  reflection  that  law  was 
not  quite  so  expensive  an  article  here,  as  at  home;  and  that 
the  absence  of  sundry  formalities  which  we  regard  as  indis- 
pensable, had  doubtless  a  very  favourable  influence  upon 
the  bill  of  costs. 

In  every  Court,  ample  and  commodious  provision  is  made 
for  the  accommodation  of  the  citizens.  This  is  the  case  all 
through  America.  In  every  Public  Institution,  the  right  of 
the  people  to  attend,  and  to  have  an  interest  in  the  pro- 
ceedings, is  most  fully  and  distinctly  recognised.  There 
are  no  grim  doorkeepers  to  dole  out  their  tardy  civility  by 
the  sixpenny  worth;  nor  is  there,  I  sincerely  believe,  any 
insolence  of  office  of  any  kind.  Nothing  national  is  exhib- 
ited for  money;  and  no  public  officer  is  a  showman.  We 
have  begun  of  late  years  to  imitate  this  good  example.  I 
hope  we  shall  continue  to  do  so;  and  that  in  the  fulness  of 
time,  even  deans  and  chapters  may  be  converted. 

In  the  civil  court  an  action  was  trying,  for  damages  sus- 
tained in  some  accident  upon  a  railway.  The  witnesses 
had  been  examined,  and  counsel  was  addressing  the  jury. 
The  learned  gentleman  (like  a  few*  of  his  English  brethren) 
was  desperately  long-winded,  and  had  a  remarkable  capac- 
ity of  saying  the  same  thing  over  and  over  again.  His 
great  theme  was  "  Warren  the  Engine  driver,"  whom  he 
pressed  into  the  service  of  every  sentence  he  uttered.     I 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  55 

listened  to  him  for  about  a  quarter  of  an  hour;  and,  com- 
ing out  of  court  at  the  expiration  of  that  time,  without  the 
faintest  ray  of  enlightenment  as  to  the  merits  of  the  case, 
felt  as  if  I  were  at  home  again. 

In  the  prisoner's  cell,  waiting  to  be  examined  by  the 
magistrate  on  a  charge  of  theft,  was  a  boy.  This  lad,  in- 
stead of  being  committed  to  a  common  jail,  would  be  sent 
to  the  asylum  at  South  Boston,  and  there  taught  a  trade; 
and  in  the  course  of  time  he  would  be  bound  apprentice  to 
some  respectable  master.  Thus,  his  detection  in  this  of- 
fence, instead  of  being  the  prelude  to  a  life  of  infamy  and 
a  miserable  death,  would  lead,  there  was  a  reasonable  hope, 
to  his  being  reclaimed  from  vice,  and  becoming  a  worthy 
member  of  society. 

I  am  by  no  means  a  wholesale  admirer  of  our  legal  solem- 
nities, many  of  which  impress  me  as  being  exceedingly  lu- 
dicrous. Strange  as  it  may  seem  too,  there  is  undoubtedly 
a  degree  of  protection  in  the  wig  and  gown — a  dismissal  of 
individual  responsibility  in  dressing  for  the  part — which 
encourages  that  insolent  bearing  and  language,  and  that 
gross  perversion  of  the  office  of  a  pleader  for  The  Truth,  so 
frequent  in  our  courts  of  law.  Still,  I  cannot  help  doubt- 
ing whether  America,  in  her  desire  to  shake  off  the  absurd- 
ities and  abuses  of  the  old  system,  may  not  have  gone  too 
far  into  the  opposite  extreme;  and  whether  it  is  not  desir- 
able, especially  in  the  small  community  of  a  city  like  this, 
where  each  man  knows  the  other,  to  surround  the  adminis- 
tration of  justice  with  some  artificial  barriers  against  the 
"  Hail  fellow,  well  met "  deportment  of  everyday  life.  All 
the  aid  it  can  have  in  the  very  high  character  and  ability 
of  the  Bench,  not  only  here  but  elsewhere,  it  has,  and  well 
deserves  to  have;  but  it  may  need  something  more:  not  to 
impress  the  thoughtful  and  the  well-informed,  but  the  ig- 
norant and  heedless;  a  class  which  includes  some  prisoners 
and  many  witnesses.  These  institutions  were  established, 
no  doubt,  upon  the  principle  that  those  who  had  so  large 
a  share  in  making  the  laws,  would  certainly  respect  them. 
But  experience  has  proved  this  hope  to  be  fallacious;  for  no 
men  know  better  than  the  Judges  of  America,  that  on  the 
occasion  of  any  great  popular  excitement  the  law  is  power- 
less, and  cannot,  for  the  time,  assert  its  own  supremacy. 

The  tone  of  society  in  Boston  is  one  of  perfect  politeness, 
courtesy,  and  good  breeding.     The  ladies  are  unquestior- 


66  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

ably  very  beautiful — in  face :  but  there  I  am  compelled  to 
stop.  Their  education  is  much  as  with  us;  neither  better 
nor  worse.  I  had  heard  some  very  marvellous  stories  in 
this  respect;  but  not  believing  them,  was  not  disappointed. 
Blue  ladies  there  are,  in  Boston;  but  like  philosophers  of 
that  colour  and  sex  in  most  other  latitudes,  they  rather  de- 
sire to  be  thought  superior  than  to  be  so.  Evangelical  la- 
dies there  are,  likewise,  whose  attachment  to  the  forms  of 
religion,  and  horror  of  theatrical  entertainments,  are  most 
exemplary.  Ladies  who  have  a  passion  for  attending  lec- 
tures are  to  be  found  among  all  classes  and  all  conditions. 
In  the  kind  of  provincial  life  which  prevails  in  cities  such 
as  this,  the  Pulpit  has  great  influence.  The  peculiar  prov- 
ince of  the  Pulpit  in  New  England  (always  excepting  the 
Unitarian  ministry)  would  appear  to  be  the  denouncement 
of  all  innocent  and  rational  amusements.  The  church,  the 
chapel,  and  the  lecture-room,  are  the  only  means  of  excite- 
ment excepted;  and  to  the  church,  the  chapel,  and  the  lec- 
ture-room, the  ladies  resort  in  crowds. 

Wherever  religion  is  resorted  to,  as  a  strong  drink,  and 
as  an  escape  from  the  dull  monotonous  round  of  home, 
those  of  its  ministers  who  pepper  the  highest  will  be  the 
surest  to  please.  They  who  strew  the  Eternal  Path  with 
the  greatest  amount  of  brimstone,  and  who  most  ruthlessly 
tread  down  the  flowers  and  leaves  that  grow  by  the  way- 
side, will  be  voted  the  most  righteous;  and  they  who  en- 
large with  the  greatest  pertinacity  on  the  difficulty  of  get- 
ting into  Heaven,  will  be  considered  by  all  true  believers 
certain  of  going  there :  though  it  would  be  hard  to  say  by 
what  process  of  reasoning  this  conclusion  is  arrived  at.  It 
is  so  at  home,  and  it  is  so  abroad.  With  regard  to  the 
other  means  of  excitement,  the  Lecture,  it  has  at  least  the 
merit  of  being  always  new.  One  lecture  treads  so  quickly 
on  the  heels  of  another,  that  none  are  remembered;  and 
the  course  of  this  month  may  be  safely  repeated  next,  with 
its  charm  of  novelty  unbroken,  and  its  interest  unabated. 

The  fruits  of  the  earth  have  their  growth  in  corruption. 
Out  of  the  rottenness  of  these  things,  there  has  sprung  up 
in  Boston  a  sect  of  philosophers  known  as  Transcendental- 
ists.  On  inquiring  what  this  appellation  might  be  supposed 
to  signify,  I  was  given  to  understand  that  whatever  was 
unintelligible  would  be  certainly  transcendental.  Not  de- 
riving much  comfort  from  this  elucidation,  I  pursued  the 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  57 

inquiry  still  further,  and.  found'that  the  Transcendentalists 
are  followers  of  my  friend  Mr.  Carlyle,  or  I  should  rather 
say,  of  a  follower  of  his,  Mr.  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson.  This 
gentleman  has  written  a  volume  of  Essays,  in  which, 
among  much  that  is  dreamy  and  fanciful  (if  he  will  pardon 
ine  for  saying  so),  there  is  much  more  that  is  true  and 
manly,  honest  and  bold.  Transcendentalism  has  its  occa- 
sional vagaries  (what  school  has  not?),  but  it  has  good 
healthful  qualities  in  spite  of  them;  not  least  among  the 
number  a  hearty  disgust  of  Cant,  and  an  aptitude  to  detect 
her  in  all  the  million  varieties  of  her  everlasting  wardrobe. 
And  therefore  if  I  were  a  Boston  ian,  I  think  I  would  be  a 
Transcendentalist. 

The  only  preacher  I  heard  in  Boston  was  Mr.  Taylor, 
who  addresses  himself  peculiarly  to  seamen,  and  who  was 
once  a  mariner  liimself.  I  found  his  chapel  down  among 
the  shipping,  in  one  of  the  narrow,  old,  waterside  sti"eets, 
with  a  gay  blue  flag  waving  freely  from  its  roof.  In  the 
gallery  opposite  to  the  pulpit  were  a  little  choir  of  male 
and  female  singers,  a  violoncello,  and  a  violin.  The 
preacher  already  sat  in  the  pulpit,  which  was  raised  on 
pillars,  and  ornamented  benmd  him  with  painted  drapery 
of  a  lively  and  somewhat  theatrical  appearance.  He  looked 
a  weather-beaten  hard-featured  man,  of  about  six  or  eight- 
and-fift}-;  with  deep  lines  graven  as  it  were  into  his  face, 
dark  hair,  and  a  stern,  keen  eye.  Yet  the  general  char- 
acter of  his  countenance  was  pleasant  and  agreeable.  The 
ser\dce  commenced  with  a  hymn,  to  which  succeeded  an 
extemporary  prayer.  It  had  the  fault  of  frequent  repeti- 
tion, incidental  to  all  such  prayers;  but  it  was  plain  and 
comprehensive  in  its  doctrines,  and  breathed  a  tone  of  gen- 
eral sympathy  and  charity,  which  is  not  so  commonly  a 
characteristic  of  this  form  of  address  to  the  Deity  as  it 
might  be.  That  done  he  opened  his  discourse,  taking  for 
his  text  a  passage  from  the  Song  of  Solomon,  laid  upon  the 
desk  before  the  commencement  of  the  service  by  some  un- 
known member  of  the  congregation :  "  Who  is  this  coming 
up  from  the  wilderness,  leaning  on  the  arm  of  her  Be- 
loved!" 

He  handled  his  text  in  all  kinds  of  ways,  and  twisted  it 
into  all  manner  of  shapes;  but  always  ingeniously,  and 
with  a  rude  eloquence,  well  adapted  to  the  comprehension 
of  his  hearers.     Indeed  if  I  be  not  mistaken,  he  studied 


58  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

their  sympathies  aud  understandings  much  more  than  the 
display  of  his  own  powers.  His  imagery  was  all  drawn 
from  the  sea,  and  from  the  incidents  of  a  seaman's  life; 
and  was  often  remarkably  good.  He  spoke  to  them  of 
"that  glorious  man,  Lord  Nelson,"  and  of  Collingwood; 
and  drew  nothing  in,  as  the  saying  is,  by  the  head  and 
shoulders,  but  brought  it  to  bear  upon  his  purpose,  natu- 
rally, and  with  a  sharp  mind  to  its  elfect.  Sometimes,  when 
much  excited  with  his  subject,  he  had  an  odd  way — com- 
pounded of  John  Bunyan,  and  Balfour  of  Burley — of  tak- 
ing his  great  quarto  Bible  under  his  arm  and  pacing  up  and 
down  the  pulpit  with  it;  looking  steadily  down,  meantime, 
into  the  midst  of  the  congregation.  Thus,  when  he  applied 
his  text  to  the  first  assemblage  of  his  hearers,  and  pictured 
the  wonder  of  the  Church  at  their  presumption  in  forming 
a  congregation  among  themselves,  he  stopped  short  with 
his  Bible  under  his  arm  in  the  manner  I  have  described, 
and  pursued  his  discourse  after  this  manner : 

"  Who  are  these — who  are  they — who  are  these  fellows? 
where  do  they  come  from?  Where  are  they  going  to? 
—  Come  from !  What's  the  answer?  "  —  leaning  out  of 
the  pulpit,  and  pointing  downward  with  his  right  hand: 
"From  below!"  —  starting  back  again,  and  looking  at 
the  sailors  before  him:  "From  below,  my  brethren. 
From  under  the  hatches  of  sin,  battened  down  above  you 
by  the  Evil  One.  That's  where  you  came  from!"  —  a 
walk  up  and  down  the  pulpit :  "  and  where  are  you  going  " 
— stopping  abruptly:  "where  are  you  going?  Aloft!" — 
very  softly,  and  pointing  upward :  "  Aloft ! "  —  louder : 
"aloft!"  —  louder  still:  "That's  where  you  are  going — 
with  a  fair  wind, — all  taut  and  trim,  steering  direct  for 
Heaven  in  its  glory,  w^here  there  are  no  storms  or  foul 
weather,  and  where  the  wicked  cease  from  troubling,  and 
the  weary  are  at  rest." — Another  walk:  "That's  where 
you're  going  to,  my  friends.  That's  it.  That's  the  place. 
That's  the  port.  That's  the  haven.  It's  a  blessed  har- 
bour—still water  there,  in  all  changes  of  the  winds  and 
tides;  no  driving  ashore  upon  the  rocks,  or  slipping 
your  cables  and  running  out  to  sea,  there:  Peace — Peace 
— Peace — all  peace !  "  —  Another  walk,  and  patting  the 
Bible  under  his  left  arm:  "What!  These  fellows  are 
coming  from  the  wilderness,  are  they?  Yes.  From  the 
dreary,  blighted  wilderness  of  Iniquity,  whose  only  crop  is 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  59 

Death.  But  do  they  lean  upon  anything — do  they  lean 
upon  nothing,  these  poor  seamen?  " — Three  raps  upon  the 
Bible:  "Oh  yes. — Yes. — They  lean  upon  the  arm  of  their 
Beloved  " — three  more  raps :  "  upon  the  arm  of  their  Be- 
loved " — three  more,  and  a  walk :  "  Pilot,  guiding-star,  and 
compass,  all  in  one,  to  all  hands — here  it  is  " — three  more : 
"Here  it  is.  They  can  do  their  seaman's  duty  manfully, 
and  be  easy  in  their  minds  in  the  utmost  peril  and  danger, 
with  this  " — two  more :  "  They  can  come,  even  these  poor 
fellows  can  come,  from  the  wilderness  leaning  on  the  arm 
of  their  Beloved,  and  go  up — up — up ! " — raising  his  hand 
higher,  and  higher,  at  every  repetition  of  the  word,  so  that 
he  stood  with  it  at  last  stretched  above  his  head,  regarding 
them  in  a  strange,  rapt  manner,  and  pressing  the  book  tri- 
umphantly to  his  breast,  until  he  gradually  subsided  into 
some  other  portion  of  his  discourse. 

I  have  cited  this,  rather  as  an  instance  of  the  preacher's 
eccentricities  than  his  merits,  though  taken  in  connection 
with  his  look  and  manner,  and  the  character  of  his  audi- 
ence, even  this  was  striking.  It  is  possible,  however,  that 
my  favourable  impression  of  him  nT^y  have  been  greatly 
influenced  and  strengthened,  firstly,  by  his  impressing 
upon  his  hearers  that  the  true  observance  of  religion  was 
not  inconsistent  with  a  cheerful  deportment  and  an  exact 
discharge  of  the  duties  of  their  station,  which,  indeed,  it 
scrupulously  required  of  them;  and  secondly,  by  his  cau- 
tioning them  not  to  set  up  any  monopoly  in  Paradise  and 
its  mercies.  I  never  heard  these  two  points  so  wisely 
touched  (if  indeed  I  have  ever  heard  them  touched  at  all), 
by  any  preacher  of  that  kind  before. 

Having  passed  the  time  I  spent  in  Boston,  in  making 
myself  acquainted  with  these  things,  in  settling  the  course 
I  should  take  in  my  future  travels,  and  in  mixing  constantly 
vrith.  its  society,  I  am  not  aware  that  I  have  any  occasion 
to  prolong  this  chapter.  Such  of  its  social  customs  as  I 
have  not  mentioned,  however,  may  be  told  in  a  very  few 
words. 

The  usual  dinner-hour  is  two  o'clock.  A  dinner  party 
takes  place  at  five;  and  at  an  evening  party,  they  seldom 
sup  later  than  eleven;  so  that  it  goes  hard  but  one  gets 
home,  even  from  a  rout,  by  midnight.  I  never  could  find 
out  any  difference  between  a  party  at  Boston  and  a  party 
in  London,  saving  that  at  the  former  place  all  assemblies 


60  AMERICAN   NOTES. 

are  held  at  more  rational  hours;  that  the  conversation  may 
possibly  be  a  little  louder  and  more  cheerful;  that  a  guest 
is  usually  expected  to  ascend  to  the  very  top  of  the  house 
to  take  his  cloak  off;  that  he  is  certain  to  see,  at  every 
dinner,  an  unusual  amount  of  poultry  on  the  table;  and  at 
every  supper,  at  least  two  mighty  bowls  of  hot  stewed  oys- 
ters, in  any  one  of  which  a  half-grown  Duke  of  Clarence 
might  be  smothered  easily. 

There  are  two  theatres  in  Boston,  of  good  size  and  con- 
struction, but  sadly  in  want  of  patronage.  The  few  ladies 
who  resort  to  them,  sit,  as  of  right,  in  the  front  rows  of 
the  boxes. 

There  is  no  smoking-room  in  any  hotel,  and  there  was 
none  consequently  in  ours;  but  the  bar  is  a  large  room  with 
a  stone  floor,  and  there  people  stand  and  smoke,  and  lounge 
about,  all  the  evening :  dropping  in  and  out  as  the  humour 
takes  them.  There  too  the  stranger  is  initiated  into  the 
mysteries  of  Gin-sling,  Cocktail,  Sangaree,  Mint  Julep, 
Sherry-cobbler,  Timber  Doodle,  and  other  rare  drinks. 
The  house  is  full  of  boarders,  both  married  and  single, 
many  of  whom  sleep  upon  the  premises,  and  contract  by 
the  week  for  their  board  and  lodging :  tlie  charge  for  which 
diminishes  as  tliey  go  nearer  the  sky  to  roost.  A  public 
table  is  laid  in  a  very  handsome  hall  for  breakfast,  and  for 
dinner,  and  for  supper.  The  party  sitting  down  together 
to  these  meals  will  vary  in  number  from  one  to  two  hun- 
dred :  sometimes  move.  The  advent  of  each  of  these  epochs 
in  the  day  is  proclaimed  by  an  awful  gong,  which  shakes 
the  very  window-frames  as  it  reverberates  throiigh  the 
house,  and  horribly  disturbs  nervous  foreigners.  There  is 
an  ordinary  for  ladies,  and  an  ordinary  for  gentlemen. 

In  our  private  room  the  cloth  could  not,  for  any  earthly 
consideration,  have  been  laid  for  dinner  without  a  huge 
glass  dish  of  cranberries  in  the  middle  of  the  table;  and 
breakfast  would  have  been  no  breakfast  unless  the  principal 
dish  were  a  deformed  beefsteak  with  a  great  fiat  bone  in 
the  centre,  swimming  in  hot  butter,  and  sprinkled  with  the 
very  blackest  of  all  possible  pep})er.  Our  bedroom  was 
spacious  and  airy,  but  (like  every  bedroom  on  this  side  of 
the  Atlantic)  very  bare  of  furniture,  having  no  curtains  to 
the  French  bedstead  or  to  the  window.  It  had  one  unusual 
luxury,  however,  in  the  shape  of  a  wardrobe  of  painted 
wood,  something  smaller  than  an  English  watch-box :  or  if 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  61 

this  comparison  should  be  insufficient  to  convey  a  just  idea 
of  its  dimensions,  they  may  be  estimated  from  the  fact  of 
my  having  lived  for  fourteen  days  and  nights  in  the  firm 
belief  that  it  was  a  shower-bath. 


CHAPTER    THE    FOURTH. 

AN  AMERICAN  RAILROAD— LOWELL  AND  ITS 
FACTORY  SYSTEM. 

Before  leaving  Boston,  I  devoted  one  day  to  an  excur- 
sion to  Lowell.  I  assign  a  separate  chapter  to  this  visit; 
not  because  I  am  about  to  describe  it  at  any  great  length, 
but  because  I  remember  it  as  a  thing  by  itself,  and  am  de- 
sirous that  my  readers  should  do  the  same. 

I  made  acquaintance  with  an  American  railroad,  on  this 
occasion,  for  the  first  time.  As  these  work?  are  pretty 
much  alike  all  through  the  States,  their  general  character- 
istics are  easily  described. 

There  are  no  first  and  second-class  carriages  as  with  us;» 
but  there  is  a  gentlemen's  car  and  a  ladies'  car;  the  main 
distinction  between  which  is  that  in  the  first,  everybody 
smokes;  and  in  the  second,  nobody  does  As  a  black  man 
never  travels  with  a  white  one,  there  is  also  a  negro  car; 
which  is  a  great  blundering  clumsy  chest,  such  as  Gulliver 
put  to  sea  in,  from  the  kingdom  of  Brobdingnag.  There  is 
a  great  deal  of  jolting,  a  great  deal  of  noise,  a  great  deal 
of  wall,  not  much  window,  a  locomotive  engine,  a  shriek, 
and  a  bell. 

The  cars  are  like  shabby  omnibuses,  but  larger :  holding 
thirty,  forty,  fifty  people.  The  seats,  instead  of  stretch- 
ing from  end  to  end,  are  placed  crosswise.  Each  seat  holds 
two  persons.  There  is  a  long  row  of  them  on  each  side  of 
the  caravan,  a  narrow  passage  up  the  middle,  and  a  door 
at  both  ends.  In  the  centre  of  the  carriage  there  is  usually 
a  stove,  fed  with  charcoal  or  anthracite  coal ;  which  is  for 
the  most  part  red-hot.  It  is  insufferably  close;  and  you 
see  the  hot  air  fluttering  between  yourself  and  any  other 
object  you  may  happen  to  look  at,  like  the  ghost  of  smoke. 

In  the  ladies'  car,  there  are  a  great  many  gentlemen  who 


62  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

have  ladies  with  them.  There  are  also  a  great  many  ladies 
who  have  nobody  with  them;  for  any  lady  may  travel 
alone,  from  one  end  of  the  United  States  to  the  other,  and 
be  certain  of  the  most  courteous  and  considerate  treatment 
everywhere.  The  conductor  or  check-taker,  or  guard,  or 
whatever  he  may  be,  wears  no  uniform.  He  walks  up  and 
down  the  car,  and  in  and  out  of  it,  as  his  fancy  dictates; 
leans  against  the  door  with  his  hands  in  his  pockets  and 
stares  at  you,  if  you  chance  to  be  a  stranger;  or  enters  into 
conversation  with  the  passengers  about  him.  A  great 
many  newspapers  are  pulled  out,  and  a  few  of  them  are 
read.  Everybody  talks  to  you,  or  to  anybody  else  who 
hits  his  fancy.  If  you  are  an  Englishman,  he  expects  that 
that  railroad  is  pretty  much  like  an  English  railroad.  If 
you  say  "No,"  he  says  "  Yes?  "  (interrogatively),  and  asks 
in  what  respect  they  differ.  You  enumerate  the  heads  of 
difference,  one  by  one,  and  he  says  "Yes?"  (still  interrog- 
atively) to  each.  Then  he  guesses  that  you  don't  travel 
faster  in  England;  and  on  your  replying  tliat  you  do,  says 
"  Yes?  "  again  (still  interrogatively),  and,  it  is  quite  evi- 
dent, don't  believe  it.  After  a  long  pause  he  remarks, 
partly  to  you,  and  partly  to  the  knob  on  the  top  of  his 
stick,  that  "  Yankees  are  reckoned  to  be  considerable  of  a 
go-ahead  people  too;"  upon  which  you  say  "Yes,"  and 
then  he  says  "Yes"  again  (affirmatively  this  time);  and 
upon  your  looking  out  of  window,  tells  you  that  behind 
that  hill,  and  some  three  miles  from  the  next  station,  there 
is  a  clever  town  in  a  smart  lo-ca-tion,  where  he  expects  you 
have  con-eluded  to  stop.  Your  answer  in  the  negative  nat- 
urally leads  to  more  questions  in  reference  to  your  intended 
route  (always  pronounced  rout);  and  wherever  you  are  go- 
ing, you  invariably  learn  that  you  can't  get  there  without 
immense  difficulty  and  danger,  and  that  all  the  great  sights 
are  somewhere  else. 

If  a  lady  take  a  fancy  to  any  male  passenger's  seat,  the 
gentleman  who  accompanies  her  gives  him  notice  of  the 
fact,  and  he  immediately  vacates  it  with  great  politeness. 
Politics  are  much  discussed,  so  are  banks,  so  is  cotton. 
Quiet  people  avoid  the  question  of  the  Presidency,  for  there 
will  be  a  new  election  in  three  years  and  a  half,  and  party 
feeling  runs  very  high :  the  great  constitutional  feature  of 
this  institution  being,  that  directly  the  acrimony  of  the  last 
election  is  over,  the   acrimony  of  the  next  one  begins; 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  68 

which  is  an  unspeakable  comfort  to  all  strong  politicians 
and  true  lovers  of  their  country :  that  is  to  say,  to  ninety- 
nine  men  and  boys  out  of  every  ninety-nine  and  a  quarter. 

Except  when  a  branch  road  joins  the  main  one,  there  is 
seldom  more  than  one  track  of  rails;  so  that  the  road  is 
very  narrow,  and  the  view,  where  there  is  a  deep  cutting, 
by  no  means  extensive.  When  there  is  not,  the  character 
of  the  scenery  is  always  the  same.  Mile  after  mile  of 
stunted  trees :  some  hewn  down  by  the  axe,  some  blown 
down  by  the  wind,  some  half  fallen  and  resting  on  their 
neighbours,  many  mere  logs  half  hidden  in  the  swamp, 
others  mouldered  away  to  spongy  chips.  The  very  soil  of 
the  earth  is  made  up  of  minute  fragments  such  as  these; 
each  pool  of  stagnant  water  has  its  crust  of  vegetable  rot- 
tenness; on  every  side  there  are  the  boughs,  and  trunks, 
and  stumps  of  trees,  in  every  possible  stage  of  decay,  de- 
composition, and  neglect.  Now  you  emerge  for  a  few  brief 
minutes  on  an  open  country,  glittering  with  some  bright 
lake  or  pool,  broad  as  many  an  English  river,  but  so  small 
here  that  it  scarcely  has  a  name;  now  catch  hasty  glimpses 
of  a  distant  town,  with  its  clean  white  houses  and  their  cool 
piazzas,  its  prim  New  England  church  and  schoolhouse; 
when  whir-r-r-r!  almost  before  you  have  seen  them,  comes 
the  same  dark  screen :  the  stunted  trees,  the  stumps,  the 
logs,  the  stagnant  water — all  so  like  the  last  that  you  seem 
to  have  been  transported  back  again  by  magic. 

The  train  calls  at  stations  in  the  woods,  where  the  wild 
impossibility  of  anybody  having  the  smallest  reason  to  get 
out,  is  only  to  be  equalled  by  the  apparently  desperate 
hopelessness  of  there  being  anybody  to  get  in.  It  rushes 
across  the  turnpike  road,  where  there  is  no  gate,  no  police- 
man, no  signal:  nothing  but  a  rough  wooden  arch,  on 
which  is  painted  "  When  the  bell  rings,  look  out  for 
THE  Locomotive."  On  it  whirls  headlong,  dives  through 
the  woods  again,  emerges  in  the  light,  clatters  over  frail 
arches,  rumbles  upon  the  heavy  ground,  shoots  beneath  a 
wooden  bridge  which  intercepts  the  light  for  a  second  like 
a  wink,  suddenly  awakens  all  tlie  slumbering  echoes  in  the 
main  street  of  a  large  town,  and  dashes  on  haphazard,  pell- 
mell,  neck-or-nothing,  down  the  middle  of  the  road.  There 
—with  mechanics  working  at  their  trades,  and  people  lean- 
ing from  their  doors  and  windows,  and  boys  flying  kites 
and  playing  marbles,  and  men  smoking,  and  women  talk- 


64  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

ing,  and  children  crawling,  and  pigs  burrowing,  and  unac- 
customed horses  plunging  and  rearing,  close  to  the  very- 
rails — there — on,  on,  on — tears  the  mad  dragon  of  an  en- 
gine with  its  train  of  cars;  scattering  in  all  directions  a 
shower  of  burning  sparks  from  its  wood  fire;  screeching, 
hissing,  yelling,  panting;  until  at  last  the  thirsty  monster 
stops  beneath  a  covered  way  to  drink,  the  people  cluster 
round,  and  you  have  time  to  breathe  again. 

I  was  met  at  the  station  at  Lowell  by  a  gentleman  inti- 
mately connected  with  the  management  of  the  factories 
there;  and  gladly  putting  myself  under  his  guidance,  drove 
off  at  once  to  that  quarter  of  the  town  in  which  the  works, 
the  object  of  my  visit,  were  situated.  Although  only  just 
of  age — for  if  my  recollection  serve  me,  it  has  been  a  man- 
ufacturing town  barely  one-and-twenty  years — Lowell  is  a 
large,  populous,  thriving  place.  Those  indications  of  its 
youth  which  first  attract  the  eye,  give  it  a  quaintness  and 
oddity  of  character  which,  to  a  visitor  from  the  old  coun- 
tr}-,  is  amusing  enough.  It  was  a  very  dirty  winter's  day, 
and  nothing  in  the  whole  town  looked  old  to  me,  except  the 
mud,  which  in  some  parts  was  almost  knee-deep,  and  might 
have  been  deposited  there,  on  the  subsiding  of  the  waters 
after  the  Deluge.  In  one  place,  there  was  a  new  wooden 
church,  which,  having  no  steeple,  and  being  j-et  unpainted, 
looked  like  an  enormous  packing-case  without  any  direction 
upon  it.  In  another  there  was  a  large  hotel,  whose  walls 
and  colonnades  were  so  crisp,  and  thin,  and  light,  that  it 
had  exactly  the  appearance  of  being  built  v/ith  cards.  I 
was  careful  not  to  draw  my  breath  as  we  passed,  and  trem- 
bled when  I  saw  a  workman  come  out  upon  the  roof,  lest 
with  one  thoughtless  stamp  of  his  foot  he  should  crush  the 
structure  beneath  him,  and  bring  it  rattling  down.  The 
very  river  that  moves  the  machinery  in  the  mills  (for  they 
are  all  worked  by  water  power),  seems  to  acquire  a  new 
character  from  the  fresh  buildings  of  bright  red  brick  and 
painted  wood  among  Avhich  it  takes  its  course;  and  to  be  as 
light-headed,  thoughtless,  and  brisk  a  young  river,  in  its 
murmurings  and  tumblings,  as  one  would  desire  to  see. 
One  would  swear  that  every  "Bakery,"  "Grocery,"  and 
"Book bindery,"  and  other  kind  of  store,  took  its  shutters 
down  for  the  first  time,  and  started  in  business  yesterday. 
The  golden  pestles  and  mortars  fixed  as  signs  upon  the  sun- 
blind  frames  outside  the  Druggists',  appear  to  have  been 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  66 

just  turned  out  of  the  United  States'  Mint;  and  when  I 
saw  a  baby  of  some  week  or  ten  days  old  in  a  woman's 
arms  at  a  street  corner,  I  found  myself  unconsciously  won- 
dering where  it  came  from :  never  supposing  for  an  instant 
that  it  could  have  been  born  in  such  a  young  town  as 
that. 

There  are  several  factories  in  Lowell,  each  of  which  be- 
longs to  what  we  should  term  a  Company  of  Proprietors, 
but  what  they  call  in  America  a  Corporation.  I  went  over 
several  of  these;  such  as  a  woollen  factory,  a  carpet  fac- 
tory, and  a  cotton  factory :  examined  them  in  every  part; 
and  saw  them  in  their  ordinary  working  aspect,  with  no 
preparation  of  any  kind,  or  departure  from  their  ordinary 
3very-day  proceedings.  I  may  add  that  I  am  well  ac- 
quainted with  our  manufacturing  towns  in  England,  and 
have  visited  many  mills  in  Manchester  and  elsewhere  in 
the  same  manner. 

I  happened  to  arrive  at  the  first  factory  just  as  the  din- 
ner hour  was  over,  and  the  girls  were  returning  to  their 
work;  indeed  the  stairs  of  the  mill  were  thronged  with 
them  as  I  ascended.  They  were  all  well  dressed,  but  not 
to  my  thinking  above  their  condition;  for  I  like  to  sge  the 
humbler  class  of  society  careful  of  their  dress  and  appear- 
ance, and  even,  if  they  please,  decorated  with  such  little 
trinkets  as  come  within  the  compass  of  their  means.  Sup- 
posing it  confined  within  reasonable  limits,  I  would  always 
encourage  this  kind  of  pride,  as  a  worthy  element  of  self- 
respect,  in  any  person  I  employed;  and  should  no  more  be 
deterred  from  doing  so,  because  some  wretched  female  re- 
ferred her  fall  to  a  love  of  dress,  than  I  would  allow  my 
construction  of  the  real  intent  and  meaning  of  the  Sabbath 
to  be  influenced  by  any  warning  to  the  well-disposed, 
founded  on  his  backslidings  on  that  particular  day,  which 
might  emanate  from  the  rather  doubtful  authority  of  a 
murderer  in  Newgate. 

These  girls,  as  I  have  said,  were  all  well  dressed :  and 
that  phrase  necessarily  includes  extreme  cleanliness.  They 
had  serviceable  bonnets,  good  warm  cloaks,  and  shawls; 
and  were  not  above  clogs  and  pattens.  Moreover,  there 
were  places  in  the  mill  in  which  they  could  deposit  these 
things  without  injury;  and  tliere  were  conveniences  for 
washing.  They  were  healthy  in  appearance,  many  of  them 
remarkably  so,  and  had  the  manners  and  deportment  of 
5 


66  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

young  women:  not  of  degraded  brutes  of  burden  If  I 
had  seen  in  one  of  those  mills  (but  I  did  not,  though  I 
looked  for  something  of  this  kind  with  a  sharp  eye),  the 
most  lisping,  mincing,  affected,  and  ridiculous  young  creat- 
ure that  my  imagination  could  suggest,  I  should  have 
thought  of  the  careless,  moping,  slatternly,  degraded,  dull 
reverse  (I  have  seen  that),  and  should  have  been  still  well 
pleased  to  look  upon  her. 

The  rooms  in  which  they  worked,  were  as  well  ordered 
as  themselves.  In  the  windows  of  some,  there  were  green 
plants,  which  were  trained  to  shade  the  glass;  in  all,  there 
was  as  much  fresh  air,  cleanliness,  and  comfort,  as  the  na- 
ture of  the  occupation  would  possibly  admit  of.  Out  of  so 
large  a  number  of  females,  many  of  whom  were  only  then 
just  verging  upon  womanhood,  it  may  be  reasonably  sup- 
posed that  some  were  delicate  and  fragile  in  appearance : 
no  doubt  there  were.  But  I  solemnly  declare,  that  from 
all  the  crowd  I  saw  in  the  different  factories  that  day,  I 
cannot  recall  or  separate  one  young  face  that  gave  me  a 
painful  impression;  not  one  young  girl  whom,  assuming  it 
to  be  matter  of  necessity  that  she  should  gain  her  daily 
bread  by  the  labour  of  her  hands,  I  would  have  removed 
from  those  works  if  I  had  had  the  power. 

They  reside  in  various  boarding-houses  near  at  hand. 
The  ovmers  of  the  mills  are  particularly"  careful  to  allow 
no  persons  to  enter  upon  the  possession  of  these  houses, 
whose  characters  have  not  undergone  the  most  searching 
and  thorough  inquiry  Any  complaint  that  is  made  against 
them,  by  the  boarders,  or  by  any  one  else,  is  fully  inves- 
tigated; and  if  good  ground  of  complaint  be  shown  to  exist 
against  them,  they  are  removed,  and  their  occupation  is 
handed  over  to  some  more  deserving  person.  There  are  a 
few  children  employed  in  these  factories,  but  not  many. 
The  laws  of  the  State  forbid  their  working  more  than  nine 
months  in  the  year,  and  require  that  they  be  educated  dur- 
ing the  other  three.  For  this  purpose  there  are  schools  in 
Lowell;  and  there  are  churches  and  chapels  of  various  per- 
suasions, in  which  the  young  women  may  observe  that  form 
of  worship  in  which  they  have  been  educated. 

At  some  distance  from  the  factories,  and  on  the  highest 
and  pleasantest  ground  in  the  neighbourhood,  stands  their 
hospital,  or  boarding-house  for  the  sick :  it  is  the  best  house 
in  those  parts,  and  was  built  by  an  eminent  merchant  for 


AMERICAN  NOTES  67 

his  own  residence.  Like  that  institution  at  Boston  which 
I  have  before  described,  it  is  not  parcelled  out  into  wards, 
but  is  divided  into  convenient  chambers,  each  of  which  has 
all  the  comforts  of  a  very  comfortable  home.  The  princi- 
pal medical  attendant  resides  under  the  same  roof;  and 
were  the  patients  members  of  his  own  family,  they  could 
not  be  better  cared  for,  or  attended  with  greater  gentleness 
and  consideration.  The  weekly  charge  in  this  establish- 
ment for  each  female  patient  is  three  dollars,  or  twelve 
shillings  English;  but  no  girl  employed  by  any  of  the  cor- 
porations is  ever  excluded  for  want  of  the  means  of  pay- 
ment. That  they  do  not  very  often  want  the  means,  may 
be  gathered  from  the  fact,  that  in  July  1841  no  fewer  than 
nine  hundied  and  seventy-eight  of  these  girls  were  depos- 
itors in  the  Lowell  Savings  Bank :  the  amount  of  whose 
joint  savings  was  estimated  at  one  hundred  thousand  dol- 
lars, or  twenty  thousand  English  pounds. 

I  am  now  going  to  state  three  facts,  which  will  startle  a 
large  class  of  readers  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic,  very 
much. 

Firstly,  there  is  a  joint-stock  piano  in  a  great  many  of 
the  boarding-houses.  Secondly,  nearly  all  these  young  la- 
dies subscribe  to  circulating  libraries.  Thirdly,  they  have 
got  up  among  themselves  a  periodical  called  The  Lowell 
Offerixg,  "  A  repository  of  original  articles,  written  ex- 
clusively by  females  actively  employed  in  the  mills," — 
which  is  duly  printed,  published,  and  sold;  and  whereof  I 
brought  away  from  Lowell  four  hundred  good  solid  pages, 
which  I  have  read  from  beginning  to  end. 

The  large  class  of  readers,  startled  by  these  facts,  will 
exclaim,  with  one  voice,  "  How  very  preposterous !  "  On 
my  deferentially  inquiring  why,  they  will  answer,  "  These 
things  are  above  their  station."  In  reply  to  that  objection, 
I  would  beg  to  ask  what  their  sta,tion  is. 

It  is  their  station  to  work.  And  they  do  work.  They 
labour  in  these  mills,  upon  an  average,  twelve  hours  a  day, 
which  is  unquestionably  work,  and  pretty  tight  work  too. 
Perhaps  it  is  above  their  station  to  indulge  in  such  amuse- 
ments, on  any  terms.  Are  we  quite  sure  that  we  in  Eng- 
land have  not  formed  our  ideas  of  the  "  station  "  of  working 
people,  from  accustoming  ourselves  to  the  contemplation  of 
that  class  as  they  are,  and  not  as  they  might  be?  I  think 
that  if  we  examine  our  own  feelings,  we  shall  find  that  the 


68  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

pianos,  and  the  circulating  libraries,  and  even  the  Lowell 
Offering,  startle  us  by  their  novelty,  and  not  by  their  bear- 
ing upon  any  abstract  question  of  right  or  wrong. 

For  myself,  I  know  no  station  in  which,  the  occupation 
of  to-day  cheerfully  done  and  the  occupation  of  to-morrow 
cheerfully  looked  to,  any  one  of  these  pursuits  is  not  most 
humanizing  and  laudable.  I  know  no  station  which  is  ren- 
dered more  endurable  to  the  person  in  it,  or  more  safe  to 
the  person  out  of  it,  by  having  ignorance  for  its  associate. 
I  know  no  station  which  has  a  right  to  monopolize  the 
means  of  mutual  instruction,  improvement,  and  rational 
entertainment;  or  which  has  ever  continued  to  be  a  station 
very  long,  after  seeking  to  do  so. 

Of  the  merits  of  the  Lowell  Offering  as  a  literary  pro- 
duction, I  will  only  observe,  putting  entirely  out  of  sight 
the  fact  of  the  articles  having  been  written  by  these  girls 
after  the  arduous  labours  of  the  day,  that  it  will  compare 
advantageously  with  a  great  many  English  Annuals.  It  is 
pleasant  to  find  that  many  of  its  Tales  are  of  the  Mills  and 
of  those  who  work  in  them;  that  they  inculcate  habits  of 
self-denial  and  contentment,  and  teach  good  doctrines  of 
enlarged  benevolence.  A  strong  feeling  for  the  beauties 
of  nature,  as  displayed  in  the  solitudes  the  writers  have  left 
at  home,  breathes  through  its  pages  like  wholesome  village 
air;  and  tliough  a  circulating  library  is  a  favourable  school 
for  the  study  of  such  topics,  it  has  very  scant  allusion  to 
fine  clothes,  fine  marriages,  fine  houses,  or  fine  life.  Some 
persons  might  object  to  the  papers  being  signed  occasion- 
ally with  rather  fine  names,  but  this  is  an  American  fasli- 
ion.  One  of  the  provinces  of  the  State  Legislature  of  Mas- 
sachusetts is  to  alter  ugly  names  into  pretty  ones,  as  the 
children  improve  upon  the  tastes  of  their  parents.  These 
changes  costing  little  or  nothing,  scores  of  Mary  Annes  are 
solemnly  converted  into  Bevelinas  every  session. 

It  is  said  that  on  the  occasion  of  a  visit  from  General 
Jackson  or  General  Harrison  to  this  town  (I  forget  which, 
but  it  is  not  to  the  purpose),  he  walked  through  three 
miles  and  a  half  of  these  young  ladies,  all  dressed  ou.t  with 
parasols  and  silk  stockings.  But  as  I  am  not  aware  that 
any  worse  consequence  ensued,  than  a  sudden  ]ooking-up 
of  all  the  parasols  and  silk  stockings  in  the  market;  and 
perhaps  the  bankruptcy  of  some  speculative  New  Eng- 
lander  who  bought  them  all  up  at  any  price,  in  expectatior 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  69 

of  a  demand  that  never  came;  I  set  no  great  store  by  the 
circumstance. 

In  this  brief  account  of  Lowell,  and  inadequate  expres- 
sion of  the  gratification  it  yielded  me,  and '  cannot  fail  to 
afford  to  any  foreigner  to  whom  the  condition  of  such  peo- 
ple at  home  is  a  subject  of  interest  and  anxious  speculation, 
I  have  carefully  abstained  from  drawing  a  comparison  be- 
tween these  factories  and  those  of  our  own  land.  Many  of 
the  circumstances  wliose  strong  influence  has  been  at  work 
for  years  in  our  manufacturing  towns  have  not  arisen  here ; 
and  there  is  no  manufacturing  population  in  Lowell,  so  to 
speak :  for  these  girls  (often  the  daughters  of  small  farm- 
ers) come  from  other  States,  remain  a  few  years  in  the 
mills,  and  then  go  home  for  good. 

The  contrast  would  be  a  strong  one,  for  it  would  be  be- 
tween the  Good  and  Evil,  the  living  light  and  deepest 
shadow.  I  abstain  from  it,  because  I  deem  it  just  to  do  so. 
But  I  only  the  more  earnestly  abjure  all  those  whose  eyes 
may  rest  on  these  pages,  to  pause  and  reflect  upon  the  dif- 
ference between  this  town  and  those  great  haunts  of  des- 
perate misery:  to  call  to  mind,  if  they  can  in  the  midst  of 
party  strife  and  squabble,  the  efforts  that  must  be  made  to 
purge  them  of  their  suifering  and  danger:  and  last,  and 
foremost,  to  remembftr  how  the  precious  Time  is  rushing 

I  returned  at  night  by  the  same  railroad  and  in  the  same 
kind  of  car.  One  of  the  passengers  being  exceedingly  anx- 
ious to  expound  at  great  length  to  my  companion  (not  to 
me,  of  course)  the  true  principles  on  which  books  of  travel 
in  America  should  be  written  by  Englishmen,  I  feigned 
to  fall  asleep.  But  glancing  all  the  way  out  at  window 
from  the  corners  of  my  eyes,  I  found  abundance  of  enter- 
tainment for  the  rest  of  the  ride  in  watching  the  effects  of 
th?  wood  fire,  which  had  been  invisible  in  the  morning  but 
were  now  brought  out  in  full  relief  by  the  darkness :  for 
we  were  travelling  in  a  whirlwind  of  bright  sparks,  which 
showered  about  us  like  a  storm  of  fiery  snow. 


70  AMERICAN  NOTES. 


CHAPTER    THE    FIFTH. 

WORCESTER— THE    CONNECTICUT    RIVER— HARTFORD 
—NEW  HAVEN— TO  NEW  YORK. 

Leavikg  Boston  on  the  afternoon  of  Saturday  the  fifth 
of  February,  we  proceeded  by  another  railroad  to  Worces- 
ter :  a  pretty  New  England  town,  where  we  had  arranged 
to  remain  under  the  hospitable  roof  of  the  Governor  of  the 
State,  until  Monday  morning. 

These  towns  and  cities  of  New  England  (many  of  which 
would  be  villages  in  Old  England),  are  as  favourable  speci- 
mens of  rural  America,  as  their  people  are  of  rural  Ameri- 
cans. The  well- trimmed  lawns  and  green  meadows  of 
home  are  not  there;  and  the  grass,  compared  with  our  or- 
namental plots  and  pastures,  is  rank,  and  rough,  and  wild : 
but  delicate  slopes  of  land,  gently -swelling  hills,  wooded 
valleys,  and  slender  streams,  abound.  Every  little  colony 
of  houses  has  its  church  and  schoolhouse  peeping  from 
among  the  white  roofs  and  shady  trees;  every  house  is  the 
whitest  of  the  white;  every  Venetian  blind  the  greenest  of 
the  green;  every  fine  day's  sky  the  bluest  of  the  blue.  A 
sharp  dry  wind  and  a  slight  frost  had  so  hardened  the  roads 
when  we  alighted  at  Worcester,  that  their  furrowed  tracks 
were  like  ridges  of  granite.  There  was  the  usual  aspect  of 
newness  on  every  object,  of  course.  All  the  buildings 
looked  as  if  they  had  been  built  and  painted  that  morning, 
and  could  be  taken  down  on  Monday  with  very  lit,tle 
trouble.  In  the  keen  evening  air,  every  sharp  outline  looked 
a  hundred  times  sharper  than  ever.  The  clean  cardboard 
colonnades  had  no  more  perspective  than  a  Chinese  bridge 
on  a  teacup,  and  appeared  equally  well  calculated  for  use. 
The  razor-like  edges  of  the  detached  cottages  seemed  to  cut 
the  very  wind  as  it  whistled  against  them,  and  to  send  it 
smarting  on  its  way  with  a  shriller  cry  than  before.  Those 
slightly-built  wooden  dwellings  behind  which  the  sun  was 
setting  with  a  brilliant  lustre,  could  be  so  looked  through 
and  through,  that  the  idea  of  any  inhabitant  being  able  to 
hide  himself  from  the  public  gaze,  or  to  have  any  secrets 
from  the  public  eye^  was  not  entertainable  for  a  moment. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  71 

Even  where  a  blazing  fire  shone  througli  the  uncurtained 
window  of  some  distant  house,  it  had  the  air  of  being  newly 
lighted,  and  of  lacking  warmth ;  and  instead  of  awakening 
thoughts  of  a  snug  chamber,  bright  with  faces  that  first 
saw  the  light  round  that  same  hearth,  and  ruddy  with 
warm  hangings,  it  came  upon  one  suggestive  of  the  smell 
of  new  mortar  and  damp  walls 

So  I  thought,  at  least,  that  evening.  Next  morning 
when  the  sun  was  shining  brightly,  and  the  clear  church 
bells  were  ringing,  and  sedate  people  in  their  best  clothes 
enlivened  the  pathway  neai*  at  hand  and  dotted  the  distant 
thread  of  road,  there  was  a  pleasant  Sabbath  peacefulness 
on  everything,  which  it  was  good  to  feel.  It  would  have 
been  the  better  for  an  old  church;  better  still  for  some  old 
graves;  but  as  it  was,  a  wholesome  repose  and  tranquillity 
pervaded  the  scene,  which  after  the  restless  ocean  and  the 
hurried  city,  had  a  doubly  grateful  influence  on  the  spirits. 

We  went  on  next  morning,  still  by  railroad,  to  Spring- 
field. From  that  place  to  Hartford,  whither  we  were 
bound,  is  a  distance  of  only  five-and-twenty  miles,  but  at 
that  time  of  the  year  the  roads  were  so  bad  that  the  journey 
would  probably  have  occupied  ten  or  twelve  hours.  Fortu- 
nately, however,  the  winter  having  been  unusually  mild, 
the  Connecticut  River  was  "open,"  or,  in  other  words,  not 
frozen.  The  captain  of  a  small  steamboat  was  going  to 
make  his  first  trip  for  the  season  that  day  (the  second  Feb- 
ruary trip,  I  believe,  within  the  memory  of  man),  and  only 
waited  for  us  to  go  on  board.  Accordingly,  we  went  on 
board,  with  as  little  delay  as  might  be.  He  was  as  good 
as  his  word,  and  started  directly. 

It  certainly  was  not  called  a  small  steamboat  without 
reason.  I  omitted  to  ask  the  question,  but  I  should  think 
it  must  have  been  of  about  half  a  pony  power.  Mr.  Paap, 
the  celebrated  Dwarf,  might  have  lived  and  died  happily 
in  the  cabin,  which  was  fitted  with  common  sash-windows 
like  an  ordinary  dwelling-house.  These  windows  had 
bright  red  curtains,  too,  hung  on  slack  strings  across  the 
lower  panes;  so  that  it  looked  like  the  parlour  of  a  Lilli- 
putian public-house,  which  had  got  afloat  in  a  flood  or  some 
other  water  accident,  and  was  drifting  nobody  knew  where. 
But  even  in  this  chamber  there  was  a  rocking-chair.  It 
would  be  impossible  to  get  on  anywhere,  in  America,  with- 
out a  rocking-chair. 


72  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

I  am  afraid  to  tell  how  many  feet  short  this  vessel  was, 
or  how  many  feet  narrow :  to  apply  the  words  length  and 
width  to  such  measurement  would  be  a  contradiction  in 
terms.  But  I  may  state  that  we  all  kept  the  middle  of  the 
deck,  lest  the  boat  should  unexpectedly  tip  over;  and  that 
the  machinery,  by  some  surprising  process  of  condensation, 
worked  between  it  and  the  keel:  the  whole  forming  a 
warm  sandwich,  about  three  feet  thick. 

It  rained  all  day  as  I  once  thought  it  never  did  rain  any- 
where, but  in  the  Highlands  of  Scotland.  The  river  was 
full  of  floating  blocks  of  ice,  which  were  constantly  crunch- 
ing and  cracking  under  us;  and  the  depth  of  water,  in  the 
course  we  took  to  avoid  the  larger  masses,  carried  down  the 
middle  of  the  river  by  the  current,  did  not  exceed  a  few 
inches.  Nevertheless,  we  moved  onward,  dexterously;  and 
being  well  wrapped  up,  bade  defiance  to  the  weather,  and 
enjoyed,  the  journey.  The  Connecticut  River  is  a  fine 
stream;  and  the  banks  in  summer-time  are,  I  have  no 
doubt,  beautiful :  at  all  events,  I  was  told  so  by  a  young 
lady  in  the  cabin;  and  she  should  be  a  judge  of  beauty,  if 
the  possession  of  a  quality  include  the  appreciation  of  it, 
for  a  more  beautiful  creature  I  never  looked  upon. 

After  two  hours  and  a  half  of  this  odd  travelling  (in- 
cluding a  stoppage  at  a  small  town,  where  we  were  saluted 
by  a  gun  considerably  bigger  than  our  own  chimney),  we 
reached  Hartford,,  and  straightway  repaired  to  an  extremely 
comfortable  hotel :  except,  as  usual,  in  the  article  of  bed- 
rooms, which,  in  almost  every  place  we  visited,  were  very 
conducive  to  early  rising. 

We  tarried  here,  four  days.  The  town  is  beautifully  sit- 
uated in  a  basin  of  green  hills;  the  soil  is  rich,  well- wood- 
ed, and  carefully  improved.  It  is  the  seat  of  the  local 
legislature  of  Connecticut,  which  sage  body  enacted,  in  by- 
gone times,  the  renowned  code  of  "Blue  Laws,"  in  virtue 
whereof,  among  other  enlightened  provisions,  any  citizen 
who  could  be  proved  to  have  kissed  his  wife  on  Sunday, 
was  punishable,  I  believe,  with  the  stocks.  Too  much  of 
the  old  Puritan  spirit  exists  in  these  parts  to  the  present 
hour;  but  its  influence  has  not  tended,  that  I  know,  to 
make  the  people  less  hard  in  their  bargains,  or  more  equal 
in  their  dealings.  As  I  never  heard  of  its  working  that 
effect  anywhere  else,  I  infer  that  it  never  will,  here.  In- 
deed, I  am  accustomed,  with  reference  to  great  professions 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  73 

and  severe  faces,  to  judge  of  the  goods  of  the  other  world 
pretty  much  as  I  judge  of  the  goods  of  this;  and  whenever 
I  see  a  dealer  in  such  commodities  with  too  great  a  display 
of  them  in  his  window,  I  doubt  the  quality  of  the  article 
within. 

In  Hartford  stands  the  famous  oak  in  which  the  charter 
of  King  Charles  was  hidden.  It  is  now  inclosed  in  a  gen- 
tleman's garden.  In  the  State  House  is  the  charter  itself. 
I  found  the  courts  of  law  here,  just  the  same  as  at  Boston; 
the  public  Institutions  almost  as  good.  The  Insane  Asy- 
lum is  admirably  conducted,  and  so  is  the  Institution  for 
the  Deaf  and  Dumb. 

I  very  much  questioned  within  myself,  as  I  walked 
through  the  Insane  Asylum,  whether  I  should  have  known 
the  attendants  from  the  patients,  but  for  the  few  words 
which  passed  between  the  former,  and  the  Doctor,  in  refer- 
ence to  the  persons  under  their  charge.  Of  course  I  limit 
this  remark  merely  to  their  looks;  for  the  conversation  of 
the  mad  people  was  mad  enough. 

There  was  one  little  prim  old  lady,  of  very  smiling  and 
good-humoured  appearance,  who  came  sidling  up  to  me 
from  the  end  of  a  long  passage,  and  with  a  curtsey  of  inex- 
pressible condescension,  propounded  this  unaccountable 
inquiry : 

"  Does  Pontef ract  still  flourish,  Sir,  upon  the  soil  of  Eng- 
land? " 

"He  does,  ma'am,"  I  rejoined. 

"  When  you  last  saw  him.  Sir,  he  was " 

"Well,  ma'am,"  said  I,  "extremely  well.  He  begged 
me  to  present  his  compliments.  I  never  saw  him  looking 
better." 

At  this,  the  old  lady  was  very  much  delighted.  After 
glancing  at  me  for  a  moment,  as  if  to  be  quite  sure  that  I 
was  serious  in  my  respectful  air,  she  sidled  back  some 
paces;  sidled  forward  again;  made  a  sudden  skip  (at  which 
I  precipitately  retreated  a  step  or  two);  and  said : 

"i  am  an  antediluvian.  Sir." 

I  thought  the  best  thing  to  say  was,  that  I  had  suspected 
as  much  from  the  first.     Therefore  I  said  so. 

"  It  is  an  extremely  proud  and  pleasant  thing.  Sir,  to  be 
an  antediluvian,"  said  the  old  lady. 

"I  should  think  it  was,  ma'am,"  I  rejoined. 

The  old  lady  kissed  her  hand,  gave  another  skip,  smirked 


74  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

and  sidled  down  the  gallery  in  a  most  extraordinary  man- 
ner, and  ambled  gracefully  into  her  own  bedchamber. 

In  another  part  of  the  building,  there  was  a  male  patient 
in  bed;  very  much  flushed  and  heated. 

"  Well,"  said  he,  starting  up,  and  pulling  off  his  night- 
cap: "It's  all  settled,  at  last.  I  have  arranged  it  with 
Queen  Victoria." 

"  Arranged  what?  "  asked  the  Doctor. 

"  Why,  that  business,"  passing  his  hand  wearily  across 
his  forehead,  "about  the  siege  of  New  York." 

"Oh!"  said  I,  like  a  man  suddenly  enlightened.  For 
he  looked  at  me  for  an  answer. 

"  Yes.  Every  house  without  a  signal  will  be  fired  upon 
by  the  British  troops.  No  harm  will  be  done  to  the  others* 
No  harm  at  all.  Those  that  want  to  be  safe,  must  hoist 
flags.  That's  all  they'll  have  to  do.  They  must  hoist 
flags." 

Even  while  he  was  speaking  he  seemed,  I  thought,  to 
have  some  faint  idea  that  his  talk  was  incoherent.  Directly 
he  had  said  these  words,  he  lay  down  again;  gave  a  kind 
of  a  groan;  and  covered  his  hot  head  with  the  blankets. 

There  was  another:  a  young  man,  whose  madness  was 
love  and  music.  After  playing  on  the  accordion  a  march 
he  had  composed,  he  was  very  anxious  that  I  should  walk 
into  his  chamber,  which  I  immediately  did. 

By  way  of  being  very  knowing,  and  humouring  him  to 
the  top  of  his  bent,  I  went  to  the  window,  which  com- 
manded a  beautiful  prospect,  and  remarked,  with  an  ad- 
dress upon  which  I  greatly  plumed  myself : 

"  What  a  delicious  country  you  have  about  these  lodgings 
of  yours." 

"  Poh ! "  said  he,  moving  his  fingers  carelessly  over  the 
notes  of  his  instrument :  "  Well  enough  for  such  an  Insti- 
tution as  this  !  " 

I  don't  think  I  was  ever  so  taken  aback  in  all  my  life. 

"  I  come  here  just  for  a  whim,"  he  said  coolly.  "  That's 
all." 

"Oh!     That's  all!"  said  I. 

"Yes.  That's  all.  The  Doctor's  a  smart  man.  He 
quite  enters  into  it.  It's  a  joke  of  mine.  I  like  it  for  a 
time.  You  needn't  mention  it,  but  I  think  I  shall  go  out 
next  Tuesday ! " 

I  assured  him  that  I  would  consider  our  interview  per- 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  75 

fectly  confidential;  and  rejoined  the  Doctor.  As  we  were 
passing  through  a  gallery  on  our  way  out,  a  well-dressed 
lady,  of  quiet  and  composed  manners,  came  up,  and  proffer- 
ing a  slip  of  paper  and  a  pen,  begged  that  I  would  oblige 
her  with  an  autograph.     I  complied,  and  we  parted. 

"  I  think  I  remember  having  had  a  few  interviews  like 
that,  with  ladies  out  of  doors.     I  hope  she  is  not  mad?  '* 

"Yes." 

"  On  what  subject?     Autographs?  " 

"No.     She  hears  voices  in  the  air." 

"  Well ! "  thought  I,  "  it  would  be  well  if  we  could  shut 
up  a  few  false  prophets  of  these  later  times,  who  have  pro- 
fessed to  do  the  same;  and  I  should  like  to  try  the  experi- 
ment on  a  Mormonist  or  two  to  begin  with." 

In  this  place,  there  is  the  best  Jail  for  untried  offenders 
in  the  world.  There  is  also  a  very  well-ordered  State 
prison,  arranged  upon  the  same  plan  as  that  at  Boston,  ex- 
cept that  here,  there  is  always  a  sentry  on  the  wall  with  a 
loaded  gun.  It  contained  at  that  time  about  two  hundred 
prisoners.  A  spot  was  shown  me  in  the  sleeping- ward, 
where  a  watchman  was  murdered  some  years  since  in  the 
dead  of  night,  in  a  desperate  attempt  to  escape,  made  by  a 
prisoner  who  had  broken  from  his  cell.  A  woman,  too, 
was  pointed  out  to  me,  who,  for  the  murder  of  her  hus- 
band, had  been  a  close  prisoner  for  sixteen  years. 

"Do  you  think,"  I  asked  of  my  conductor,  "that  after 
so  very  long  an  imprisonment,  she  has  any  thought  or  hope 
of  ever  regaining  her  liberty?  " 

"Oh  dear  yes,"  he  answered.     "To  be  sure  she  has." 

"  She  has  no  chance  of  obtaining  it,  I  suppose?  " 

"  Well,  I  don't  know: "  which,  by  the  bye,  is  a  national 
answer.     "  Her  friends  mistrust  her." 

"  What  have  they  to  do  with  it?  "  I  naturally  inquired. 

"  Well,  they  won't  petition." 

"  But  if  they  did,  they  couldn't  get  her  out,  I  suppose?  " 

"  Well,  not  the  first  time,  perhaps,  nor  yet  the  second, 
but  tiring  and  wearying  for  a  few  years  might  do  it," 

"  Does  that  ever  do  it?  " 

"  Why  yes,  that'll  do  it  sometimes.  Political  friends  '11 
do  it  sometimes.  It's  pretty  often  done,  one  way  or  an- 
other." 

I  shall  always  entertain  a  very  pleasant  and  grateful 
recollection  of  Hartford.     It  is  a  lovely  place,  and  I  had 


76  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

many  friends  there,  whom  I  can  never  remember  with  in- 
difference. We  left  it  with  no  little  regret  on  the  evening 
of  Friday  the  11th,  and  travelled  that  night  by  railroad  to 
New  Haven.  Upon  the  way,  the  guard  and  I  were  for- 
mally introduced  to  each  other  (as  we  usually  were  on  such 
occasions),  and  exchanged  a  variety  of  small-talk.  We 
reached  New  Haven  at  about  eight  o'clock,  after  a  journey 
of  three  hours,  and  put  up  for  the  night  at  the  best  inu. 

New  Haven,  known  also  as  the  City  of  Elms,  is  a  fine 
town.  Many  of  the  streets  (as  its  alias  sufficiently  im- 
ports) are  planted  with  rows  of  grand  old  elm-trees;  and 
the  same  natural  ornaments  surround  Yale  College,  an 
establishment  of  considerable  eminence  and  reputation. 
The  various  departments  of  this  Institution  are  erected  in 
a  kind  of  park  or  common  in  the  middle  of  the  town,  where 
they  are  dimly  visible  among  the  shadowing  trees.  The 
effect  is  very  like  that  of  an  old  cathedral  yard  in  England; 
and  when  their  branches  are  in  full  leaf,  must  be  extremely 
picturesque.  Even  in  the  winter  time,  these  groups  of 
well-grown  trees,  clustering  among  the  busy  streets  and 
houses  of  a  thriving  city,  have  a  very  quaint  appearance; 
seeming  to  bring  about  a  kind  of  compromise  between  town 
and  country;  as  if  each  had  met  the  other  half-way,  and 
shaken  hands  upon  it;  which  is  at  once  novel  and  pleasant. 

After  a  night's  rest,  we  rose  earl}',  and  in  good  time 
went  down  to  the  wharf,  and  on  board  the  packet  New 
York,  for  New  York.  This  was  the  first  American  steam- 
boat of  any  size  that  I  had  seen;  and  certainly  to  an  Eng- 
lish eye  it  was  infinitely  less  like  a  steamboat  than  a  huge 
floating-bath.  I  could  hardly  persuade  myself,  indeed, 
but  that  the  bathing  establishment  off  Westminster  Bridge, 
which  I  left  a  baby,  had  suddenly  grown  to  an  enormous 
size;  run  away  from  home;  and  set  up  in  foreign  parts  as 
a  steamer.  Being  in  America  too,  which  our  vagabonds  do 
so  particularly  favour,  it  seemed  the  more  probable. 

The  great  difference  in  appearance  between  these  packets 
and  ours,  is,  that  there  is  so  much  of  them  out  of  the  wa- 
ter :  the  main  deck  being  enclosed  on  all  sides,  and  filled 
with  casks  and  goods,  like  any  second  or  third  floor  in  a 
stack  of  warehouses;  and  the  promenade  or  hurricane-deck 
being  atop  of  that  again.  A  part  of  the  machinery  is  al- 
ways above  this  deck;  where  the  connecting-rod,  in  a  strong 
and  lofty  frame,  is  seen  working  away  like  an  iron  top- 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  77 

sawyer.  There  is  seldom  any  mast  or  tackle :  nothing  aloft 
but  two  tall  black  chimneys.  The  man  at  the  helm  is  shut 
up  in  a  little  house  in  the  fore  part  of  the  boat  (the  wheel 
being  connected  with  the  rudder  by  iron  chains,  working 
the  whole  length  of  the  deck);  and  the  passengers,  unless 
the  weather  be  very  fine  indeed,  usually  congregate  below. 
Directly  you  have  left  the  wharf,  all  the  life,  and  stir,  and 
bustle  of  a  packet  cease.  You  wonder  for  a  long  time  how 
she  goes  on,  for  there  seems  to  be  nobody  in  charge  of  her; 
and  when  another  of  these  dull  machines  comes  splashing 
by,  you  feel  quite  indignant  with  it,  as  a  sullen,  cumbrous, 
ungraceful,  unshiplike  leviathan :  quite  forgetting  that  the 
vessel  you  are  on  board  of,  is  its  very  counterpart.' 

There  is  always  a  clerk's  office  on  the  lower  deck,  where 
you  pay  your  fare;  a  ladies'  cabin;  baggage  and  stowage- 
rooms;  engineer's  room;  and  in  short  a  great  variety  of 
perplexities  which  render  the  discovery  of  the  gentlemen's 
cabin  a  matter  of  some  difficulty.  It  often  occupies  the 
whole  length  of  the  boat  (as  it  did  in  this  case),  and  has 
three  or  four  tiers  of  berths  on  each  side.  When  I  first 
descended  into  the  cabin  of  the  New  York,  it  looked,  in 
my  unaccustomed  eyes,  about  as  long  as  the  Burlington 
Arcade. 

The  Sound,  which  has  to  be  crossed  on  this  passage,  is 
not  always  a  very  safe  or  pleasant  navigation,  and  has  been 
the  scene  of  some  unfortunate  accidents.  It  was  a  wet 
morning,  and  very  misty,  and  we  soon  lost  sight  of  land. 
The  day  was  calm,  however,  and  brightened  towards  noon. 
After  exhausting  (with  good  help  from  a  friend)  the  larder, 
and  the  stock  of  bottled  beer,  I  lay  down  to  sleep :  being 
very  much  tired  with  the  fatigues  of  yesterday.  But  I 
awoke  from  my  nap  in  time  to  hurry  up,  and  see  Hell  Gate, 
The  Hog's  Back,  the  Frying  Pan,  and  other  notorious  lo- 
calities, attractive  to  all  readers  of  famous  Diedrich  Knick- 
erbocker's History.  We  were  now  in  a  narrow  channel, 
with  sloping  banks  on  either  side,  besprinkled  with  pleas- 
ant villas,  and  made  refreshing  to  the  sight  by  turf  and 
trees.  Soon  we  shot  in  quick  succession,  past  a  lighthouse; 
a  madhouse  (how  the  lunatics  flung  up  their  caps,  and 
roared  in  sympathy  with  the  headlong  engine  and  the  driv- 
ing tide !);  a  jail;  and  other  buildings;  and  so  emerged  into 
a  noble  bay,  whose  waters  sparkled  in  the  now  cloudless 
sunshine  like  Nature's  eyes  turned  up  to  Heaven. 


78  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

Then  there  lay  stretched  out  before  us,  to  the  right,  con- 
fused heaps  of  buildings,  with  here  and  there  a  spire  or 
steeple,  looking  down  upon  the  herd  below;  and  here  and 
there,  again,  a  cloud  of  lazy  smoke;  and  in  the  foreground 
a  forest  of  ships'  masts,  cheery  with  flapping  sails  and 
waving  flags.  Crossing  from  among  them  to  the  opposite 
shore,  were  steam  ferry-boats  laden  with  people,  coaches, 
horses,  waggons,  baskets,  boxes :  crossed  and  recrossed  by 
other  ferry-boats :  all  travelling  to  and  fro :  and  never  idle. 
Stately  among  these  restless  Insects,  were  two  or  three 
large  ships,  moving  with  slow  majestic  pace,  as  creatures 
of  a  prouder  kind,  disdainful  of  their  puny  journeys,  and 
making  for  the  broad  sea.  Beyond,  were  shining  heights, 
and  islands  in  the  glancing  river,  and  a  distance  scarcely 
less  blue  and  bright  than  the  sky  it  seemed  to  meet.  The 
city's  hum  and  buzz,  the  clinking  of  capstans,  the  ringing 
of  bells,  the  barking  of  dogs,  the  clattering  of  wheels,  tin- 
gled in  the  listening  ear.  All  of  which  life  and  stir,  com- 
ing across  the  stirring  water,  caught  new  life  and  anima- 
tion from  its  free  companionship;  and,  sympathising  with 
its  buoyant  spirits,  glistened  as  it  seemed  in  sport  upon  its 
surface,  and  hemmed  the  vessel  round,  and  plashed  the 
water  high  about  her  sides,  and,  floating  her  gallantly  into 
the  dock,  flew  off  again  to  welcome  other  comers,  and  speed 
before  them  to  the  busy  Port. 


CHAPTER    THE   SIXTH. 

NEW  YORK. 

The  beautiful  metropolis  of  America  is  by  no  means  so 
clean  a  city  as  Boston,  but  many  of  its  streets  have  the 
same  characteristics;  except  that  the  houses  are  not  quite 
so  fresh-coloured,  the  signboards  are  not  quite  so  gaudy, 
the  gilded  letters  not  quite  so  golden,  the  bricks  not  quite 
so  red,  the  stone  not  quite  so  white,  the  blinds  and  area 
railings  not  quite  so  green,  the  knobs  and  plates  upon  the 
street  doors  not  quite  so  bright  and  twinkling.  There  are 
many  by-streets,  almost  as  neutral  in  clean  colours,  and 
positive  in  dirty  ones,  as  by-streets  in  London;  and  there 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  7\f 

is  one  quarter,  commonly  called  the  Five  Points,  which,  in 
respect  of  filth  and  wretchedness,  may  be  safely  backed 
against  Seven  Dials,  or  any  other  part  of  famed  St.  Giles's. 

The  great  promenade  and  thoroughfare,  as  most  people 
know,  is  Broadway;  a  wide  and  bustling  street,  which, 
from  the  Battery  Gardens  to  its  opposite  termination  in  a 
country  road,  may  be  four  miles  long.  Shall  we  sit  down 
in  an  upper  floor  of  the  Carlton  House  Hotel  (sitiiated  in 
the  best  part  of  this  main  artery  of  New  York),  and  when 
we  are  tired  of  looking  down  upon  the  life  below,  sally 
forth  arm-in-arm,  and  mingle  with  the  stream? 

Warm  weather !  Tlie  sun  strikes  upon  our  heads  at  this 
open  window,  as  though  its  rays  were  concentrated  through 
a  burning-glass;  but  the  day  is  in  its  zenith,  and  the  season 
an  unusual  one.  Was  there  ever  such  a  sunny  street  as 
this  Broadway !  The  pavement  stones  are  polished  with 
the  tread  of  feet  until  they  shine  again;  the  red  bricks  of 
the  houses  might  be  yet  in  the  dry,  hot  kilns;  and  the  roofs 
of  those  omnibuses  look  as  though,  if  water  were  poured 
on  them,  they  would  hiss  and  smoke,  and  smell  like  half- 
quenched  fires.  No  stint  of  omnibuses  here !  Half-a-dozen 
have  gone  by  within  as  many  minutes.  Plenty  of  hackney 
cabs  and  coaches  too;  gigs,  phaetons,  large-wheeled  til- 
buries, and  private  carriages — rather  of  a  clumsy  make, 
and  not  very  different  from  the  public  vehicles,  but  built 
for  the  heavy  roads  beyond  the  city  pavement.  Negro 
coachmen  and  white;  in  straw  hats,  black  hats,  white  hats, 
glazed  caps,  fur  caps;  in  coats  of  drab,  black,  brown,  green, 
blue,  nankeen,  striped  jean  and  linen;  and  there,  in  that 
one  instance  (look  while  it  passes,  or  it  will  be  too  late),  in 
suits  of  livery.  Some  southern  republican  that,  who  puts 
his  blacks  in  uniform,  and  swells  with  Sultan  pomp  and 
power.  Yonder,  where  that  phaeton  with  the  well-clipped 
pair  of  grays  has  stopped — standing  at  their  heads  now — is 
a  Yorkshire  groom,  who  has  not  been  very  long  in  these 
parts,  and  looks  sorrowfully  round  for  a  companion  pair  of 
top-boots,  which  he  may  traverse  the  city  half  a  year  with- 
out meeting.  Heaven  save  the  ladies,  how  they  dress !  We 
have  seen  more  colours  in  these  ten  minutes,  than  we 
should  have  seen  elsewhere,  in  as  many  days.  What  vari- 
ous parasols !  what  rainbow  silks  and  satins !  what  pinking 
of  thin  stockings,  and  pinching  of  thin  shoes,  and  flutter- 
ing of  ribbons  and  silk  tassels,  and  display  of  rich  cloaks 


80  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

with  gaudy  hoods  and  linings !  The  young  gentlemen  are 
fond,  you  see,  of  turning  down  their  shirt-collars  and  cul- 
tivating their  whiskers,  especially  under  the  chin;  but  they 
cannot  approach  the  ladies  in  their  dress  or  bearing,  being, 
to  say  the  truth,  humanity  of  quite  another  sort.  Byrons 
of  tlie  desk  and  counter,  pass  on,  and  let  us  see  what  kind 
of  men  those  are  behind  ye :  those  two  labourers  in  holiday 
clothes,  of  whom  one  carries  in  his  hand  a  crumpled  scrap 
of  paper  from  which  he  tries  to  spell  out  a  hard  name, 
while  the  other  looks  about  for  it  on  all  the  doors  and 
windows. 

Irishmen  both!  You  might  know  them,  if  they  were 
masked,  by  their  long-tailed  blue  coats  and  Isright  buttons, 
and  their  drab  trousers,  which  they  wear  like  men  well 
used  to  working  dresses,  who  are  easy  in  no  others.  It 
would  be  hard  to  keep  your  model  republics  going,  without 
the  countrymen  and  countrywomen  of  those  two  labourers. 
For  who  else  would  dig,  and  delve,  and  drudge,  and  do 
domestic  work,  and  make  canals  and  roads,  and  execute 
great  lines  of  Internal  Improvement!  Irishmen  both,  and 
sorely  puzzled  too,  to  find  out  what  they  seek.  Let  us  go 
down,  and  help  them,  for  the  lova  of  home,  and  that  spirit 
of  liberty  which  admits  of  honest  service  to  honest  men, 
and  honest  work  for  honest  bread,  no  matter  what  it  be. 

That's  well!  We  have  got  at  the  right  address  at  last, 
though  it  is  written  in  strange  characters  truly,  and  might 
have  been  scrawled  with  the  blunt  handle  of  the  spade  the 
writer  better  knows  the  use  of,  than  a  pen.  Their  way  lies 
yonder,  but  what  business  takes  them  there?  They  carry 
savings:  to  hoard  up?  No.  They  are  brothers,  those 
men.  One  crossed  the  sea  alone,  and  working  very  hard 
for  one  half-year,  and  living  harder,  saved  funds  enough  to 
bring  the  other  out.  That  done,  they  worked  together, 
side  by  side,  contentedly  sharing  hard  labour  and  hard  liv- 
ing for  another  term,  and  then  their  sisters  came,  and  then 
another  brother,  and,  lastly,  their  old  mother.  And  Avhat 
now?  Why,  the  poor  old  crone  is  restless  in  a  strange 
land,  and  yearns  to  lay  her  bones,  she  says,  among  her 
people  in  the  old  graveyard  at  home :  and  so  they  go  to 
pay  her  passage  back:  and  God  help  her  and  them,  and 
every  simple  heart,  and  all  who  turn  to  the  Jerusalem  of 
their  younger  days,  and  have  an  altar-fire  upon  the  cold 
hearth  of  their  fathers. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  81 

This  narrow  thoroughfare,  baking  and  blistering  in  the 
sun,  is  Wall  Street:  tlie  Stock  Exchange  and  Lombard 
Street  of  New  York.  Many  a  rapid  fortune  has  been  made 
in  this  street,  and  many  a  no  less  rapid  ruin.  Some  of 
these  very  merchants  whom  you  see  hanging  about  here 
now,  have  locked  up  money  in  their  strong-boxes,  like  the 
man  in  the  Arabian  Nights,  and  opening  them  again,  have 
found  but  withered  leaves.  Below,  here  by  the  water-side, 
where  the  bowsprits  of  ships  stretch  across  the  footway, 
and  almost  thrust  themselves  into  the  windows,  lie  the 
noble  American  vessels  which  have  made  their  Packet 
Service  the  finest  in  the  world.  They  have  brought  hither 
the  foreigners  who  abound  in  all  the  streets :  not  ])er]iaps, 
that  there  are  more  here,  than  in  other  commercial  cities; 
but  elsewhere,  they  have  particular  haunts,  and  you  must 
find  them  out;  here,  they  pervade  the  town. 

We  must  cross  Broadway  again;  gaining  some  refresh- 
ment from  the  heat,  in  the  sight  of  the  great  blocks  of 
clean  ice  which  are  being  carried  into  shops  and  bar-rooms; 
and  the  pineapples  and  Avater-melons  profusely  displayed 
for  sale.  Fine  streets  of  spacious  houses  here,  you  see ! — 
Wall  Street  has  furnished  and  dismantled  many  of  them 
very  often — and  here  a  deep  green  leafy  square.  Be  sure 
that  is  a  hospitable  house  with  inmates  to  be  affectionately 
remembered  always,  where  they  have  the  open  door  and 
pretty  show  of  plants  within,  and  where  the  child  with 
laughing  eyes  is  peeping  out  of  window  at  the  little  dog 
below.  You  wonder  what  may  be  the  use  of  this  tall  flag- 
staff in  the  by-street,  with  something  like  Liberty's  head- 
dress on  its  top :  so  do  I.  But  there  is  a  passion  for  tall 
flagstaffs  hereabout,  and  you  may  see  its  twin  brother  in 
five  minutes,  if  you  have  a  mind. 

Again  across  Broadway,  and  so — passing  from  the  many- 
coloured  crowd  and  glittering  shops — into  another  long 
main  street,  the  Bowery.  A  railroad  yonder,  see,  where 
two  stout  horses  trot  along,  drawing  a  score  or  two  of  peo- 
ple and  a  great  wooden  ark,  with  ease.  The  stores  are 
poorer  here;  the  passengers  less  gny.  Clothes  ready-made, 
and  meat  ready -cooked,  are  to  be  bought  in  these  parts; 
and  the  lively  whirl  of  carriages  is  exchanged  for  the  deep 
lunible  of  carts  and  waggons.  These  signs  which  are  so 
plentiful,  in  shape  like  river  buoys,  or  small  balloons, 
hoisted  by  cords  to  poles,  and  dangling  there,  announce,  as 
6 


82  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

you  may  see  by  looking  up,  "Oysters  in  every  Style." 
They  tempt  the  hungry  most  at  night,  for  then  dull  candles 
glimmering  inside,  illuminate  these  dainty  words,  and 
make  the  mouths  of  idlers  water,  as  they  read  and 
linger. 

What  is  this  dismal -fronted  pile  of  bastard  Egyptian, 
like  an  enchanter's  palace  in  a  melodrama! — a  famous 
prison,  called  The  Tombs.     Shall  we  go  in? 

So.  A  long  narrow  lofty  building,  stove-heated  as 
usual,  with  four  galleries,  one  above  the  other,  going  round 
it,  and  communicating  by  stairs.  Between  the  two  sides 
of  each  gallery,  and  in  its  centre,  a  bridge,  for  the  greater 
convenience  of  crossing.  On  each  of  these  bridges  sits  a 
man:  dozing  or  reading,  or  talking  to  an  idle  companion. 
On  each  tier,  are  two  opposite  rows  of  small  iron  doors. 
They  look  like  furnace-doors,  but  are  cold  and  black,  as 
though  the  fires  within  had  all  gone  out.  Some  two  or 
three  are  open,  and  women,  with  drooping  heads  bent  down, 
are  talking  to  the  inmates.  The  whole  is  lighted  by  a  sky- 
light, but  it  is  fast  closed :  and  from  the  roof  there  dangle, 
limp  and  drooping,  two  useless  windsails. 

A  man  with  keys  appears,  to  show  us  round.  A  good- 
looking  fellow,  and,  in  his  way,  civil  and  obliging. 

"  Are  those  black  doors  the  cells?  " 

"Yes." 

"Are  they  all  full?" 

"  Well,  they's  pretty  nigh  full,  and  that's  a  fact,  and  no 
two  ways  about  it." 

"  Those  at  the  bottom  are  imwholesome,  surely?  " 

"  Why,  we  do  only  put  coloured  people  in  'em.  That's 
the  truth." 

"  When  do  the  prisoners  take  exercise?  " 

"  Well,  they  do  without  it  pretty  much." 

"Do  they  never  walk  in  the  yard?" 

"Considerable  seldom." 

"  Sometimes,  I  suppose?  " 

"  Well,  it's  rare  they  do.  They  keep  pretty  bright  with- 
out it." 

"But  suppose  a  man  were  here  for  a  twelvemonth.  I 
know  this  is  only  a  prison  for  criminals  who  are  charged 
with  grave  offences,  while  they  are  awaiting  their  trial,  or 
are  under  remand,  but  the  law  here  affords  criminals  many 
means  of  delay.     What  with  motions  for  new  trial,  and 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  83 

in  arrest  of  judgment,  and  what  not,  a  prisoner  might  be 
here  for  twelve  months,  I  take  it,  might  he  not? '' 

"Well,  I  guess  he  might." 

"  Do  you  mean  to  say  that  in  all  that  time  he  would 
never  come  out  at  that  little  iron  door,  for  exercise?  " 

"He  might  walk  some,  perhaps — not  much." 

"  Will  you  open  one  of  the  doors?  " 

"All,  if  you  like." 

The  fastenings  jar  and  rattle,  and  one  of  the  doors  turns 
slowly  on  its  hinges.  Let  us  look  in.  A  small  bare  cell, 
into  which  the  light  enters  through  a  high  chink  in  the 
wall.  There  is  a  rude  means  of  washing,  a  table,  and  a 
bedstead.  Upon  the  latter,  sits  a  man  of  sixty;  reading. 
He  looks  up  for  a  moment;  gives  an  impatient  dogged 
shake;  and  fixes  his  eyes  upon  his  book  again.  As  we 
withdraw  our  heads,  the  door  closes  on  him,  and  is  fastened 
as  before.  This  man  has  murdered  his  wife,  and  will  prob- 
ably be  hanged. 

"  How  long  has  he  been  here?  " 

"A  month." 

"  When  will  he  be  tried?  " 

"Next  term." 

"When  is  that?" 

"Next  month." 

"In  England,  if  a  man  be  under  sentence  of  death,  even, 
he  has  air  and  exercise  at  certain  periods  of  the  day." 

"Possible?" 

With  what  stupendous  and  untranslatable  coolness  he 
says  this,  and  how  loungingly  he  leads  on  to  the  women's 
side :  making,  as  he  goes,  a  kind  of  iron  castanet  of  the 
key  and  the  stair- rail ! 

Each  cell  door  on  this  side  has  a  square  aperture  in  it. 
Some  of  the  women  peep  anxiously  through  it  at  the  sound 
of  footsteps;  others  shrink  away  in  shame. — For  what  of- 
fence can  that  lonely  child,  of  ten  or  twelve  years  old,  be 
shut  up  here?  Oh!  that  boy?  He  is  the  son  of  the  pris- 
oner we  saw  just  now;  is  a  witness  ngainst  his  father;  and 
is  detained  here  for  safe  keeping,  until  the  trial:  that's 
all 

But  it  is  a  dreadful  place  for  the  child  t-o  pass  the  long 
days  and  nights  in.  This  is  rather  hard  treatment  for  a 
young  witness,  is  it  not? — What  says  our  conductor? 

"  Well,  it  an't  a  very  rowdy  life,  and  thafs  a  fact  I " 


84  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

Again  he  clinks  his  metal  Castanet,  and  leads  us  lei- 
surely away.     I  have  a  question  to  ask  him  as  we  go. 

"Pray,  why  do  they  call  this  place  The  Tombs? " 

"  Well,  it's  the  cant  name." 

"  I  know  it  is.     Why?  " 

"  Some  suicides  happened  here,  when  it  was  first  built. 
I  expect  it  come  about  from  that." 

"I  saw  just  now,  that  that  man's  clothes  were  scattered 
about  the  floor  of  his  cell.  Don't  you  oblige  the  prisoners 
to  be  orderly,  and  put  such  things  away?  " 

"  Where  should  they  put  'em?  " 

"  Not  on  the  ground  surely.  What  do  you  say  to  hang- 
ing them  up?  " 

He  stops,  and  looks  round  to  emphasize  his  answer: 

"  Why,  I  say  that's  just  it.  When  they  had  hooks  they 
would  hang  themselves,  so  they're  taken  out  of  every  cell, 
and  there's  only  the  marks  left  where  they  used  to  be ! " 

The  prison-yard  in  which  he  pauses  now,  has  been  the 
scene  of  terrible  performances.  Into  this  narrow,  grave- 
like place,  men  are  brought  out  to  die.  The  wretched 
creature  stands  beneath  the  gibbet  on  the  ground;  the  rope 
about  his  neck;  and  when  the  sign  is  given,  a  weight  at  its 
other  end  comes  running  down,  and  swings  him  up  into  the 
air — a  corpse. 

The  law  requires  that  there  be  present  at  this  dismal 
spectacle,  the  judge,  the  jury,  and  citizens  to  the  amount  of 
twenty-five.  From  the  community  it  is  hidden.  To  the 
dissolute  and  bad,  the  thing  remains  a  frightful  myster}-. 
Between  the  criminal  and  them,  the  prison-wall  is  inter- 
posed as  a  thick  gloomy  veil.  It  is  the  curtain  to  his  bed 
of  death,  his  winding-sheet,  and  grave  From  him  it  shuts 
out  life,  and  all  the  motives  to  unrepenting  hardihood  in 
that  last  hour,  which  its  mere  sight  and  presence  is  often 
all-sufficient  to  sustain.  There  are  no  bold  eyes  to  make 
him  bold;  no  ruffians  to  uphold  a  ruffian's  name  before. 
All  beyond  the  pitiless  stone  wall,  is  unknown  space. 

Let  us  go  forth  again  into  the  cheerful  streets. 

Once  more  in  Broadway !  Here  are  the  same  ladies  in 
bright  colours,  walking  to  and  fro,  in  pairs  and  singly; 
yonder  the  very  same  light  blue  parasol  which  passed  and 
repassed  the  hotel-window  twenty  times  while  we  were 
sitting  there.  We  are  going  to  cross  here.  Take  care  of 
the  pigs.     Two  portly  sows  are  trotting  up  behind  this 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  85 

Giirriage,  and  a  select  party  of  half-a-dozen  gentlemen  hogs 
have  just  now  turned  the  corner. 

Here  is  a  solitary  swine,  lounging  homeward  by  him- 
self. He  has  only  one  ear;  havmg  parted  with  the  other 
to  vagrant-dogs  in  the  course  of  his  city  rambles.  But  he 
gets  on  very  well  without  it;  and  leads  a  roving,  gentle- 
manly, vagabond  kind  of  life,  somewhat  answering  to  that 
of  our  club-men  at  home.  He  leaves  his  lodgings  every 
morning  at  a  certain  hour,  throws  himself  upon  the  town, 
gets  through  his  day  in  some  manner  quite  satisfactory  to 
himself,  and  regularly  appears  at  the  door  of  b's  own  house 
igain  at  night,  like  the  mysterious  master  of  Gil  Bias.  He 
is  a  free-and-easy,  careless,  indifferent  kind  of  pig,  having 
a  very  large  acquaintance  among  other  pigs  of  the  same 
character,  whom  he  rather  knows  by  sight  than  conversa- 
tion, as  he  seldom  troubles  himself  to  stop  and  exchange 
civilities,  but  goes  grunting  down  the  kennel,  turning  up 
the  news  and  small-talk  ot  the  city  in  the  shape  of  cab- 
bage-stalks and  offal,  and  bearing  no  tails  but  his  own : 
which  is  a  very  short  one,  for  his  old  enemies,  the  dogs,  have 
been  at  that  too,  and  have  left  him  hardly  enough  to  swear 
by.  He  is  in  every  respect  a  republican  pig,  going  wher- 
ever he  pleases,  and  mingling  with  the  best  society,  on  an 
equal,  if  not  superior  footing,  for  every  one  makes  way 
when  he  appears,  and  the  haughtiest  give  him  the  wall,  if 
he  prefer  it.  •  He  is  a  great  philosopher,  and  seldom  moved, 
unless  by  the  dogs  before-mentioned.  Sometimes,  indeed, 
you  may  see  his  small  eye  twinkling  on  a  slaughtered  friend, 
whose  carcase  garnishes  a  butcher's  door-post,  but  he  grunts 
out  "  Such  is  life :  all  flesh  is  pork ! "  buries  his  nose  in  the 
mire  again,  and  waddles  down  the  gutter:  comforting  him- 
self with  the  reflection  that  there  is  one  snout  the  less  to 
anticipate  stray  cabbage-stalks,  at  any  rate. 

They  are  the  city  scavengers,  these  pigs.  Ugly  brutes 
they  are;  having,  for  the  most  part,  scanty  brown  backs, 
like  the  lids  of  old  horsehair  trunks:  spotted  with  un- 
wholesome black  blotches.  They  have  long,  gaunt  legs, 
too,  and  such  peaked  snouts,  that  if  one  of  them  could  be 
persuaded  to  sit  for  his  profile,  nobody  would  recognise  it 
for  a  pig's  likeness.  They  are  never  attended  upon,  or 
fed,  or  driven,  or  caught,  but  are  thrown  upon  their  own 
resources  in  early  life,  and  become  preternatural ly  knowing 
in  consequence.     Every  pig  knows  where  he  lives,  mucb 


86  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

better  than  anybody  could  tell  him.  At  this  hour,  just  as 
evening  is  closing  in,  you  will  see  them  roaming  towards 
bed  by  scores,  eating  their  way  to  the  last.  Occasionally, 
some  youth  among  them  who  has  over-eaten  himself,  or  has 
been  much  worried  by  dogs,  trots  shrinkingly  homeward, 
like  a  prodigal  son :  but  this  is  a  rare  case :  perfect  self- 
possession  and  self-reliance,  and  immovable  composure, 
being  their  foremost  attributes. 

The  streets  and  shops  are  lighted  now;  and  as  the  eye 
travels  down  the  long  thoroughfare,  dotted  with  bright  jets 
of  gas,  it  is  reminded  of  Oxford  Street,  or  Piccadilly. 
Here  and  there,  a  flight  of  broad  stone  cellar-steps  appears, 
and  a  painted  lamp  directs  you  to  the  Bowling  Saloon,  or 
Ten-Pin  ally;  Ten-Pins  being  a  game  of  mingled  chance 
and  skill,  invented  when  the  legislature  passed  an  act  for- 
bidding Nine-Pins.  At  other  downward  flights  of  steps, 
are  other  lamps,  marking  the  whereabouts  of  oyster-cellars 
— pleasant  retreats,  say  I :  not  .only  by  reason  of  their  won- 
derful cookery  of  oysters,  pretty  nigh  as  large  as  cheese- 
plates  (or  for  thy  dear  sake,  heartiest  of  Greek  Profess- 
ors !),  but  because  of  all  kinds  of  eaters  of  fish,  or  flesh,  or 
fowl,  in  these  latitudes,  the  swallowers  of  oysters  alone  are 
not  gregarious;  but  subduing  themselves,  as  it  were,  to  the 
nature  of  what  they  work  in,  and  copying  the  coyness  of 
the  thing  they  eat,  do  sit  apart  in  curtained  boxes,  and 
consort  by  twos,  not  by  two  hundreds. 

But  how  quiet  the  streets  are !  Are  there  no  itinerant 
bands;  no  wind  or  stringed  instruments?  No,  not  one.  By 
day,  are  there  no  Punches,  Fantoccinis,  Dancing-dogs,  Jug- 
glers, Conjurors,  Orchestrinas,  or  even  Barrel-organs?  No, 
not  one.  Yes,  I  remember  one.  One  barrel-organ  and  a 
dancing-monkey — sportive  by  nature,  but  fast  fading  into 
a  dull,  lumpish  monkey,  of  the  Utilitarian  school.  Beyond 
that,  nothing  lively;  no,  not  so  much  as  a  white  mouse  in 
a  twirling  cage 

Are  there  no  amusements?  Yes.  There  is  a  lecture- 
room  across  the  way,  from  which  that  glare  of  light  pro- 
ceeds, and  there  may  be  evening  service  for  the  ladies 
thrice  a  week,  or  oftener.  For  the  young  gentlemen,  there 
is  the  counting-house,  the  store,  the  bar-room :  the  latter, 
as  you  may  see  through  these  windows,  pretty  full.  Hark! 
to  the  clinking  sound  of  hammers  breaking  lumps  of  ice, 
and  to  the  cool  gurgling  of  the  pounded  bits,  as,  in  the 


AMERICAN  N0TE8.  S7 

process  of  mixing,  they  are  poured  from  glass  to  glass! 
No  amusements?  What  are  these  suckers  of  cigars  and 
swallow  ers  of  strong  drinks,  whose  hats  and  legs  we  see  in 
every  possible  variety  of  twist,  doing,  but  amusing  them- 
selves? What  are  the  fifty  newspapers,  which  those  pre- 
cocious urchins  are  bawling  down  the  street,  and  which  are 
kept  filed  within,  what  are  they  but  amusements?  Not 
vapid  waterish  amusements,  but  good  strong  stuff;  deal- 
ing in  round  abuse  and  blackguard  names;  pulling  off  the 
roofs  of  private  houses,  as  the  Halting  Devil  did  in  Spain; 
pimping  and  pandering  for  all  degrees  of  vicious  taste,  and 
gorging  with  coined  lies  the  most  voracious  maw;  imputing 
to  every  man  in  public  life  the  coarsest  and  the  vilest 
motives;  scaring  away  from  the  stabbed  and  prostrate  body- 
politic,  every  Samaritan  of  clear  conscience  and  good  deeds; 
and  setting  on,  with  yell  and  whistle  and  the  clapping  of 
foul  hands,  the  vilest  vermin  and  worst  birds  of  prey.  — No 
amusements ! 

Let  us  go  on  again;  and  passing  this  wilderness  of  an 
hotel  with  stores  about  its  base,  like  some  Continental 
theatre,  or  the  London  Opera  House  shorn  of  its  colonnade, 
plunge  into  the  Five  Points,  But  it  is  needful,  first,  that 
we  take  as  our  escort  these  two  heads  of  the  police,  whom 
you  would  know  for  sharp  and  well-trained  officers  if  you 
met  them  in  the  Great  Desert.  So  true  it  is,  that  certain 
pursuits,  wherever  carried  on,  will  stamp  men  with  the 
same  character.  These  two  might  have  been  begotten, 
born,  and  bred,  in  Bow  Street, 

We  have  seen  no  beggars  in  the  streets  by  night  or  day; 
but  of  other  kinds  of  strollers,  plenty.  Poverty,  wretched- 
ness, and  vice,  are  rife  enough  where  we  are  going  now. 

This  is  the  place :  these  narrow  ways,  diverging  to  the 
right  and  left,  and  reeking  everywhere  with  dirt  and  filth. 
Such  lives  as  are  led  here,  bear  the  same  fruits  here  as 
elsewhere.  The  coarse  and  bloated  faces  at  the  doors, 
have  counterparts  at  home,  and  all  the  wide  world  over. 
Debauchery  has  made  the  very  houses  prematurely  old. 
See  how  the  rotten  beams  are  tumbling  down,  and  how  the 
patched  and  broken  windows  seem  to  scowl  dimly,  like  eyes 
that  have  been  hurt  in  drunken  frays.  Many  of  those  pigs 
live  here.  Do  they  ever  wonder  why  their  masters  walk 
upright  in  lieu  of  going  on  all-four?  and  why  they  talk  in- 
stead of  grunting? 


88  AMERICAN"  NOTES. 

So  far,  nearly  every  house  is  a  low  tavern;  and  on  the 
bar-room  walls,  are  coloured  prints  of  Washington,  and 
Queen  Victoria  of  England,  and  the  American  Eagle. 
Among  the  pigeon-holes  that  hold  the  bottles,  are  pieces  of 
plate-glass  and  coloured  paper,  for  there  is,  in  some  sort,  a 
taste  for  decoration,  even  here.  And  as  seamen  frequent 
these  haunts,  there  are  maritime  pictures  by  the  dozen :  of 
partings  between  sailors  and  their  lady-loves,  portraits  of 
William,  of  the  ballad,  and  his  Black-Eyed  Susan;  of  Will 
Watch,  the  Bold  Smuggler;  of  Paul  Jones  the  Pirate,  and 
the  like :  on  which  the  painted  eyes  of  Queen  Victoria,  and 
of  Washington  to  boot,  rest  in  as  strange  companionship, 
as  on  most  of  the  scenes  that  are  enacted  in  their  wondering 
presence. 

What  place  is  this,  to  which  the  squalid  street  conducts 
us?  A  kind  of  square  of  leprous  houses,  some  of  which 
are  attainable  only  by  crazy  Avooden  stairs  without.  What 
lies  beyond  this  tottering  flight  of  steps,  that  creak  beneath 
our  tread? — a  miserable  room,  liglited  by  one  dim  candle^ 
and  destitute  of  all  comfort,  save  that  which  may  be  hid- 
den in  a  wretched  bed.  Beside  it,  sits  a  man :  his  elbows 
on  his  knees :  his  forehead  hidden  in  his  hands.  "  What 
ails  that  man!"  asks  the  foremost  officer.  "Fever,"  he 
sullenly  replies,  Avithout  looking  up.  Conceive  the  fancies 
of  a  fevered  brain,  in  such  a  place  as  this ! 

Ascend  these  pitch-dark  stairs,  heedful  of  a  false  footing 
on  the  trembling  boards,  and  grope  your  way  with  me  into 
this  wolfish  den,  where  neither  ray  of  light  nor  breath  of 
air,  appears  to  come.  A  negro  lad,  startled  from  nis  sleep 
by  the  officer's  voice — he  knows  it  well — but  comforted  by 
his  assurance  that  he  has  not  come  on  business,  officiously 
bestirs  himself  to  light  a  candle.  The  match  flickers  for  a 
moment,  and  shows  great  mounds  of  dusky  rags  upon  the 
ground;  then  dies  away  and  leaves  a  denser  darkness  than 
before,  if  there  can  be  degrees  in  such  extremes.  He 
stumbles  down  the  stairs  and  presently  comes  back,  shad- 
ing a  flaring  taper  Avith  his  hand.  Then  the  mounds  of 
rags  are  seen  to  be  astir,  and  rise  slowly  up,  and  the  floor 
is  covered  with  heaps  of  negro  women,  waking  from  their 
sleep:  their  white  teeth  chattering,  and  their  bright  eyes 
glistening  and  winking  on  all  sides  Avith  surprise  and  fear, 
like  the  countless  repetition  of  one  astonished  African  face 
in  some  strange  mirror. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  89 

Mount  up  these  other  stairs  with  no  less  caution  (there 
are  traps  and  pitfalls  here,  for  those  who  are  not  so  well 
escorted  as  ourselves)  into  the  housetop;  where  the  bare 
beams  and  rafters  meet  overhead,  and  calm  night  looks 
down  through  the  crevices  in  the  roof.  Open  the  door  of 
one  of  these  cramped  hutches  full  of  sleeping  negroes. 
Pah !  They  have  a  charcoal  fire  within ;  there  is  a  smell 
of  singeing  clothes,  or  flesh,  so  close  they  gather  round  the 
brazier;  and  vapours  issue  forth  that  blind  and  suffocate. 
From  every  corner,  as  you  glance  about  you  in  these  dark 
retreats,  some  figure  crawls  half-awakened,  as  if  the  Judg- 
ment-hour were  near  at  hand,  and  every  obscene  grave 
were  giving  up  its  dead.  Where  dogs  would  howl  to  lie, 
women,  and  men,  and  boys  slink  off  to  sleep,  forcing  the 
dislodged  rats  to  move  away  in  quest  of  better  lodgings. 

Here  too  are  lanes  and  alleys,  paved  with  mud  knee- 
deep:  underground  chambers,  where  they  dance  and  game; 
the  walls  bedecked  with  rough  designs  of  ships,  and  forts, 
and  flags,  and  American  Eagles  out  of  number:  ruined 
houses,  open  to  the  street,  whence,  through  wide  gaps  in 
the  walls,  other  ruins  loom  upon  the  eye,  as  though  the 
world  of  vice  and  misery  had  nothing  else  to  show :  hideous 
tenements  which  take  their  name  from  robbery  and  murder : 
all  that  is  loathsome,  drooping,  and  decayed  is  here. 

Our  leader  has  his  hand  upon  the  latch  of  "  Almack's," 
and  calls  to  us  from  the  bottom  of  the  steps;  for  the  as- 
sembly-room of  the  Five  Point  fashionable  is  approached 
by  a  descent.     Shall  we  go  in?     It  is  but  a  moment. 

Heyday!  the  landlady  of  Almack's  thrives!  A  buxom 
fat  mulatto  woman,  with  sparkling  eyes,  whose  head  is 
daintily  ornamented  with  a  handkerchief  of  many  colours. 
Nor  is  the  landlord  much  behind  her  in  his  finery,  being  at- 
tired in  a  smart  blue  jacket,  like  a  ship's  steward,  with  a 
thick  gold  ring  upon  his  little  finger,  and  round  his  neck  a 
gleaming  golden  watch-guard.  How  glad  he  is  to  see  us ! 
What  will  we  please  to  call  for?  A  dance?  It  shall  be 
done  directly.  Sir:  "a  regular  break-down." 

The  corpulent  black  fiddler,  and  his  friend  who  plays 
the  tambourine,  stamp  upon  the  boarding  of  the  small 
raised  orchestra  in  which  they  sit,  and  play  a  lively 
measure.  Five  or  six  couple  come  upon  the  floor,  mar- 
shalled by  a  lively  young  negro,  who  is  the  wit  of  the  as- 
sembly, and  the  greatest  dancer  known.     He  never  leaves 


90  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

off  making  queer  faces,  and  is  the  delight  of  all  the  rest, 
who  grin  from  ear  to  ear  incessantly.  Among  the  dancers 
are  two  young  mulatto  girls,  with  large,  black,  drooping 
eyes,  and  headgear  after  the  fashion  of  the  hostess,  who 
are  as  shy,  or  feign  to  be,  as  though  they  never  danced  be 
fore,  and  so  look  down  before  the  visitors,  that  their  part- 
ners can  see  nothing  but  the  long  fringed  lashes. 

But  the  dance  commences.  Every  gentleman  sets  as 
long  as  he  likes  to  the  opposite  lady,  and  the  opposite  lady 
to  him,  and  all  are  so  long  about  it  that  the  sport  begins  to 
languish,  when  suddenly  the  lively  hero  dashes  in  to  the 
rescue.  Instantly  the  fiddler  grins,  and  goes  at  it  tooth 
and  nail;  there  is  new  energy  in  the  tambourine;  new 
laughter  in  the  dancers;  new  smiles  in  the  landlady;  new 
confidence  in  the  landlord;  new  brightness  in  the  very 
candles.  Single  shufiie,  double  shuffle,  cut  and  cross-cut ; 
snapping  his  fingers,  rolling  his  eyes,  turning  in  his  knees, 
presenting  the  backs  of  his  legs  in  front,  spinning  about  on 
his  toes  and  heels  like  nothing  but  the  man's  fingers  on  the 
tambourine;  dancing  with  two  left  legs,  two  right  legs,  two 
wooden  legs,  two  wire  legs,  two  spring  legs — all  sorts  of 
legs  and  no  legs — what  is  this  to  him?  And  in  what  walk 
of  life,  or  dance  of  life,  does  man  ever  get  such  stimulating 
applause  as  thunders  about  him,  when,  having  danced  his 
partner  off  her  feet,  and  himself  too,  he  finishes  by  leaping 
gloriously  on  the  bar-counter,  and  calling  for  something  to 
drink,  with  the  chuckle  of  a  million  of  counterfeit  Jim 
Crows,  in  one  inimitable  sound ! 

The  air,  even  in  these  distempered  parts,  is  fresh  after 
the  stifling  atmosphere  of  the  houses;  and  now,  as  we 
emerge  into  a  broader  street,  it  blows  upon  us  with  a  purer 
breath,  and  the  stars  look  bright  again.  Here  are  The 
Tombs  once  more.  The  city  watch-house  is  a  part  of  the 
building.  It  follows  naturally  on  the  sights  we  have  just 
left.     Let  us  see  that,  and  then  to  bed. 

What !  do  you  thrust  your  common  offenders  against  the 
police  discipline  of  the  town,  into  such  holes  as  these?  Do 
men  and  women,  against  whom  no  crime  is  proved,  lie  here 
all  night  in  perfect  darkness,  surrounded  by  the  noisome 
vapours  which  encircle  that  flagging  lamp  you  light  us 
with,  and  breathing  this  filthy  and  offensive  stench !  Why, 
such  indecent  and  disgusting  dungeons  as  these  cells,  would 
bring  disgrace  upon  the  most  despotic  empire  in  the  world  I 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  91 

Look  at  them,  man — you,  who  see  them  every  night,  and 
keep  the  keys.  Do  you  see  what  they  are?  Do  you  know 
how  drains  are  made  below  the  streets,  and  wherein  these 
human  sewers  differ,  except  in  being  always  stagnant? 

Well,  he  don't  know.  He  has  had  five-and-twenty  young 
women  locked  up  in  this  very  cell  at  one  time,  and  you'd 
hardly  realise  what  handsome  faces  there  were  among  'em. 

In  God's  name !  shut  the  door  upon  the  wretched  creat- 
ure who  is  in  it  now,  and  put  its  screen  before  a  place, 
quite  unsurpassed  in  all  the  vice,  neglect,  and  devilry,  of 
the  worst  old  town  in  Europe. 

Are  people  really  left  all  night,  untried,  in  those  black 
sties? — Every  night.  The  watch  is  set  at  seven  in  the 
evening.  The  magistrate  opens  his  court  at  five  in  the 
morning.  That  is  the  earliest  hour  at  which  the  first  pris- 
oner can  be  released;  and  if  an  officer  appear  against  him, 
he  is  not  taken  out  till  nine  o'clock  or  ten. — But  if  any  one 
among  them  die  in  the  interval,  as  one  man  did,  not  long 
ago?  Then  he  is  half-eaten  by  the  rats  in  an  hour's  time; 
as  that  man  was;  and  there  au  end. 

What  is  this  intolerable  tolling  of  great  bells,  and  crash- 
ing of  wheels,  and  shouting  in  the  distance?  A  fire.  And 
what  that  deep  red  light  in  the  opposite  direction?  An- 
other fire.  And  what  these  charred  and  blackened  walls 
we  stand  before?  A  dwelling  where  a  fire  has  been.  It 
was  more  than  hinted,  in  an  official  report,  not  long  ago, 
that  some  of  these  conflagrations  were  not  wholly  acci- 
dental, and  that  speculation  and  enterprise  found  a  field  of 
exertion,  even  in  flames :  but  be  this  as  it  may,  there  was  a 
fire  last  night,  there  are  two  to-night,  and  you  may  lay  an 
even  wager  there  will  be  at  least  one,  to-morrow.  So,  car- 
rying that  with  us  for  our  comfort,  let  us  say,  Good  night, 
and  climb  up  stairs  to  bed. 

One  day,  during  my  stay  in  New  York,  I  paid  a  visit  to 
the  different  public  institutions  on  Long  Island.  One  of 
them  is  a  Lunatic  Asylum.  The  building  is  handsome; 
and  is  remarkable  for  a  spacious  and  elegant  staircase. 
The  whole  structure  is  not  yet  finished,  but  it  is  already 
one  of  considerable  size  and  extent,  and  is  capable  of  ac- 
commodating a  very  large  number  of  patients. 

I  cannot  say  that  I  derived  much  comfort  from  the  in- 
spection of  this  charity.     The  different  wards  might  have 


92  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

been  cleaner  and  better  ordered;  I  saw  nothing  of  that  sal- 
utary system  which  had  impressed  me  so  favorably  else- 
where; and  everything  had  a  lounging,  listless,  madhouse 
air,  which  was  very  painful.  The  moping  idiot,  cowering 
down  with  long  dishevelled  hair;  the  gibbering  maniac, 
with  his  hideous  laugh  and  pointed  finger;  the  vacant  eye, 
the  fierce  wild  face,  the  gloomy  picking  of  the  hands  and 
lips,  and  munching  of  the  nails :  there  they  were  all,  with- 
out disguise,  in  naked  ugliness  and  horror.  In  the  dining- 
room,  a  bare,  dull,  dreary  place,  Avith  nothing  for  the  eye 
to  rest  on  but  the  empty  walls,  a  woman  was  locked  up 
alone.  She  was  bent,  they  told  me,  on  committing  sui- 
cide. If  anything  could  have  strengthened  lier  in  her  reso- 
lution, it  would  certainly  have  been  the  insupportable  mo- 
notony of  such  an  existence. 

The  terrible  crowd  Avith  which  these  halls  and  galleries 
were  filled,  so  shocked  me,  that  I  abridged  my  stay  within 
the  shortest  limits,  and  declined  to  see  that  portion  of  the 
building  in  which  the  refractory  and  violent  were  under 
closer  restraint.  I  have  no  doubt  that  the  gentleman  who 
presided  over  this  establishment  at  the  time  I  write  of, 
was  competent  to  manage  it,  and  had  done  all  in  his  power 
to  promote  its  usefulness :  but  will  it  be  believed  that  the 
miserable  strife  of  Party  feeling  is  carried  even  into  this 
sad  refuge  of  afflicted  and  degraded  humanity?  Will  it  be 
believed  that  the  eyes  which  are  to  watch  over  and  control 
the  wanderings  of  minds  on  which  the  most  dreadful  visita- 
tion to  which  our  nature  is  exposed  has  fallen,  must  wear 
the  glasses  of  some  wretched  side  in  Politics?  Will  it  be 
believed  that  the  governor  of  such  a  house  as  this,  is  ap- 
pointed, and  deposed,  and  changed  perpetually,  as  Parties 
fluctuate  and  vary,  and  as  their  despicable  weathercocks  are 
blown  this  way  or  that?  A  hundred  times  in  every  week, 
some  new  most  paltry  exhibition  of  that  narrow-minded  and 
injurious  Party  Spirit,  which  is  the  Simoom  of  America, 
sickening  and  blighting  everything  of  wholesome  life  within 
its  reach,  was  forced  upon  my  notice;  but  I  never  turned  my 
back  upon  it  with  feelings  of  such  deep  disgust  and  meas- 
ureless contempt,  as  when  I  crossed  the  threshold  of  this 
madhouse  on  Long  Island. 

At  a  short  distance  from  this  building  is  another  called 
the  Alms  House,  that  is  to  say,  the  workhouse  of  New 
York.     This  is  a  large  Institution  also :  lodging,  I  believe. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  93 

when  I  was  there,  nearly  a  thousand  poor.  It  was  badly 
ventilated,  and  badly  lighted;  was  not  too  clean;  and  im- 
pressed me,  on  the  whole,  very  uncomfortably.  But  it 
must  be  remembered  that  New  York,  as  a  great  emporium 
of  commerce,  and  as  a  place  of  general  resort,  not  only  from 
all  parts  of  the  States,  but  from  most  parts  of  the  world, 
has  always  a  large  pauper  population  to  provide  for;  and 
labours,  therefore,  under  peculiar  difficulties  in  this  respect. 
Nor  must  it  be  forgotten  that  New  York  is  a  large  town, 
and  that  in  all  large  towns  a  vast  amount  of  good  and  evil 
is  intermixed  and  jumbled  up  together. 

In  the  same  neighbourhood  is  the  Long  Island  Farm, 
where  young  orphans  are  nursed  and  bred.  I  did  not  see 
it,  but  I  believe  it  is  well  conducted;  and  I  can  the  more 
easily  credit  it,  from  knowing  how  mindful  they  usually 
are,  in  America,  of  that  beautiful  passage  in  the  Litany 
which  remembers  all  sick  persons  and  young  children. 

I  was  taken  to  these  Institutions  by  water,  in  a  boat  be- 
longing to  the  Long  Island  Jail,  and  rowed  by  a  crew  of 
prisoners,  who  were  dressed  in  a  striped  uniform  of  black 
and  buff,  in  which  they  looked  like  faded  tigers.  They 
took  me,  by  the  same  conveyance,  to  the  Jail  itself. 

It  is  an  old  prison,  and  quite  a  pioneer  establishment,  on 
the  plan  I  have  already  described.  I  was  glad  to  hear  this, 
for  it  is  imquestionably  a  very  indifferent  one.  The  most 
is  made,  however,  of  the  means  it  possesses,  and  it  is  as 
well  regulated  as  such  a  place  can  be. 

The  women  work  in  covered  sheds,  erected  for  that  pur- 
pose. If  I  remember  right,  there  are  no  shops  for  the  men, 
but  be  that  as  it  may,  the  greater  part  of  them  labour  in 
certain  stone-quarries  near  at  hand.  The  day  being  very 
wet  indeed,  this  labour  was  suspended,  and  the  prisoners 
were  in  their  cells.  Imagine  these  cells,  some  two  or  three 
hundred  in  number,  and  in  every  one  a  man  locked  up :  this 
one  at  his  door  for  air,  with  his  hands  thrust  through  the 
grate;  this  one  in  bed  (in  the  middle  of  the  day,  remem- 
ber); and  this  one  flung  down  in  a  heap  upon  the  ground, 
with  his  head  against  the  bars,  like  a  wild  beast.  Make 
the  rain  pour  down,  outside,  in  torrents.  Put  the  everlast- 
ing stove  in  the  midst :  hot,  and  suffocating,  and  vaporous, 
as  a  witch's  cauldron.  Add  a  collection  of  gentle  odours, 
such  as  would  arise  from  a  thousand  mildewed  umbrellas, 
wet  through,  and  a   thousand   buck-baskets,  full  of  half- 


94  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

washed  linen — and  there  is  the  prison,  as  it  was  that 
day. 

The  prison  for  the  State  at  Sing  Sing,  is,  on  the  other 
hand,  a  model  jail.  That,  and  Mount  Auburn,  are  the 
largest  and  best  examples  of  the  silent  system. 

In  another  part  of  the  city,  is  the  Refuge  for  the  Desti- 
tute: an  Institution  whose  object  is  to  reclaim  youthful 
offenders,  male  and  female,  black  and  white,  without  dis- 
tinction; to  teach  them  useful  trades,  apprentice  them  to 
respectable  masters,  and  make  them  worthy  members  of 
society.  Its  design,  it  will  be  seen,  is  similar  to  that  at 
Boston;  and  it  is  a  no  less  meritorious  and  admirable  estab- 
lishment. A  suspicion  crossed  my  mind  during  my  inspec- 
tion of  this  noble  charity,  whether  the  superintendent  had 
quite  sufficient  knowledge  of  the  world  and  worldly  char- 
acters; and  whether  he  did  not  commit  a  great  mistake  in 
treating  some  young  girls,  who  were  to  all  intents  and  pur- 
poses, by  their  years  and  their  past  lives,  women,  as  though 
they  were  little  children;  which  certainly  had  a  ludicrous 
effect  in  my  eyes,  and,  or  I  am  much  mistaken,  in  theirs 
also.  As  the  Institution,  however,  is  always  under  the 
vigilant  examination  of  a  body  of  gentlemen  of  great  intel- 
ligence and  experience,  it  cannot  fail  to  be  well  conducted; 
and  whether  I  am  right  or  wrong  in  this  slight  particular, 
is  unimportant  to  its  deserts  and  character,  which  it  would 
be  difficult  to  estimate  too  highly. 

In  addition  to  these  establishments,  there  are,  in  New 
York,  excellent  hospitals  and  schools,  literary  institutions 
and  libraries;  an  admirable  fire  department  (as  indeed  it 
should  be,  having  constant  practice),  and  charities  of  every 
sort  and  kind.  In  the  suburbs  there  is  a  spacious  ceme- 
tery; unfinished  yet,  but  every  day  improving.  The  sad- 
dest tomb  I  saw  there  was  "The  Strangers'  Grave.  Dedi- 
cated to  the  different  hotels  in  this  city." 

There  are  three  theatres.  Two  of  them,  the  Park  and 
the  Bowery,  are  large,  elegant,  and  handsome  buildiugs, 
and  are,  I  grieve  to  write  it,  generally  deserted.  The 
third,  the  Olympic,  is  a  tiny  show-box  for  vaudevilles  and 
burlesques.  It  is  singularly  well  conducted  by  Mr.  Mitchell, 
a  comic  actor  of  great  quiet  humour  and  originality,  who 
is  well  remembered  and  esteemed  by  London  playgoers.  I 
am  happy  to  report  of  this  deserving  gentleman,  that  his 
benches  are  usually  well  filled,  and  that  his  theatre,  rings 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  96 

with  merriment  every  night.  I  had  almost  forgotten  a 
small  summer  theatre,  called  Niblo's,  with  gardens  and 
open-air  amusements  attached;  but  I  believe  it  is  not  ex- 
empt from  the  general  depression  under  which  Theatrical 
Property,  or  what  is  humorously  called  by  that  name,  un- 
fortunately labours. 

The  country  round  New  York,  is  surpassingly  and  ex- 
quisitely picturesque.  The  climate,  as  I  have  aleady  inti- 
mated, is  somewhat  of  the  warmest.  What  it  would  be, 
without  the  sea  breezes  which  come  from  its  beautiful  Bay 
in  the  evening  time,  I  will  not  throw  myself  or  my  readers 
into  a  fever  by  inquiring. 

The  tone  of  the  best  society  in  this  city,  is  like  that  of 
Boston;  here  and  there,  it  may  be,  with  a  greater  infusion 
of  the  mercantile  spirit,  but  generally  polished  and  refined, 
and  always  most  hospitable.  The  houses  and  tables  are 
elegant;  the  hours  later  and  more  rakish;  and  there  is, 
perhaps,  a  greater  spirit  of  contention  in  reference  to 
appearances,  and  the  display  of  wealth  and  costly  living. 
The  ladies  are  singularly  beautiful. 

Before  I  left  New  York  I  made  arrangements  for  secur- 
ing a  passage  home  in  the  George  Washington  packet  ship, 
which  was  advertised  to  sail  in  June :  that  being  the  month 
in  which  I  had  determined,  if  prevented  by  no  accident  in 
the  course  of  my  ramblings,  to  leave  America. 

I  never  thought  that  going  back  to  England,  returning 
to  all  who  are  dear  to  me,  and  to  pursuits  that  have  insen- 
sibly grown  to  be  a  part  of  my  nature,  1  could  have  felt  so 
much  sorrow  as  I  endured,  when  I  parted  at  last,  on  board 
this  ship,  with  the  friends  who  had  accompanied  me  from 
this  city.  I  never  thought  the  name  of  any  place,  so  far 
away  and  so  lately  known,  could  ever  associate  itself  in  my 
mind  with  the  crowd  of  affectionate  remembrances  that  now 
cluster  about  it.  There  are  those  in  this  city  who  would 
brighten,  to  me,  the  darkest  winter-day  that  ever  glim- 
mered and  went  out  in  Lapland;  and  before  whose  presence 
even  Home  grew  dim,  when  they  and  I  exchanged  that 
painful  word  which  mingles  with  our  every  thought  and 
deed;  which  haunts  our  cradle-heads  in  infancy,  and  closes 
up  the  vista  of  our  lives  in  age. 


96  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

CHAPTER    THE    SEVENTH. 

PHILADELPHIA,   AND  ITS  SOLITARY  PRISON. 

The  journey  from  New  York  to  Philadelphia,  is  made 
by  railroad,  and  two  ferries;  and  usually  occupies  between 
five  and  six  hours.  It  was  a  fine  evening  when  we  were 
passengers  in  the  train:  and,  watching  the  bright  sunset 
from  a  little  window  near  the  door  by  which  we  sat,  my 
attention  was  attracted  to  a  remarkable  appearance  issuing 
from  the  windows  of  the  gentlemen's  car  immediately  in 
front  of  us,  which  I  supposed  for  some  time  Avas  occasioned 
by  a  number  of  industrious  persons  inside,  ripping  open 
feather-beds,  and  giving  the  feathers  to  the  wind.  At 
length  it  occurred  to  me  that  they  were  only  spitting,  which 
was  indeed  the  case;  though  how  any  number  of  passengers 
which  it  WHS  possible  for  that  car  to  contain,  could  have 
maintained  such  a  playful  and  incessant  shower  of  exj^ec- 
toration,  I  am  still  at  a  loss  to  understand :  notwithstand- 
ing the  experience  in  all  salivatory  phenomena  which  I  after- 
wards acquired.  ' 

I  made  acquaintance,  on  this  journey,  with  a  mild  and 
modest  young  Quaker,  who  opened  the  discourse  by  inform- 
ing me,  in  a  grave  whisper,  that  his  grandfather  was  the 
inventor  of  cold-drawn  castor  oil.  I  mention  the  circum- 
stance here,  thinking  it  probable  that  this  is  the  first  occa- 
sion on  which  the  valuable  medicine  in  question  was  ever 
used  as  a  conversational  aperient. 

We  reached  the  city,  late  that  night.  Looking  out  of 
my  chamber- window,  before  going  to  bed,  I  saw,  on  the  op- 
posite side  of  the  way,  a  handsome  building  of  white  mar- 
ble, which  had  a  mournful  ghost-like  aspect,  dreary  to 
behold.  I  attributed  this  to  the  sombre  influence  of  the 
night,  and  on  rising  in  the  morning  looked  out  again,  ex- 
pecting to  see  its  steps  and  portico  thronged  with  groups  of 
people  passing  in  and  out.  The  door  was  still  tight  shut, 
however;  the  same  cold  cheerless  air  prevailed;  and  the 
building  looked  as  if  the  marble  statue  of  Don  Guzman 
could  alone  have  any  business  to  transact  within  its  gloomy 
walls.     I  hastened  to  inquire  its  name  and  purpose,  and 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  97 

then  my  surprise  vanished.  It  was  the  Tomb  of  many  for- 
tunes; the  Great  Catacomb  of  investment;  the  memorable 
United  States  Bank. 

The  stoppage  of  this  bank,  with  all  its  ruinous  conse- 
quences, had  cast  (as  I  was  told  on  every  side)  a  gloom  on 
Pliiladeli)hia,  under  the  depressing  effect  of  which  it  yet 
laboured.  It  certainly  did  seem  rather  dull  and  out  of 
spirits. 

It  is  a  handsome  city,  but  distractingly  regular.  After 
walking  about  it  for  an  hour  or  two,  I  felt  that  I  would 
have  given  the  world  for  a  crooked  street.  The  collar  of 
my  coat  appeared  to  stiffen,  and  the  brim  of  my  hat  to 
expand,  beneath  its  Quakerly  influence.  My  hair  shrank 
into  a  sleek  short  crop,  my  hands  folded  themselves  upon 
my  breast  of  their  own  calm  accord,  and  thoughts  of  taking 
lodgings  in  Mark  Lane  over  against  the  Market  Place,  and 
of  making  a  large  fortune  by  speculations  in  corn,  came 
over  me  involuntarily. 

Philadelphia  is  most  bountifully  provided  with  fresh 
water,  which  is  showered  and  jerked  about,  and  turned 
on,  and  poured  off,  everywhere.  The  Waterworks,  which 
are  on  a  height  near  the  city,  are  no  less  ornamental  than 
useful,  being  tastefully  laid  out  as  a  public  garden,  and 
kept  in  the  best  and  neatest  order.  The  river  is  dammed 
at  this  point,  and  forced  by  its  own  power  into  certain  high 
tanks  or  reservoirs,  whence  the  whole  city,  to  the  top 
stories  of  the  houses,  is  supplied  at  a  very  trifling  expense. 

There  are  various  public  institutions.  Among  them  a 
most  excellent  Hospital — a  Quaker  establishment,  but  not 
sectarian  in  the  great  benefits  it  confers;  a  quiet,  quaint 
old  Library,  named  after  Franklin;  a  handsome  Exchange 
and  Post  Office;  and  so  forth.  In  connection  with  the 
Quaker  Hospital,  there  is  a  picture  by  West,  which  is  ex- 
hibited for  the  benefit  of  the  fuiids  of  the  institution.  The 
subject  is,  our  Saviour  healing  the  sick,  and  it  is,  perhaps, 
as  favourable  a  specimen  of  the  master  as  can  be  seen  any- 
where. Whether  this  be  high  or  low  praise,  depends  upon 
the  reader's  taste. 

In  the  same  room,  there  is  a  very  characteristic  and  life- 
like portrait  by  Mr.  Sully,  a  distinguished  American  artist. 

My  stay  in  Philadelphia  was  very  short,  but  what  I  saw 
of  its  society,  I  greatly  liked.  Treating  of  its  general  char- 
acteristics, I  should  be  disposed  to  say  that  it  is  more  pro- 


98  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

vincial  than  Boston  or  New  York,  and  that  there  is,  afloat 
iu  the  fair  city,  an  assumption  of  taste  and  criticism,  sa- 
vouring rather  of  those  genteel  discussions  upon  the  same 
themes,  in  connection  with  Shakspeare  and  the  Musical 
Glasses,  of  which  we  read  iu  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield. 
Near  the  cit}-,  is  a  most  splendid  unfinished  marble  struc- 
ture for  the  Girard  College,  founded  by  a  deceased  gentle- 
man of  that  name  and  of  enormous  wealth,  which,  if  com- 
pleted according  to  the  original  design,  will  be  perhaps  the 
richest  edifice  of  modern  times.  But  the  bequest  is  in- 
volved in  legal  disputes,  and  pending  them  the  work  has 
stopped;  so  that  like  many  other,  great  undertakings  in 
America,  even  this  is  rather  going  to  be  done  one  of  these 
days,  than  doing  now. 

In  the  outskirts,  stands  a  great  prison,  called  the  Eastern 
Penitentiary :  conducted  on  a  plan  peculiar  to  the  state  of 
Pennsylvania.  The  system  here  is  rigid,  strict,  and  hope- 
less solitary  confinement,  I  believe  it,  in  its  effects,  to  be 
cruel  and  wrong. 

In  its  intention,  I  am  well  convinced  that  it  is  kind,  hu- 
mane, and  meant  for  reformation ;  but  I  am  persuaded  that 
those  who  devised  this  system  of  Prison  Discipline,  and 
those  benevolent  gentlemen  who  carry  it  into  execution,  do 
not  know  what  it  is  that  they  are  doing.  I  believe  that 
very  few  men  are  capable  of  estimating  the  immense  amount 
of  torture  and  agony  which  this  dreadful  punishment,  pro- 
longed for  years,  inflicts  upon  the  sufferers;  and  in  guess- 
ing at  it  myself,  and  in  reasoning  from  what  I  have  seen 
written  upon  their  faces,  and  what  to  my  certain  knowledge 
they  feel  within,  I  am  only  the  more  convinced  that  there 
is  a  depth  of  terrible  endurance  in  it  which  none  but  the 
sufferers  themselves  can  fathom,  and  which  no  man  has  a 
right  to  inflict  upon  his  fellow-creature.  I  hold  this  slow 
and  daily  tampering  with  the  mysteries  of  the  brain,  to  be 
immeasurably  worse  than  any  torture  of  the  body :  and  be- 
cause its  ghastly  signs  and  tokens  are  not  so  palpable  to 
the  eye  and  sense  of  touch  as  scars  upon  the  flesh;  because 
its  wounds  are  not  upon  the  surface,  and  it  extorts  few 
cries  that  human  ears  can  hear;  therefore  I  the  more  de- 
nounce it,  as  a  secret  punishment  which  slumbering  human- 
ity is  not  roused  up  to  stay.  I  hesitated  once,  debating 
with  myself,  whether,  if  I  had  the  power  of  saying  "  Yes  " 
or  "No,"  I  would  allow  it  to  be  tried  in  certain  cases, 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  99 

where  the  terms  of  imprisonment  were  short;  but  now,  I 
solemnly  declare,  that  with  no  rewards  or  honours  could  I 
walk  a  happy  man  beneath  the  open  sky  by  day,  or  lie  me 
down  upon  my  bed  at  night,  with  the  consciousness  that 
one  human  creature,  for  any  length  of  time,  no  matter 
what,  lay  suffering  this  unknown  punishment  in  his  silent 
cell,  and  I  the  cause,  or  I  consenting  to  it  in  the  least 
degree. 

I  was  accompanied  to  this  prison  by  two  gentlemen  offi- 
cially connected  with  its  management,  and  passed  the  day 
in  going  from  cell  to  cell,  and  talking  with  the  inmates. 
Every  facility  was  afforded  me,  that  the  utmost  courtesy 
could  suggest.  Nothing  was  concealed  or  hidden  from  my 
view,  and  every  piece  of  information  that  I  sought,  was 
openly  and  frankly  given.  The  perfect  order  of  the  build- 
ing cannot  be  praised  too  highly,  and  of  the  excellent  mo- 
tives of  all  who  are  immediately  concerned  in  the  adminis- 
tration of  the  system,  there  can  be  no  kind  of  question. 

Between  the  body  of  the  prison  and  the  outer  wall,  there 
is  a  spacious  garden.  Entering  it,  by  a  wicket  in  the  mas- 
sive gate,  we  pursued  the  path  before  us  to  its  other  ter- 
mination, and  passed  into  a  large  chamber,  from  which  seven 
long  passages  radiate.  On  either  side  of  each,  is  a  long, 
long  row  of  low  cell-doors,  with  a  certain  number  over  ev- 
ery one.  Above,  a  gallery  of  cells  like  those  below,  except 
that  they  have  no  narrow  yard  attached  (as  those  in  the 
ground  tier  have),  and  are  somewhat  smaller.  The  posses- 
sion of  two  of  these,  is  supposed  to  compensate  for  the 
absence  of  so  much  air  and  exercise  as  can  be  had  in  the 
dull  strip  attached  to  each  of  the  others,  in  an  hour's  time 
every  day;  and  therefore  every  prisoner  in  this  upper 
story  has  two  cells,  adjoining  and  communicating  with 
each  other. 

Standing  at  the  central  point,  and  looking  down  these 
dreary  passages,  the  dull  repose  and  quiet  that  prevail,  is 
awful.  Occasionally,  there  is  a  drowsy  sound  from  some 
lone  weaver's  shuttle,  or  shoemaker's  last,  but  it  is  stifled 
by  the  thick  walls  and  heavy  dungeon-door,  and  only  serves 
to  make  the  general  stillness  more  profound.  Over  the 
head  and  face  of  every  prisoner  who  comes  into  this  mel- 
ancholy house,  a  black  hood  is  drawn;  and  in  this  dark 
shroud,  an  emblem  of  the  curtain  dropped  between  him  and 
the  living  world,  he  is  led  to  the  cell  from  which  he  never 


100  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

again  comes  forth,  until  his  whole  term  of  imprisonment 
has  expired.  He  never  hears  of  wife  or  children;  home  or 
friends;  the  life  or  death  of  any  single  creature.  He  sees 
the  prison-officers,  but  with  that  exception  he  never  looks 
upon  a  human  countenance,  or  hears  a  human  voice.  He 
is  a  man  buried  alive;  to  be  dug  out  in  the  slow  round  of 
years;  and  in  the  mean  time  dead  to  everything  but  tortur- 
ing anxieties  and  horrible  despair. 

His  name,  and  crime,  and  term  of  suffering,  are  un- 
known, even  to  the  officer  who  delivers  him  his  daily  food. 
There  is  a  number  over  his  cell-door,  and  in  a  book  of 
which  the  governor  of  the  prison  has  one  copy,  and  the 
moral  instructor  another :  this  is  the  index  to  his  history. 
Beyond  these  pages  the  prison  has  no  record  of  his  exist- 
ence :  and  though  he  live  to  be  in  the  same  cell  ten  weary 
years,  he  has  no  means  of  knowing,  down  to  the  very  last 
hour,  in  what  part  of  the  building  it  is  situated ;  what  kind 
of  men  there  are  about  him;  whether  in  the  long  winter 
nights  there  are  living  people  near,  or  he  is  in  some  lonely 
corner  of  the  great  jail,  with  walls,  and  passages,  and  iron 
doors  between  him  and  the  nearest  sharer  in  its  solitary 
horrors. 

Every  cell  has  double  doors:  the  outer  one  of  sturdy 
oak,  the  other  of  grated  iron,  wherein  there  is  a  trap 
through  which  his  food  is  handed.  He  has  a  Bible,  and  a 
slate  and  pencil,  and,  under  certain  restrictions,  has  some- 
times other  books,  provided  for  the  purpose,  and  pen  and 
ink  and  paper.  His  razor,  plate,  and  can,  and  basin,  hang 
upon  the  wall,  or  shine  upon  the  little  shelf.  Fresh  water 
is  laid  on  in  every  cell,  and  he  can  draw  it  at  his  pleasure. 
During  the  day,  his  bedstead  turns  up  against  the  wall, 
and  leaves  more  space  for  him  to  work  in.  His  loom,  or 
bench,  or  wheel,  is  there;  and  there  he  labours,  sleeps,  and 
wakes,  and  counts  the  seasons  as  they  change,  and  grows 
old. 

The  first  man  I  saw,  was  seated  at  his  loom,  at  work. 
He  had  been  there  six  years,  and  was  to  remain,  I  think, 
three  more.  He  had  been  convicted  as  a  receiver  of  stolen 
goods,  but  even  after  this  long  imprisonment,  denied  his 
guilt,  and  said  he  had  been  hardly  dealt  by.  It  was  his 
second  offence. 

He  stopped  his  work  when  we  went  in,  took  off  his  spec- 
tacles, and  answered  freely  to  everything  that  was  said  to 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  101 

him,  but  always  with  a  strange  kind  of  pause  first,  and  in 
a  low,  thoughtful  voice.  He  wore  a  paper  hat  of  his  own 
making,  and  was  pleased  to  have  it  noticed  and  commended. 
He  had  very  ingeniously  manufactured  a  sort  of  Dutch  clock 
from  some  disregarded  odds  and  ends;  and  his  vinegar- 
bottle  served  for  ihe  pendulum.  Seeing  me  interested  in 
this  contrivance,  he  looked  up  at  it  with  a  great  deal  of 
pride,  and  said  that  he  had  been  thinking  of  improving  it, 
and  that  he  hoped  the  hammer  and  a  little  piece  of  broken 
glass  beside  it  "would  play  music  before  long."  He  had 
extracted  some  colours  from  the  yarn  with  whicli  he  worked, 
and  painted  a  few  poor  figures  on  the  wall.  One,  of  a  fe- 
male, over  the  door,  he  called  "The  Lady  of  the  Lake." 

He  smiled  as  I  looked  at  these  contrivances  to  wile  away 
the  time;  but  when  I  looked  from  them  to  him,  I  saw  that 
his  lip  trembled,  and  could  have  counted  the  beating  of 
his  heart.  I  forget  how  it  came  about,  but  some  allusion 
was  made  to  his  having  a  wife.  He  shook  his  head  at  the 
word,  turned  aside,  and  covered  his  face  with  his  hands. 

"  But  you  are  resigned  now !  "  said  one  of  the  gentlemen 
after  a  short  pause,  during  which  he  had  resumed  his  former 
manner.  He  answered  with  a  sigh  that  seemed  quite  reck- 
less in  its  hopelessness,  "  Oh  yes,  oh  yes !  I  am  resigned  to 
it."  "And  are  a  better  man,  you  think?  "  "  Well,  I  hope 
so:  I'm  sure  I  hope  I  may  be."  "And  time  goes  pretty 
quickly?"  "Time  is  very  long,  gentlemen,  within  these 
four  walls ! " 

He  gazed  about  him — Heaven  only  knows  how  wearily ! 
— as  he  said  these  words;  and  in  the  act  of  doing  so,  fell 
into  a  strange  stare  as  if  he  had  forgotten  something.  A 
moment  afterwards  he  sighed  heavily,  put  on  his  specta- 
cles, and  went  about  his  work  again. 

In  another  cell,  there  was  a  German,  sentenced  to  five 
years'  imprisonment  for  larceny,  two  of  which  had  just  ex- 
pired. With  colours  procured  in  the  same  manner,  he  had 
painted  every  inch  of  the  walls  and  ceiling  quite  beautiful- 
ly. He  had  laid  out  the  few  feet  of  ground,  behind,  with 
exquisite  neatness,  and  had  made  a  lit^,le  bed  in  the  centre, 
that  looked  by  the  bye  like  a  grave.  The  taste  and  ingenu- 
ity he  had  displayed  in  everything  were  most  extraordinary; 
and  yet  a  more  dejected,  heart-broken,  wretched  creature, 
it  would  be  difficult  to  imagine.  I  never  saw  such  a  pic- 
ture of  forlorn  affliction  and  distress  of  mind.     My  heart 


102  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

bled  for  him;  and  when  the  tears  ran  down  his  cheeks,  and 
he  took  one  of  the  visitors  aside,  to  ask,  with  his  trembling 
hands  nervously  clutching  at  his  coat  to  detain  him,  whether 
there  was  no  hope  of  his  dismal  sentence  being  commuted, 
the  spectacle  was  really  too  painful  to  witness.  I  never  saw 
or  heard  of  any  kind  of  misery  that  impressed  me  more  than 
the  wretchedness  of  this  man. 

In  a  third  cell,  was  a  tall  strong  black,  a  burglar,  work- 
ing at  his  proper  trade  of  making  screws  and  the  like.  His 
time  was  nearly  out.  He  was  not  only  a  very  dexterous 
thief,  but  was  notorious  for  his  boldness  and  hardihood, 
and  for  the  number  of  his  previous  convictions.  He  enter- 
tained us  with  a  long  account  of  his  achievements,  which 
he  narrated  with  such  infinite  relish,  that  he  actually 
seemed  to  lick  his  lips  as  he  told  us  racy  anecdotes  of  stolen 
plate,  and  of  old  ladies  whom  he  had  watched  as  they  sat 
at  windows  in  silver  spectacles  (he  had  plainly  had  an  eye 
to  their  metal  even  from  the  other  side  of  the  street),  and 
had  afterwards  robbed.  This  fellow,  upon  the  slightest 
encouragement,  would  have  mingled  with  his  professional 
recollections  the  most  detestable  cant;  but  I  am  very  much 
mistaken  if  he  could  have  surpassed  the  unmitigated  hy- 
pocrisy with  which  he  declared  that  he  blessed  the  day  on 
which  he  came  into  that  prison,  and  that  he  never  would 
commit  another  robbery  as  long  as  he  lived. 

There  was  one  man  who  was  allowed,  as  an  indulgence, 
to  keep  rabbits.  His  room  having  rather  a  close  smell  in 
consequence,  they  called  to  him  at  the  door  to  come  out 
into  the  passage.  He  complied  of  course,  and  stood  shad- 
ing his  haggard  face  in  the  unwonted  sunlight  of  the  great 
window,  looking  as  wan  and  unearthly  as  if  he  had  been 
summoned  from  the  grave.  He  had  a  white  rabbit  in  his 
breast;  and  when  the  little  creature,  getting  down  upon  the 
ground,  stole  back  into  the  cell,  and  he,  being  dismissed, 
crept  timidly  after  it,  I  thought  it  would  have  been  very 
hard  to  say  in  what  respect  the  man  was  the  nobler  animal 
of  the  two. 

There  was  an  English  thief,  who  had  been  there  but  a 
few  days  out  of  seven  years:  a  villainous,  low-browed, 
thin-lipped  fellow,  with  a  white  face;  who  had  as  yet  no 
relish  for  visitors,  and  who,  but  for  the  additional  penalty, 
would  have  gladly  stabbed  me  with  his  shoemaker's  knife. 
There  was  another  German  who  had  entered  the  jail  but 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  103 

yesterday,  and  who  started  from  his  bed  when  we  looked 
in,  and  pleaded,  in  his  broken  English,  very  hard  for  work. 
There  was  a  poet,  who  after  doing  two  days'  work  in  every 
four-and-twenty  hours,  one  for  himself  and  one  for  the 
prison,  wrote  verses  about  ships  (he  was  by  trade  a  mari- 
ner), and  "the  maddening  wine-cup,"  and  his  friends  at 
home.  There  were  very  many  of  them.  Some  reddened 
at  the  sight  of  visitors,  and  some  turned  very  pale.  Some 
two  or  three  had  prisoner  nurses  with  them,  for  they  were 
very  sick;  and  one,  a  fat  old  negro  whose  leg  had  been 
taken  off  within  the  jail,  had  for  his  attendant  a  classical 
scholar  and  an  accomplished  surgeon,  himself  a  prisoner 
likewise.  Sitting  upon  the  stairs,  engaged  in  some  slight 
work,  was  a  pretty  coloured  boy.  "  Is  there  no  refuge  for 
young  criminals  in  Philadelphia,  then?"  said  I.  "Yes, 
but  only  for  white  children."     Noble  aristocracy  in  crime ! 

There  was  a  sailor  who  had  been  there  upwards  of  eleven 
years,  and  who  in  a  few  months'  time  would  be  free. 
Eleven  years  of  solitary  confinement ! 

"  I  am  very  glad  to  hear  your  time  is  nearly  out."  What 
does  he  say?  Nothing.  Why  does  he  stare  at  his  hands, 
and  pick  the  flesh  upon  his  fingers,  and  raise  his  eyes  for 
an  instant,  every  now  and  then,  to  those  bare  walls  which 
have  seen  his  head  turn  grey?  It  is  a  way  he  has  some- 
times. 

Does  he  never  look  men  in  the  face,  and  does  he  always 
pluck  at  those  hands  of  his,  as  though  he  were  bent  on 
parting  skin  and  bone?     It  is  his  humour :  nothing  more. 

It  is  his  humour  too,  to  say  that  he  does  not  look  forward 
to  going  out;  that  he  is  not  glad  the  time  is  drawing  near; 
that  he  did  look  forward  to  it  once,  but  that  was  very  long 
ago;  that  he  has  lost  all  care  for  everything.  It  is  his  hu- 
mour to  be  a  helpless,  crushed,  and  broken  man.  And, 
Heaven  be  his  witness  that  he  has  his  humour  thoroughly 
gratified ! 

There  were  three  young  women  in  adjoining  cells,  all 
convicted  at  the  same  time  of  a  conspiracy  to  rob  their 
prosecutor.  In  the  silence  and  solitude  of  their  lives,  they 
had  grown  to  be  quite  beautiful.  Their  looks  were  very 
sad,  and  might  have  moved  the  sternest  visitor  to  tears, 
but  not  to  that  kind  of  sorrow  which  the  contemplation  of 
the  men  awakens.  One  was  a  young  girl;  not  twenty,  as 
I  recollect;    whose  snow-white  room  was  hung  with  the 


104  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

work  of  some  former  prisoner,  and  upon  whose  downcast 
face  the  sun  in  all  its  splendour  shone  down  through  the 
high  chink  in  the  wall,  where  one  narrow  strip  of  bright 
blue  sky  was  visible.  She  was  very  penitent  and  quiet; 
had  come  to  be  resigned,  she  said  (and  I  believe  her);  and 
had  a  mind  at  peace  "In  a  word,  you  are  happy  here? " 
said  one  of  my  companions.  She  stioiggled — she  did  strug- 
gle very  hard — to  answer,  Yes :  but  raising  her  eyes,  and 
meeting  that  glimpse  of  freedom  overhead,  she  burst  into 
tears,  and  said,  She  tried  to  be;  she  uttered  no  complaint; 
but  it  was  natural  that  she  should  sometimes  long  to  go  out 
of  that  one  cell :  she  could  not  help  that,  she  sobbed,  poor 
thing ! 

I  went  from  cell  to  cell  that  day ;  and  every  face  I  saw, 
or  word  I  heard,  or  incident  I  noted,  is  present  to  my  mind 
in  all  its  painfulness.  But  let  me  pass  them  hy,  for  one, 
more  pleasant,  glance  of  a  prison  on  the  same  plan  which  I 
afterwards  saw  at  Pittsburgh. 

When  I  had  gone  over  that,  in  the  same  manner,  I  asked 
the  governor  if  he  had  any  person  in  his  charge  who  was 
shortly  going  out.  He  had  one,  he  said,  whose  time  was 
up  next  day;  but  he  had  only  been  a  prisoner  two  years. 

Two  years !  I  looked  back  through  two  years  in  my  own 
life — out  of  jail,  prosperous,  happy,  surrounded  by  bless- 
ings, comforts,  and  good  fortune — and  thought  how  wide  a 
gap  it  was,  and  how  long  those  two  years  passed  in  solitary 
captivity  would  have  been.  I  have  the  face  of  this  man, 
who  was  going  to  be  released  next  day,  before  me  now.  It 
is  almost  more  memorable  in  its  happiness  than  the  other 
faces  in  their  misery.  How  easy  and  how  natural  it  was 
for  him  to  say  that  the  system  was  a  good  one;  and  that 
the  time  went  "  pretty  quick — considering ; "  and  that  when 
a  man  once  felt  he  had  offended  the  law,  and  must  satisfy 
it,  "he  got  along,  somehow:  "  and  so  forth! 

"  What  did  he  call  you  back  to  say  to  you,  in  that  strange 
flutter?  "  I  asked  of  m}-  conductor,  when  he  had  locked  the 
door  and  joined  me  in  the  passage. 

"  Oh !  That  he  was  afraid  the  soles  of  his  boots  were  not 
fit  for  walking,  as  they  were  a  good  deal  worn  when  he 
came  in;  and  that  he  would  thank  me  very  much  to  have 
them  mended,  ready." 

Those  boots  had  been  taken  off  his  feet,  and  put  away 
with  the  rest  of  his  clothes,  two  years  before ! 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  105 

I  took  that  opportunity  of  inquiring  how  they  conducted 
themselves  immediately  before  going  out;  adding  that  I 
presumed  they  trembled  very  much. 

"  Well,  it's  not  so  much  a  trembling,"  was  the  answer — 
"  though  they  do  quiver — as  a  complete  derangement  of  the 
nervous  system.  They  can't  sign  their  names  to  the  book; 
sometimes  can't  even  hold  the  pen;  look  about  'em  without 
appearing  to  know  why,  or  where  they  are;  and  sometimes 
get  up  and  sit  down  again,  twenty  times  in  a  minute.  This 
is  when  they're  in  the  office,  where  they  are  taken  with  the 
hood  on,  as  they  were  broviglit  in.  When  they  get  outside 
the  gate,  they  stop,  and  look  first  one  way  and  then  the 
other:  not  knowing  which  to  take.  Sometimes  they  stag- 
ger as  if  they  were  drunk,  and  sometimes  are  forced  to  lean 
against  the  fence,  they're  so  bad: — but  they  clear  off  in 
course  of  time." 

As  I  walked  among  these  solitary  cells,  and  looked  at 
the  faces  of  the  men  within  them,  I  tried  to  picture  to  my- 
self the  thoughts  and  feelings  natural  to  their  condition.  I 
imagined  the  hood  just  taken  off,  and  the  scene  of  their  cap- 
tivity disclosed  to  them  in  all  its  dismal  monotony. 

At  first,  the  man  is  stunned.  His  confinement  is  a  hide- 
ous vision;  and  his  old  life  a  reality.  He  throws  himself 
upon  his  bed,  and  lies  there  abandoned  to  despair.  By  de- 
grees the  insupportable  solitude  and  barrenness  of  the  place 
rouses  him  from  this  stupor,  and  when  the  trap  in  his  grated 
door  is  opened,  he  humbly  begs  and  prays  for  work.  "  Give 
me  some  work  to  do,  or  I  shall  go  raving  mad ! " 

He  has  it;  and  by  fits  and  starts  applies  himself  to  la- 
bour; but  every  now  and  then  there  comes  upon  him  a  burn- 
ing sense  of  the  years  that  must  be  wasted  in  that  stone 
coffin,  and  an  agony  so  piercing  in  the  recollection  of  those 
who  are  hidden  from  his  view  and  knowledge,  that  he 
starts  from  his  seat,  and  striding  up  and  down  the  narrow 
room  with  both  hands  clasped  on  his  uplifted  head,  hears 
spirits  tempting  him  to  beat  his  brains  out  on  the  wall. 

Again  he  falls  upon  his  bed,  and  lies  there,  moaning. 
Suddenly  he  starts  up,  wondering  whether  any  other  man 
is  near;  whether  there  is  another  cell  like  that  on  either 
side  of  him :  and  listens  keenly. 

There  is  no  sound,  but  other  prisoners  may  be  near  for 
all  that.  He  remembers  to  have  heard  once,  when  he  little 
thought  of  coming  here  himself,  that  the  cells  were  so  con- 


106  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

structed  that  the  prisoners  could  not  hear  each  other, 
though  the  officers  could  hear  them.  Where  is  the  nearest 
man — upon  the  right,  or  on  the  left?  or  is  there  one  in  both 
directions?  Where  is  he  sitting  now — with  his  face  to  the 
light?  or  is  he  walking  to  and  fro?  How  is  he  dressed? 
Has  he  been  here  long?  Is  he  much  worn  away?  Is  he 
very  white  and  spectre-like?  Does  he  think  of  his  neigh- 
bour too? 

Scarcely  venturing  to  breathe,  and  listening  while  he 
thinks,  he  conjures  up  a  figure  with  its  back  towards  him, 
and  imagines  it  moving  about  in  this  next  cell.  He  has  no 
idea  of  the  face,'  but  he  is  certain  of  the  dark  form  of 
a  stooping  man.  In  the  cell  upon  the  other  side,  he  puts 
another  figure,  whose  face  is  hidden  from  him  also.  Day 
after  day,  and  often  when  he  wakes  up  in  the  middle  of 
the  night,  he  thinks  of  these  two  men,  until  he  is  almost 
distracted.  He  never  changes  them.  There  they  are  al- 
ways as  he  first  imagined  them — an  old  man  on  the  right; 
a  younger  man  upon  the  left — whose  hidden  features  torture 
him  to  death,  and  have  a  mystery  that  makes  him  tremble. 

The  weary  days  pass  on  with  solemn  pace,  like  mourners 
at  a  funeral;  and  slowly  he  begins  to  feel  that  the  white 
walls  of  the  cell  have  something  dreadful  in  them :  that 
their  colour  is  horrible :  that  their  smooth  surface  chills  his 
blood ;  that  there  is  one  hateful  corner  which  torments  him. 
Every  morning  when  he  wakes,  he  hides  his  head  beneath 
the  coverlet,  and  shudders  to  see  the  ghastly  ceiling  look- 
ing down  upon  him.  The  blessed  light  of  day  itself  peeps 
in,  an  ugly  phantom  face,  through  the  unchangeable  crevice 
which  is  his  prison  window. 

By  slow  but  sure  degrees,  the  terrors  of  that  hateful  cor- 
ner swell  until  they  beset  him  at  all  times;  invade  his  rest, 
make  his  dreams  hideous,  and  his  nights  dreadful.  At 
first,  he  took  a  strange  dislike  to  it :  feeling  as  though  it 
gave  birth  in  his  brain  to  something  of  corresponding 
shape,  which  ought  not  to  be  there,  and  racked  his  head 
Avith  pains.  Then  he  began  to  fear  it,  then  to  dream  of 
it,  and  of  men  whispering  its  name  and  pointing  to  it. 
Then  he  could  not  bear  to  look  at  it,  nor  yet  to  turn  his 
back  upon  it.  Now,  it  is  every  night  the  lurking-place  of 
a  ghost:  a  shadow:— a  silent  something,  horrible  to  see, 
but  whether  bird,  or  beast,  or  muffled  human  shape,  he 
cannot  tell. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  107 

When  he  is  in  his  cell  by  day,  he  fears  the  little  yard 
without.  When  he  is  in  the  yard,  he  dreads  to  re-enter  the 
cell.  When  night  comes,  there  stands  the  phantom  in  the 
corner.  If  he  have  the  courage  to  stand  in  its  place,  and 
drive  it  out  (he  had  once :  being  desperate),  it  broods  upon 
his  bed.  In  the  twilight,  and  always  at  the  same  hour,  a 
voice  calls  to  him  by  name;  as  the  darkness  thickens,  his 
Loom  begins  to  live;  and  even  that,  his  comfort,  is  a  hide- 
ous figure,  watching  him  till  daybreak. 

Again,  by  slow  degrees,  these  horrible  fancies  depart 
from  him  one  by  one :  returning  sometimes,  unexpectedly, 
but  at  longer  intervals,  and  in  less  alarming  shapes.  He 
has  talked  upon  religious  matters  with  the  gentleman  who 
visits  him,  and  has  read  his  Bible,  and  has  written  a  prayer 
upon  his  slate,  and  hung  it  up,  as  a  kind  of  protection,  and 
an  assurance  of  Heavenly  companionship.  He  dreams  now, 
sometimes,  of  his  children  or  his  wife,  but  is  sure  that  they 
are  dead  or  have  deserted  him.  He  is  easily  moved  to 
tears;  is  gentle,  submissive,  and  broken-spirited.  Occa- 
sionally, the  old  agony  comes  back :  a  very  little  thing  will 
revive  it;  even  a  familiar  sound,  or  the  scent  of  summer 
flowers  in  the  air;  but  it  does  not  last  long,  now:  for  the 
world  without,  has  come  to  be  the  vision,  and  this  solitary 
life,  the  sad  reality. 

If  his  term  of  imprisonment  be  short — I  mean  compara- 
tively, for  short  it  cannot  be — the  last  half-year  is  almost 
worse  than  all ;  for  then  he  thinks  the  prison  will  take  lire 
and  he  be  burnt  in  the  ruins,  or  that  he  is  doomed  to  die 
within  the  walls,  or  that  he  will  be  detained  on  some  false 
charge  and  sentenced  for  another  term :  or  that  something, 
no  matter  what,  must  happen  to  prevent  his  going  at  large. 
And  this  is  natural,  and  impossible  to  be  reasoned  against, 
because,  after  his  long  separation  from  human  life,  and  his 
great  suffering,  any  event  will  appear  to  him  more  prob- 
able in  the  contemplation,  than  the  being  restored  to  liberty 
and  his  fellow-creatures. 

If  his  period  of  confinement  have  been  very  long,  the 
prospect  of  release  bewilders  and  confuses  him.  His  broken 
heart  may  flutter  for  a  moment,  when  he  thinks  of  the 
world  outside,  and  what  it  might  have  been  to  him  in  all 
those  lonely  years,  but  that  is  all.  The  cell-door  has  been 
closed  too  long  on  all  its  hopes  and  cares.  Better  to  have 
hanged  him  in  the  beginning  than  bring  him  to  this  pass. 


108  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

and  send  him  forth  to  mingle  with  his  kind,  who  are  his 
kind  no  more. 

On  the  haggard  face  of  every  man  among  these  prisoners 
the  same  expression  sat.  I  know  not  what  to  liken  it  to. 
It  had  something  of  that  strained  attention  which  we  see 
upon  the  faces  of  the  blind  and  deaf,  mingled  with  a  kind 
of  horror,  as  though  they  had  all  been  secretly  terrified. 
In  every  little  chamber  that  I  entered,  and  at  every  grate 
through  which  I  looked,  I  seemed  to  see  the  same  ap- 
palling countenance.  It  lives  in  my  memory,  with  the 
fascination  of  a  remarkable  picture.  Parade  before  my 
eyes,  a  hundred  men,  with  one  among  them  newly  re- 
leased from  this  solitary  suffering,  and  I  would  point  him 
out. 

The  faces  of  the  women,  as  I  have  said,  it  humanizes 
and  refines.  Whether  this  be,  because  of  their  better  na- 
ture, which  is  elicited  in  solitude,  or  because  of  their  being 
gentler  creatures,  of  greater  patience  and  longer  suffering, 
I  do  not  know;  but  so  it  is.  That  the  punishment  is  never- 
theless, to  my  thinking,  fully  as  cruel  and  as  wrong  in 
their  case,  as  in  that  of  the  men,  I  need  scarcely  add. 

My  firm  conviction  is  that,  independent  of  the  mental 
anguish  it  occasions — an  anguish  so  acute  and  so  tremen- 
dous, that  all  imagination  of  it  must  fall  far  short  of  the 
reality — it  wears  the  mind  into  a  morbid  state,  which  ren- 
ders it  unfit  for  the  rough  contact  and  busy  action  of  the 
world.  It  is  my  fixed  opinion  that  those  who  have  under- 
gone this  punishment,  must  pass  into  society  again  morally 
unhealthy  and  diseased.  There  are  many  instances  on 
record,  of  men  who  have  chosen,  or  have  been  condemned, 
to  lives  of  perfect  solitude,  but  I  scarcely  remember  one, 
even  among  sages  of  strong  and  vigorous  intellect,  where  its 
effect  has  not  become  apparent,  in  some  disordered  train  of 
thought,  or  some  gloomy  hallucination.  What  monstrous 
phantoms,  bred  of  despondency  and  doubt,  and  born  and 
reared  in  solitude,  have  stalked  upon  the  earth,  making 
creation  ugly,  and  darkening  the  face  of  Heaven! 

Suicides  are  rare  among  these  prisoners :  are  almost,  in- 
deed, unknown.  But  no  argument  in  favour  of  the  system, 
can  reasonably  be  deduced  from  this  circumstance,  although 
it  is  very  often  urged.  All  men  who  have  made  diseases 
of  the  mind  their  study,  know  perfectly  well  that  suoli 
extreme  depression  and  despair  as  will  change  the  wliole 


I 


AMERICAN   xNOTES.  109 

character,  aiid  beat  down  all  its  powers  of  elasticity  and 
self-resistance,  may  be  at  work  within  a  man,  and  yet  stop 
short  of  self-destruction.     This  is  a  common  case. 

That  it  makes  the  senses  dull,  and  by  degrees  impairs 
the  bodily  faculties,  I  am  quite  sure.  I  remarked  to  those 
who  were  with  me  in  this  very  establishment  at  Philadel- 
phia, that  the  criminals  who  had  been  there  long,  were  deaf. 
They,  who  were  in  the  habit  of  seeing  these  men  constantly, 
were  perfectly  amazed  at  the  idea,  which  they  regarded  as 
groundless  and  fanciful.  And  yet  the  very  first  prisoner 
to  whom  they  appealed — one  of  their  own  selection — con- 
firmed my  impression  (which  was  unknown  to  him)  in- 
stantly, and  said,  with  a  genuine  air  it  was  impossible  to 
doubt,  that  he  couldn't  think  it  happened,  but  he  was  grow- 
ing very  dull  of  hearing. 

That  it  is  a  singularly  unequal  punishment,  and  affects 
the  worst  man  least,  there  is  no  doubt.  In  its  superior 
efficiency  as  a  means  of  reformation,  compared  with  that 
other  code  of  regulations  which  allows  the  prisoners  to 
work  in  company  without  communicating  together,  I  have 
not  the  smallest  faith.  All  the  instances  of  reformation 
that  were  mentioned  to  me,  were  of  a  kind  that  might 
have  been — and  I  have  no  doubt  whatever,  in  my  own 
mind,  would  have  been — equally  well  brought  about  by  the 
Silent  System,  With  regard  to  such  men  as  the  negro 
burglar  and  the  English  thief,  even  the  most  enthusiastic 
have  scarcely  any  hope  of  their  conversion. 

It  seems  to  me  that  the  objection  that  nothing  whole- 
some or  good  has  ever  had  its  growth  in  such  unnatural  sol- 
itude, and  that  even  a  dog  or  any  of  the  more  intelligent 
among  beasts,  would  pine,  and  mope,  and  rust  away,  be- 
neath its  influence,  would  be  in  itself  a  sufficient  argument 
against  this  system.  But  when  we  recollect,  in  addition, 
how  very  cniel  and  severe  it  is,  and  that  a  solitary  life  is 
always  liable  to  peculiar  and  distinct  objections  of  a  most 
deplorable  nature,  which  have  arisen  here;  and  call  to  mind, 
moreover,  that  the  choice  is  not  between  this  system,  and 
a  bad  or  ill-considered  one,  but  between  it  and  another 
which  has  worked  well,  and  is,  in  its  whole  design  and 
practice,  excellent;  there  is  surely  more  than  sufficient 
reason  for  abandoning  a  mode  of  punishment  attended  by 
so  little  hope  or  promise,  and  fraught,  beyond  dispute, 
with  such  a  host  of  evils. 


110  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

As  a  relief  to  its  contemplation,  I  will  close  this  chapter 
with  a  curioas  story,  arising  out  of  the  same  theme,  which 
was  related  to  me,  on  the  occasion  of  this  visit,  by  some  of 
the  gentlemen  concerned. 

At  one  of  the  periodical  meetings  of  the  inspectors  of 
this  prison,  a  working  man  of  Philadelphia  presented  him- 
self before  the  Board,  and  earnestly  requested  to  be  placed 
in  solitary  confinement.  On  being  asked  what  motive  could 
possibly  prompt  him  to  make  this  strange  demand,  he  an- 
swered that  he  had  an  irresistible  propensity  to  get  drunk; 
that  he  was  constantly  indulging  it,  to  his  great  misery  and 
ruin;  that  he  had  no  power  of  resistance;  that  he  wished 
to  be  put  beyond  the  reach  of  temptation;  and  that  he  could 
think  of  no  better  way  than  this.  It  was  pointed  out  to 
him,  in  reply,  that  the  prison  was  for  criminals  who  had 
been  tried  and  sentenced  by  the  law,  and  could  not  be  made 
available  for  any  such  fanciful  purposes;  he  was  exliorted 
to  abstain  from  intoxicating  drinks,  as  he  surely  might  if 
he  would;  and  received  other  very  good  advice,  with  which 
he  retired,  exceedingly  dissatisfied  with  the  result  of  his 
application. 

He  came  again,  and  again,  and  again,  and  was  so  very 
earnest  and  impoi'tunate,  that  at  last  they  took  counsel  to- 
gether, and  said,  "He  will  certainly  qualify  himself  for 
admission,  if  we  reject  him  any  more.  Let  us  shut  him  up. 
He  will  soon  be  glad  to  go  away,  and  then  we  shall  get  rid 
of  him."  So  they  made  him  sign  a  statement  which  would 
prevent  his  ever  sustaining  an  action  for  false  imprison- 
ment, to  the  effect  that  his  incarceration  was  voluntary, 
and  of  his  own  seeking;  they  requested  him  to  take  notice 
that  the  officer  in  attendance  had  orders  to  release  him  at 
any  hour  of  the  day  or  night,  when  he  might  knock  upon 
his  door  for  that  purpose;  but  desired  him  to  understand, 
that  once  going  out,  he  would  not  be  admitted  any  more. 
These  conditions  agreed  upon,  and  he  still  remaining  in  the 
same  mind,  he  was  conducted  to  the  prison,  and  shut  up 
in  one  of  the  cells. 

In  this  cell,  the  man,  who  had  not  the  firmness  to  leave 
a  glass  of  liquor  standing  untasted  on  a  table  before  him — 
in  this  cell,  in  solitary  confinement,  and  working  every -day 
at  his  trade  of  shoemaking,  this  man  remained  nearly  two 
years.  His  health  beginning  to  fail  at  the  expiration  of 
that  time,  the  surgeon  recommended  that  he  should  work 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  Ill 

jccasionally  in  the  garden;  and  as  he  liked  the  notion  very 
much,  he  went  about  this  new  occupation  with  great  cheer- 
fulness. 

He  was  digging  here,  one  summer  day,  very  industrious- 
ly, when  the  wicket  in  the  outer  gate  chanced  to  be  left 
open:  showing,  beyond,  the  well-remembered  dusty  road 
and  sunburnt  fields.  The  way  was  as  free  to  him  as  to  any 
man  living,  but  he  no  sooner  raised  his  head  and  caught 
sight  of  it,  all  shining  in  the  light,  than,  with  the  involun- 
tary instinct  of  a  prisoner,  he  cast  away  his  spade,  scam- 
pered off  as  fast  as  his  legs  would  carry  him,  and  never 
once  looked  back. 


CHAPTER    THE    EIGHTH. 

WASHINGTON— THE  LEGISLATURE— AND  THE 
PRESIDENT'S  HOUSE. 

We  left  Philadelphia  by  steamboat,  at  six  o'clock  one 
very  cold  morning,  and  turned  our  faces  towards  Washing- 
ton. 

In  the  course  of  this  day's  journey,  as  on  subsequent  oc- 
casions, we  encountered  some  Englishmen  (small  farmers, 
perhaps,  or  country  publicans  at  home)  who  were  settled  in 
America,  and  were  travelling  on  their  own  affairs.  Of  all 
grades  and  kinds  of  men  that  jostle  one  in  the  public  con- 
veyances of  the  States,  these  are  often  the  most  intolerable 
and  the  most  insufferable  companions.  United  to  every 
disagreeable  characteristic  that  the  worst  kind  of  American 
travellers  possess,  these  countrymen  of  ours  display  an 
amount  of  insolent  conceit  and  cool  assumption  of  superior- 
ity, quite  monstrous  to  behold.  In  the  coarse  familiarity 
of  their  approach,  and  the  effrontery  of  their  inquisitive- 
ness  (which  they  are  in  great  haste  to  assert,  as  if  they 
panted  to  revenge  themselves  upon  the  decent  old  restraints 
of  home),  they  surpass  any  native  specimens  that  came 
within  my  range  of  observation :  and  I  often  grew  so  pa- 
triotic when  I  saw  and  heard  them,  that  I  would  cheerfully 
have  submitted  to  a  reasonable  fine,  if  I  could  have  given 
any  other  country  in  the  whole  world,  the  honour  of  claim- 
ing them  for  its  children. 

As  Washington  may  be  called  the  headquarters  of  tO" 


112  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

bacco-tinctured  saliva,  the  time  is  come  when  I  must  con- 
fess, Avithout  any  disguise,  that  the  prevalence  of  those  two 
odious  practices  of  chewing  and  expectorating  began  about 
this  time  to  be  anything  but  agreeable,  and  soon  became 
most  offensive  and  sickening.  In  all  the  public  places  of 
America,  this  filthy  custom  is  recognised.  In  the  courts  of 
law,  the  judge  has  his  spittoon,  the  crier  his,  the  witness 
his,  and  the  prisoner  his;  while  the  jurymen  and  specta- 
tors are  provided  for,  as  so  many  men  who  in  the  course  of 
nature  must  desire  to  spit  incessantly.  In  the  hospitals, 
the  students  of  medicine  are  requested,  by  notices  upon  the 
wall,  to  eject  their  tobacco  juice  into  the  boxes  provided  for 
that  purpose,  and  not  to  discolour  the  stairs.  In  public 
buildings,  visitors  are  implored,  through  the  same  agency, 
to  squirt  the  essence  of  their  quids,  or  "plugs,"  as  I  have 
heard  them  called  by  gentlemen  learned  in  this  kind  of 
sweetmeat,  into  the  national  spittoons,  and  not  about  the 
bases  of  the  marble  columns.  But  in  some  parts,  this  cus 
torn  is  inseparably  mixed  up  with  every  meal  and  morning 
call,  and  with  all  the  transactions  of  social  life.  The 
stranger,  who  follows  in  the  track  I  took  myself,  will  find 
it  in  its  full  bloom  and  glory,  luxuriant  in  all  its  alarming 
recklessness,  at  Washington.  And  let  him  not  persuade 
himself  (as  I  once  did,  to  my  shame)  that  previous  tourists 
have  exaggerated  its  extent.  The  thing  itself  is  an  exag- 
geration of  nastiness,  which  cannot  be  outdone. 

On  board  this  steamboat,  there  were  two  young  gentle- 
men, with  shirt-collars  reversed  as  usual,  and  armed  with 
very  big  walking-sticks;  who  planted  two  seats  in  the  mid- 
dle of  the  deck,  at  a  distance  of  some  four  paces  apart; 
took  out  their  tobacco-boxes;  and  sat  down  opposite  each 
other,  to  chew.  In  less  than  a  quarter  of  an  hour's  time, 
these  hopeful  youths  had  shed  about  them  on  the  clean 
boards,  a  copious  shower  of  yellow  rain;  clearing,  by  that 
means,  a  kind  of  magic  circle,  within  whose  limits  no  in- 
truders dared  to  come,  and  which  they  never  failed  to  re- 
fresh and  re-refresh  before  a  spot  was  dry.  This  being 
before  breakfast,  rather  disposed  me,  I  confess,  to  nausea; 
but  looking  attentively  at  one  of  the  expectorators,  I 
plainly  saw  that  he  was  young  in  chewing,  and  felt  in- 
wardly uneasy,  himself.  A  glow  of  delight  came  over  me 
at  this  discovery;  and  as  I  marked  his  face  turn  paler  and 
paler,  and  saw  the  ball  of  tobacco  in  his  left  cheek,  quiver 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  113 

with  his  suppressed  agony,  while  yet  he  spat,  and  chewed, 
and  spat  again,  in  emulation  of  his  older  friend,  I  could 
have  fallen  on  his  neck  and  implored  him  to  go  on  for 
hours. 

We  all  sat  down  to  a  comfortable  breakfast  in  the  cabin 
below,  where  there  was  no  more  hurry  or  confusion  than 
at  such  a  meal  in  England,  and  where  there  was  certainly 
greater  politeness  exhibited  than  at  most  of  our  stage-coach 
banquets.  At  about  nine  o'clock  we  arrived  at  the  railroad 
station,  and  went  on  by  the  cars.  At  noon  we  turned  out 
again,  to  cross  a  wide  river  in  another  steamboat;  landed 
at  a  continuation  of  the  railroad  on  the  opposite  shore;  and 
went  on  by  other  cars;  in  Avhich,  in  the  course  of  the  next 
hour  or  so,  we  crossed  by  wooden  bridges,  each  a  mile 
in  length,  two  creeks,  called  respectively  Great  and  Little 
Gunpowder.  The  water  in  both  was  blackened  with  flights 
of  canvas-backed  ducks,  which  are  most  delicious  eating, 
and  abomid  hereabouts  at  that  season  of  the  year. 

These  bridges  are  of  wood,  have  no  parapet,  and  are 
only  just  wide  enough  for  the  passage  of  the  trains;  which, 
in  the  event  of  the  smallest  accident,  would  inevitably  be 
plunged  into  the  river.  They  are  startling  contrivances, 
and  are  most  agreeable  wheii  passed. 

We  stopped  to  dine  at  Baltimore,  and  being  now  in 
Maryland,  were  waited  on,  for  the  first  time,  by  slaves. 
The  sensation  of  exacting  any  service  from  human  creat- 
ures who  are  bought  and  sold,  and  being,  for  the  time,  a 
party  as  it  were  to  their  condition,  is  not  an  enviable  one. 
The  institution  exists,  perhaps,  in  its  least  repulsive  and 
most  mitigated  form  in  such  a  town  as  this;  but  it  is  sla- 
very; and  though  I  was,  with  respect  to  it,  an  innocent 
man,  its  presence  filled  me  with  a  sense  of  shame  and  self- 
reproach. 

After  dinner,  we  went  down  to  the  railroad  again,  and 
took  our  seats  in  the  cars  for  Washington.  Being  rather 
early,  those  men  and  boys  who  happened  to  have  nothing 
particular  to  do,  and  were  curious  in  foreigners,  came  (ac- 
cording to  custom)  round  the  carriage  in  which  I  sat;  let 
down  all  the  windows;  thrust  in  their  heads  and  shoulders; 
liooked  themselves  on  conveniently,  by  their  elbows;  and 
i  fell  to  comparing  notes  on  the  subject  of  my  personal  ap- 
pearance, with  as  much  indifference  as  if  I  were  a  stuffed 
figure.     I  never  gained  so  much  uncompromising  informa- 


114  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

tion  with  reference  to  my  own  nose  and  eyes,  and  various 
impressions  wrought  by  my  mouth  and  chin  on  different 
minds,  and  how  my  head  looks  when  it  is  viewed  from  be- 
hind, as  on  these  occasions.  Some  gentlemen  were  only 
satisfied  by  exercising  their  sense  of  touch;  and  the  boys 
(who  are  surprisingly  precocious  in  America)  were  seldom 
satisfied,  even  by  that,  but  would  return  to  the  charge  over 
and  over  again.  Many  a  budding  president  has  walked 
into  my  room  with  his  cap  on  his  head  and  his  hands  in  his 
pockets,  and  stared  at  me  for  two  whole  hours :  occasionally 
refreshing  himself  with  a  tweak  of  his  nose,  or  a  draught 
from  the  water-jug;  or  by  walking  to  the  windows  and  in- 
viting other  boys  in  the  street  below,  to  come  up  and  do 
likewise :  crying,  "  Here  he  is ! "  "  Come  on !  "  "  Bring  all 
your  brothers ! "  with  other  hospitable  entreaties  of  that 
nature. 

We  reached  Washington  at  about  half -past  six  that  even- 
ing, and  had  upon  the  way  a  beautiful  view  of  the  Capitol, 
which  is  a  fine  building  of  the  Corinthian  order,  placed 
upon  a  noble  and  commanding  eminence.  Arrived  at  the 
hotel,  I  saw  no  more  of  the  place  that  night ;  being  very 
tired,  and  glad  to  get  to  bed. 

Breakfast  over  next  morning,  I  walk  about  the  streets 
for  an  hour  or  two,  and,  coming  home,  throw  up  the  win- 
dow in  the  front  and  back,  and  look  out.  Here  is  Wash- 
ington, fresh  in  my  mind  and  under  my  eye. 

Take  the  worst  parts  of  the  City  Road  and  Pentonville, 
or  the  straggling  outskirts  of  Paris,  where  the  houses  are 
smallest,  preserving  all  their  oddities,  but  especially  the 
small  shops  and  dwellings,  occupied  in  Pentonville  (but  not 
in  Washington)  by  furniture-brokers,  keepers  of  poor  eat- 
ing-houses, and  fanciers  of  birds.  Burn  the  whole  down; 
build  it  up  again  in  wood  and  plaster ;  widen  it  a  little : 
throw  in  part  of  St.  John's  Wood;  put  green  blinds  outside 
all  the  private  houses,  with  a  red  curtain  and  a  white  one 
in  every  window;  plough  up  all  the  roads;  plant  a  great 
deal  of  coarse  turf  in  every  place  where  it  ought  not  to  be; 
erect  three  handsome  buildings  in  stone  and  marble,  any- 
where, but  the  more  entirely  out  of  everybody's  way  the 
better;  call  one  the  Post  Office,  one  the  Patent  Office,  and 
one  the  Treasury;  make  it  scorching  hot  in  the  morning, 
and  freezing  cold  in  the  afternoon,  with  an  occasional  tor- 
nado of  wind  and  dust;  leave  a  brick-field  without  the 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  115 

bricks,  in  all  central  places  where  a  street  may  naturally 
be  expected:  and  that's  Washington. 

The  hotel  in  which  we  live,  is  a  long  row  of  small  houses 
fronting  on  the  street,  and  opening  at  the  back  upon  a 
common  yard,  in  which  hangs  a  great  triangle.  Whenever 
a  servant  is  wanted,  somebody  beats  on  this  triangle  from 
one  stroke  up  to  seven,  according  to  the  number  of  the 
house  in  which  his  presence  is  required;  and  as  all  the 
servants  are  always  being  wanted,  and  none  of  them  ever 
come,  this  enlivening  engine  is  in  full  performance  the 
whole  day  through.  Clothes  are  drying  in  the  same  yard; 
female  slaves,  with  cotton  handkerchiefs  twisted  round 
their  heads,  are  running  to  and  fro  on  the  hotel  business; 
black  waiters  cross  and  recross  with  dishes  in  their  hands; 
two  great  dogs  are  playing  upon  a  mound  of  loose  bricks  in 
the  centre  of  the  little  square;  a  pig  is  turning  up  his 
stomach  to  the  sun,  and  grunting  "that's  comfortable!"; 
and  neither  the  men,  nor  the  women,  nor  the  dogs,  nor  the 
pig,  nor  any  created  creature,  takes  the  smallest  notice  of 
the  triangle,  which  is  tingling  madly  all  the  time. 

I  walk  to  the  front  window,  and  look  across  the  road 
upon  a  long,  straggling  row  of  houses,  one  story  high, 
terminating,  nearly  opposite,  but  a  little  to  the  left,  in  a 
melancholy  piece  of  waste  ground  with  frowzy  grass,  which 
looks  like  a  small  piece  of  country  that  has  taken  to  drink- 
ing, and  has  quite  lost  itself.  Standing  anyhow  and  all 
wrong,  upon  this  open  space,  like  something  meteoric  that 
has  fallen  down  from  the  moon,  is  an  odd,  lop-sided,  one- 
eyed  kind  of  wooded  building,  that  looks  like  a  church, 
with  a  flagstaff  as  long  as  itself  sticking  out  of  a  steeple 
something  larger  than  a  tea-chest.  Under  the  window,  is 
a  small  stand  of  coaches,  whose  slave-drivers  are  sunning 
themselves  on  the  steps  of  our  door,  and  talking  idly  to- 
gether. The  three  most  obtrusive  houses  near  at  hand, 
are  the  three  meanest.  On  one — a  shop,  which  never  has 
anything  in  the  window,  and  never  has  the  door  open — is 
painted  in  large  characters,  "The  City  Lunch."  At  an- 
other, which  looks  like  the  backway  to  somewhere  else,  but 
is  an  independent  building  in  itself,  oysters  are  procurable 
in  every  style.  At  the  third,  which  is  a  very,  very  little 
tailor's  shop,  pants  are  fixed  to  order:  or,  in  other  words, 
pantaloons  are  made  to  measure.  And  that  is  our  street  in 
Washington. 


116  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

It  is  sometimes  called  the  City  of  Magnificent  Distances, 
but  it  might  with  greater  propriety  be  termed  the  City  of 
Magnificent  Intentions;  for  it  is  only  on  taking  a  bird's-eye 
view  of  it  from  the  top  of  the  Capitol,  that  one  can  at  all 
comprehend  the  vast  designs  of  its  projector,  an  aspiring 
Frenchman.  Spacious  avenues,  that  begin  in  nothing,  and 
lead  nowhere;  streets,  mile-long,  that  only  want  houses, 
roads,  and  inhabitants;  public  buildings  that  need  but  a 
public  to  be  complete;  and  ornaments  of  great  thorough- 
fares, which  only  lack  great  thoroughfares  to  ornament — 
are  its  leading  features.  One  might  fancy  the  seasoir  over, 
and  most  of  the  houses  gone  out  of  town  for  ever  with  their 
masters.  To  the  admirers  of  cities  it  is  a  Barmecide  Feast; 
a  pleasant  field  for  the  imagination  to  rove  in;  a  monument 
raised  to  a  deceased  project,  with  not  even  a  legible  in- 
scription to  record  its  departed  greatness. 

Such  as  it  is,  it  is  likely  to  remain.  It  was  originally 
chosen  for  the  seat  of  Government,  as  a  means  of  averting 
the  conflicting  jealousies  and  interests  of  the  different 
States;  and  very  probably,  too,  as  being  remote  from  mobs : 
a  consideration  not  to  be  slighted,  even  in  America.  It  has 
no  trade  or  commerce  of  its  own :  having  little  or  no  popu- 
lation beyond  the  President  and  his  establishment;  the 
members  of  the  Legislature  who  reside  there  during  the  ses- 
sion; the  Government  clerks  and  officers  employed  in  the 
various  departments;  the  keepers  of  the  hotels  and  board- 
ing-houses; and  the  tradesmen  who  supply  their  tables.  It 
is  very  unhealthy.  Few  people  would  live  in  Washington, 
I  take  it,  who  were  not  obliged  to  reside  there;  and  the 
tides  of  emigration  and  speculation,  those  rapid  and  regard- 
less currents,  are  little  likely  to  flow  at  any  time  towards 
such  dull  and  sluggish  water. 

The  principal  features  of  the  Capitol  are,  of  course,  the 
two  Houses  of  Assembly.  But  there  is,  besides,  in  the 
centre  of  the  building,  a  fine  rotunda,  ninety-six  feet  in 
diameter,  and  ninety-six  high,  whose  circular  wall  is  di- 
vided into  compartments,  ornamented  by  historical  pictures. 
Four  of  these  have  for  their  subjects  prominent  events  in 
the  revolutionary  struggle.  They  were  painted  by  Colonel 
Trumbull,  himself  a  member  of  Washington's  staff  at  the 
time  of  their  occurrence;  from  which  circumstance  they 
derive  a  pecviliar  interest  of  their  own.  In  this  same  hall 
Mr.    Greenough's   large  statue  of   Washington  has   been 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  117 

lately  placed.  It  has  great  merits  of  course,  but  it  struck 
me  as  being  rather  strained  and  violent  for  its  subject.  I 
could  wish,  however,  to  have  seen  it  in  a  better  light  than 
it  can  ever  be  viewed  in,  where  it  stands. 

There  is  a  very  pleasant  and  commodious  library  in  the 
Capitol;  and  from  a  balcony  in  front,  the  bird's-eye  view, 
of  which  I  have  just  spoken,  may  be  had,  together  with  a 
beautiful  prospect  of  the  adjacent  country.  In  one  of  the 
ornamented  portions  of  the  building,  there  is  a  figure  of 
Justice;  whereunto  the  Guide  Book  says,  "the  artist  at 
first  contemplated  giving  more  of  nudity,  but  he  was 
warned  that  the  public  sentiment  in  this  country  would  not 
admit  of  it,  and  in  his  caution  he  has  gone,  perhaps,  into 
the  opposite  extreme."  Poor  Justice!  she  has  been  made 
to  wear  much  stranger  garments  in  America  than  those  she 
pines  in,  in  the  Capitol.  Let  us  hope  that  she  has  changed 
her  dressmaker  since  they  were  fashioned,  and  that  the 
public  sentiment  of  the  country  did  not  cut  out  the  clothes 
she  hides  her  lovely  figure  in,  just  now. 

The  House  of  Representatives  is  a  beautiful  and  spacious 
hall,  of  semicircular  shape,  supported  by  handsome  pillars. 
One  part  of  the  gallery  is  appropriated  to  the  ladies,  and 
there  they  sit  in  front  rows,  and  come  in,  and  go  out,  as  at 
a  play  or  concert.  The  chair  is  canopied,  and  raised  con- 
siderably above  the  floor  of  the  House;  and  every  member 
has  an  easy-chair  and  a  writing-desk  to  himself :  which  is 
denounced  by  some  people  out  of  doors  as  a  most  unfortu- 
nate and  injudicious  arrangement,  tending  to  long  sittings 
and  prosaic  speeches.  It  is  an  elegant  chamber  to  look  at, 
but  a  singularly  bad  one  for  all  purposes  of  hearing.  The 
Senate,  which  is  smaller,  is  free  from  this,  objection,  and 
is  exceedingly  well  adapted  to  the  uses  for  which  it  is  de- 
signed. The  sittings,  I  need  hardly  add,  take  place  in  the 
day;  and  the  parliamentary  forms  are  modelled  on  those  of 
the  old  country. 

I  was  sometimes  asked,  in  my  progress  through  other 
places,  whether  I  had  not  been  very  much  impressed  by 
the  heads  of  the  lawmakers  at  Washington;  meaning  not 
their  chiefs  and  leaders,  but  literally  their  individual  and 
personal  heads,  whereon  their  hair  grew,  and  whereby  the 
phrenological  character  of  each  legislator  was  -  expressed, : 
and  I  almost  as  often  struck  my  questioner  dumb  with  in- 
dignant consternation  by  answering  "No,  that  I  didn't  rt- 


118  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

member  being  at  all  overcome."  As  I  must,  at  whatever 
hazard,  repeat  the  avowal  here,  I  will  follow  it  up  by  re- 
lating my  impressions  on  this  subject  in  as  few  words  as 
possible. 

In  the  first  place — it  may  be  from  some  imperfect  de- 
velopment of  my  organ  of  veneration — I  do  not  remember 
having  ever  fainted  away,  or  having  even  been  moved  to 
tears  of  joyful  pride,  at  sight  of  any  legislative  body.  I 
have  borne  the  House  of  Commons  like  a  man,  and  have 
yielded  to  no  weakness,  but  slumber,  in  the  House  of 
Lords.  I  have  seen  elections  for  borough  and  county,  and 
have  never  been  impelled  (no  matter  which  party  won)  to 
damage  my  hat  by  throwing  it  up  into  the  air  in  tri- 
umph, or  to  crack  my  voice  by  shouting  forth  any  reference 
to  our  Glorious  Constitution,  to  the  noble  purity  of  our 
independent  voters,  or  the  unimpeachable  integrity  of  our 
independent  members.  Having  withstood  such  strong  at- 
tacks upon  my  fortitude,  it  is  possible  that  I  may  be  of  a 
cold  and  insensible  temperament,  amounting  to  iciness,  in 
such  matters;  and  therefore  my  impressions  of  the  live  pil- 
lars of  the  Capitol  at  Washington  must  be  received  with 
such  grains  of  allowance  as  this  free  confession  may  seem 
to  demand. 

Did  I  see  in  this  public  body  an  assemblage  of  men, 
bound  together  in  the  sacred  names  of  Liberty  and  Free- 
dom, and  so  asserting  the  chaste  dignity  of  those  twin  god- 
desses, in  all  their  discussions,  as  to  exalt  at  once  the  Eter- 
nal Principles  to  which  their  names  are  given,  and  their 
own  character,  and  the  character  of  their  countrymen,  in 
the  admiring  eyes  of  the  whole  world? 

It  was  but  a  week,  since  an  aged,  grey-haired  man,  a 
lasting  honour  to  the  land  that  gave  him  birth,  who  has 
done  good  service  to  his  country,  as  his  forefathers  did, 
and  who  will  be  remembered  scores  upon  scores  of  years 
after  the  worms  bred  in  its  corruption  are  but  so  many 
grains  of  dust — it  was  but  a  week,  since  this  old  man  had 
stood  for  days  upon  his  trial  before  this  very  body,  charged 
with  having  dared  to  assert  the  infamy  of  that  traffic,  which 
has  for  its  accursed  merchandise  men  and  women,  and  their 
unborn  children.  Yes.  And  publicly  exhibited  in  the 
same  city  all  the  while;  gilded,  framed  and  glazed;  hung 
up  for  general  admiration;  shown  to  strangers  not  with 
shame,  but  pride;  its  face  not  turned  towards  the  wall,  it- 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  119 

self  not  taken  down  and  burned;  is  the  Unanimous  Declara- 
tion of  The  Thirteen  United  States  of  America,  which  sol- 
emnly declares  that  All  Men  are  created  Equal;  and  are 
endowed  by  their  Creator  with  the  Inalienable  Rights  of 
Life,  Liberty,  and  the  Pursuit  of  Happiness ! 

It  was  not  a  month,  since  this  same  body  had  sat  calmly 
by,  and  heard  a  man,  one  of  themselves,  with  oaths  which 
beggars  in  their  drink  reject,  threaten  to  cut  another's 
throat  from  ear  to  ear.  There  he  sat,  among  them ;  not 
crushed  by  the  general  feeling  of  the  assembly,  but  as  good 
a  man  as  any. 

There  was  but  a  week  to  come,  and  another  of  that  body, 
for  doing  his  duty  to  those  who  sent  him  there;  for  claim- 
ing in  a  Republic  the  Liberty  and  Freedom  of  expressing 
their  sentiments,  and  making  known  their  prayer;  would 
be  tried,  found  guilty,  and  have  strong  censure  passed  upon 
him  by  the  rest.  His  was  a  grave  offence  indeed;  for  years 
before,  he  had  risen  up  and  said,  "  A  gang  of  male  and  fe- 
male slaves  for  sale,  warranted  to  breed  like  cattle,  linked 
to  each  other  by  iron  fetters,  are  passing  now  along  the 
open  street  beneath  the  windows  of  your  Temple  of  Equal- 
ity !  Look ! "  But  there  are  many  kinds  of  hunters  en- 
gaged in  the  Pursuit  of  Happiness,  and  they  go  variously 
armed.  It  is  the  Inalienable  Right  of  some  among  them, 
to  take  the  field  after  their  Happiness  equipped  with  cat 
and  cartwhip,  stocks,  and  iron  collar,  and  to  shout  their 
view  halloa !  (always  in  praise  of  Liberty)  to  the  music  of 
clanking  chains  and  bloody  stripes. 

Where  sat  the  many  legislators  of  coarse  threats;  of 
words  and  blows  such  as  coalheavers  deal  upon  each  other, 
when  they  forget  their  breeding?  On  every  side.  Every 
session  had  its  anecdotes  of  that  kind,  and  the  actors  were 
all  there. 

Did  I  recognise  in  this  assembly,  a  body  of  men,  who, 
applying  themselves  in  a  new  world  to  correct  some  of  the 
falsehoods  and  vices  of  the  old,  purified  the  avenues  to 
Public  Life,  paved  the  dirty  ways  to  Place  and  Power,  de- 
bated and  made  laws  for  the  Common  Good,  and  had  no 
party  but  their  Country? 

I  saw  in  them  the  wheels  that  move  the  meanest  perver- 
sion of  virtuous  Political  Machinery  that  the  worst  tools 
ever  wrought.  Despicable  trickery  at  elections;  under- 
handed tamperings  with  public  officers;  cowardly  attacks 


120  AMERICAN  NOTES.  . 

upon  opponents,  with  scurrilous  newspapers  for  shields,  and 
hired  pens  for  daggers;  shameful  trucklings  to  mercenary 
knaves,  whose  claim  to  be  considered,  is,  that  every  day 
and  week  they  sow  new  crops  of  ruin  with  their  venal 
types,  which  are  the  dragons'  teeth  of  yore,  in  everything 
but  sharpness;  aidings  and  abettings  of  every  bad  inclina- 
tion in  the  popular  mind,  and  artful  suppressions  of  all  its 
good  influences :  such  things  as  these,  and  in  a  word,  Dis- 
honess  Faction  in  its  most  depraved  and  most  unblush- 
ing form,  stared  out  from  every  corner  of  the  crowded 
hall. 

Did  I  see  among  them  the  intelligence  and  refinement : 
the  true,  honest,  patriotic  heart  of  America?  Here  and 
there,  were  drops  of  its  blood  and  life,  but  they  scarcely 
coloured  the  stream  of  desperate  adventurers  which  sets 
that  way  for  profit  and  for  pay.  It  is  the  game  of  these 
men,  and  of  their  profligate  organs,  to  make  the  strife  of 
politics  so  fierce  and  brutal,  and  so  destructive  of  all  self- 
respect  in  worthy  men,  that  sensitive  and  delicate-minded 
persons  shall  be  kept  aloof,  and  they,  and  such  as  they,  be 
left  to  battle  out  their  selfish  views,  unchecked.  And  thus 
this  lowest  of  all  scrambling  fights  goes  on,  and  they  who 
in  other  countries  would,  from  their  intelligence  and  sta- 
tion, most  aspire  to  make  the  laws,  do  here  recoil  the 
farthest  from  that  degradation. 

That  there  are,  among  the  representatives  of  the  people 
in  both  Houses,  and  among  all  parties,  some  men  of  high 
character  and  great  abilities,  I  need  not  say.  The  fore- 
most among  those  politicians  who  are  known  in  Europe, 
have  been  already  described,  and  I  see  no  reason  to  depart 
from  the  rule  I  have  laid  down  for  my  guidance,  of  ab- 
staining from  all  mention  of  individuals.  It  will  be  suffi- 
cient to  add,  that  to  the  most  favourable  accounts  that 
have  been  written  of  them,  I  more  than  fully  and  most 
heartily  subscribe;  and  that  personal  intercourse  and  free 
communication  have  bred  within  me,  not  the  result  pre- 
dicted in  the  very  doubtful  proverb,  but  increased  admira- 
tion and  respect.  They  are  striking  men  to  look  at,  hard 
to  deceive,  prompt  to  act,  lions  in  energy,  Crichtons  in 
varied  accomplishments,  Indians  in  fire  of  eye  and  gesture, 
Americans  in  strong  and  generous  impulse;  and  they  as 
well  represent  the  honour  and  wisdom  of  their  country 
at  home,  as  the  distinguished  gentleman  who  is  now  its 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  121 

Minister  at  the  British  Court  sustains  its  highest  character 
abroad. 

I  visited  both  Houses  nearly  every  day,  during  my  stay 
in  Washington.  On  my  initiatory  visit  to  the  House  of 
Representatives,  they  divided  against  a  decision  of  the 
chair;  but  the  chair  won.  The  second  time  I  went,  the 
member  who  was  speaking,  being  interrupted  by  a  laugh, 
mimicked  it,  as  one  child  would  in  quarrelling  with  an- 
other, and  added,  "  that  he  would  make  honourable  gentle- 
men opposite,  sing  out  a  little  more  on  the  other  side  of 
their  mouths  presently."  But  interruptions  are  rare;  the 
Speaker  being  usually  heard  in  silence.  There  are  more 
quarrels  than  with  us,  and  more  threatenings  than  gentle- 
men are  accustomed  to  exchange  in  any  civilised  society  of 
which  we  have  record :  but  farm-yard  imitations  have  not 
as  yet  been  imported  from  the  Parliament  of  the  United 
Kingdom.  The  feature  in  oratory  which  appears  to  be  the 
most  practised,  and  most  relished,  is  the  constant  repeti- 
tion of  the  same  idea  or  shadow  of  an  idea  in  fresh  words; 
and  the  inquiry  out  of  doors  is  not,  "  What  did  he  say?  " 
but,  "  How  long  did  he  speak?  "  These,  however,  are  but 
enlargements  of  a  principle  which  prevails  elsewhere. 

The  Senate  is  a  dignified  and  decorous  body,  and  its  pro- 
ceedings are  conducted  with  much  gravity  and  order.  Both 
houses  are  handsomely  carpeted;  but  the  state  to  which 
these  carpets  are  reduced  by  the  universal  disregard  of  the 
spittoon  with  which  every  honourable  member  is  accommo- 
dated, and  the  extraordinary  improvements  on  the  pattern 
which  are  squirted  and  dabbled  upon  it  in  every  direction, 
do  not  admit  of  being  described.  I  will  merely  observe, 
that  I  strongly  recommend  all  strangers  not  to  look  at  the 
floor;  and  if  they  happen  to  drop  anything,  though  it  be 
their  purse,  not  to  pick  it  up  with  an  ungloved  hand  on 
any  account. 

It  is  somewhat  remarkable  too,  at  first,  to  say  the  least, 
to  see  so  many  honourable  members  with  swelled  faces; 
and  it  is  scarcely  less  remarkable  to  discover  that  this  ap- 
pearance is  caused  by  the  quantity  of  tobacco  they  contrive 
to  stow  within  the  hollow  of  the  cheek.  It  is  strange 
enough  too,  to  see  an  honourable  gentleman  leaning  back  in 
his  tilted  chair  with  his  legs  on  the  desk  before  him,  shap- 
ing a  convenient  "plug"  with  his  penknife,  and  when 
it  is  quite  ready  for  use,  shooting  the  old  one  from  his 


122  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

mouth,  as  from  a  popgun,  and  clapping  the  new  one  in  itfe 
place. 

I  was  surprised  to  observe  that  even  steady  old  chewers 
of  great  experience,  are  not  always  good  marksmen,  which 
has  rather  inclined  me  to  doubt  that  general  proficiency 
with  the  rifle,  of  which  we  have  heard  so  much  in  England. 
Several  gentlemen  called  upon  me  who,  in  the  course  of 
conversation,  frequently  missed  the  spittoon  at  five  paces; 
and  one  (but  he  was  certainly  short-sighted)  mistook  the 
closed  sash  for  the  open  window,  at  three.  On  another  oc- 
casion, when  I  dined  out,  and  was  sitting  with  two  ladies 
and  some  gentlemen  round  a  fire  before  dinner,  one  of  the 
company  fell  short  of  the  fireplace,  six  distinct  times,  I 
am  disposed  to  think,  however,  that  this  was  occasioned 
by  his  not  aiming  at  that  object;  as  there  was  a  white  mar- 
ble hearth  before  the  fender,  which  was  more  convenient, 
and  may  have  suited  his  purpos':^  better. 

The  Patent  Office  at  Washington  f  irnishea  an  extraor- 
dinary example  of  American  enterprise  and  ingenuity;  for 
the  immense  number  of  models  it  contains,  ar  j  the  accumu- 
lated inventions  of  only  five  years :  the  whole  of  the  pre- 
vious collection  having  been  destroyed  by  fire.  The  ele- 
gant structure  in  which  they  are  arranged,  is  one  of  design 
rather  than  execution,  for  there  is  but  one  side  erected  out 
of  four,  though  the  works  are  stopped.  The  Post  Office  is 
a  very  compact  and  very  beautiful  building.  In  one  of  the 
departments,  among  a  collection  of  rare  and  curious  articles, 
are  deposited  the  presents  which  have  been  made  from  time 
to  time  to  the  American  ambassadors  at  foreign  courts  by 
the  various  potentates  to  whom  they  were  the  accredited 
agents  of  the  Republic;  gifts  which  by  the  law  they  are  not 
permitted  to  retain.  I  confess  that  I  looked  upon,  this  as  a 
very  painful  exhibition,  and  one  by  no  means  flattering  to 
the  national  standard  of  honesty  and  honour.  That  can 
scarcely  be  a  high  state  of  moral  feeling  which  imagines  a 
gentleman  of  repute  and  station,  likely  to  be  corrupted,  in 
the  discharge  of  his  duty,  by  the  present  of  a  snuff-box,  or 
a  richly-mounted  sword,  or  an  Eastern  shawl ;  and  surely 
the  Nation  who  reposes  confidence  in  her  appointed  ser- 
vants, is  likely  to  be  better  served,  than  she  who  makes  them 
the  subject  of  such  very  mean  and  paltry  suspicions. 

At  George  Town,  in  the  suburbs,  there  is  a  Jesuit  Col- 
lege; delightfully  situated,  and,  so  far  as  I  had  an  oppor- 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  W3 

tunity  of  seeing,  well  managed.  Many  persons  who  are 
not  members  of  the  Romish  Church,  avail  themselves,  I 
believe,  of  these  institutions,  and  of  the  advantageous  op- 
portunities they  afford  for  the  education  of  their  children. 
The  heights  of  this  neighbourhood,  above  the  Potomac 
River,  are  very  picturesque;  and  are  free,  I  should  con- 
ceive, from  some  of  the  insalubrities  of  Washington.  The 
air,  at  that  elevation,  was  quite  cool  and  refreshing,  when 
in  the  city  it  was  burning  hot. 

The  President's  mansion  is  more  like  an  English  club- 
house, both  within  and  without,  than  any  other  kind  of 
establishment  with  which  I  can  compare  it.  The  orna- 
mental ground  about  it  has  been  laid  out  in  garden  walks ; 
they  are  pretty,  and  agreeable  to  the  eye;  though  they 
have  that  uncomfortable  air  of  having  been  made  yester- 
day, which  is  far  from  favourable  to  the  display  of  such 
beauties. 

My  first  visit  to  this  house  was  on  the  morning  after  my 
arrival,  when  I  was  carried  thither  by  an  official  gentle- 
man, who  was  so  kind  as  to  charge  himself  with  my  pres- 
entation to  the  President. 

We  entered  a  large  hall,  and  having  twice  or  thrice  rung 
a  bell  which  nobody  answered,  walked  without  further 
ceremony  through  the  rooms  on  the  ground  floor,  as  divers 
other  gentlemen  (mostly  with  their  hats  on,  and  their 
hands  in  their  pockets),  were  doing  very  leisurely.  Some 
of  these  had  ladies  with  them,  to  whom  they  were  showing 
the  premises ;  others  were  lounging  on  the  chairs  and  sofas ; 
others,  in  a  perfect  state  of  exhaustion  from  listlessness, 
were  yawning  drearily.  The  greater  portion  of  this  as- 
semblage were  rather  asserting  their  supremacy  than  doing 
anything  else,  as  they  had  no  particular  business  there, 
that  anybody  knew  of.  A  few  were  closely  eyeing  the 
moveables,  as  if  to  make  quite  sure  that  the  President  (who 
was  far  from  popular)  had  not  made  away  with  any  of  the 
furniture,  or  sold  the  fixtures  for  his  private  benefit. 

After  glancing  at  these  loungers;  who  were  scattered 
over  a  pretty  drawing-room,  opening  upon  a  terrace  which 
commanded  a  beautiful  prospect  of  the  river  and  the  adja- 
cent country;  and  who  were  sauntering  too  about  a  larger 
state-room  called  the  Eastern  Drawing-room ;  we  went  up 
stairs  into  another  chamber,  where  were  certain  visitors, 
waiting  for  audiences.     At  sight  of  my  conductor,  a  black 


124  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

in  plain  clothes  and  yellow  slippers  who  was  gliding  noise- 
lessly about,  and  whispering  messages  in  the  ears  of  the 
more  impatient,  made  a  sign  of  recognition,  and  glided  off 
to  announce  him. 

We  had  previously  looked  into  another  chamber  fitted  all 
round  with  a  great  bare  wooden  desk  or  counter,  whereon 
lay  files  of  newspapers,  to  which  sundrj^  gentlemen  were  re- 
ferring. But  there  were  no  such  means  of  beguiling  the 
time  in  this  apartment,  which  was  as  unpromising  and  tire- 
some as  any  waiting-room  in  one  of  our  public  establish- 
ments, or  any  physician's  dining-room  during  his  hours  of 
consultation  at  home. 

There  were  some  fifteen  or  twenty  persons  in  the  room. 
One,  a  tall,  wiry,  muscular  old  man,  from  the  west;  sun- 
burnt and  swarthy ;  with  a  brown  wliite  hat  on  his  knees, 
and  a  giant  umbrella  resting  between  his  legs;  who  sat 
bolt  upright  in  his  chair,  frowning  steadily  at  the  carpet, 
and  twitching  the  hard  lines  about  his  mouth,  as  if  he  had 
made  up  his  mind  "  to  fix  "  the  President  on  what  he  had 
to  say,  and  wouldn't  bate  him  a  grain.  Another,  a  Ken- 
tucky farmer,  six-feet-six  in  height,  with  his  hat  on,  and 
his  hands  under  his  coat-tails,  who  leaned  against  the  wall 
and  kicked  the  floor  with  his  heel,  as  though  he  had  Time's 
head  under  his  shoe,  and  were  literally  " killing"  him.  A 
third,  an  oval-faced,  bilious-looking  man,  with  sleek  black 
hair  cropped  close,  and  whiskers  and  beard  shaved  down  to 
blue  dots,  who  sucked  the  head  of  a  thick  stick,  and  from 
time  to  time  took  it  out  of  his  mouth,  to  see  how  it  was 
getting  on,  A  fourth  did  nothing  but  whistle.  A  fifth  did 
nothing  but  spit.  And  indeed  all  these  gentlemen  were  so 
very  persevering  and  energetic  in  this  latter  particular,  and 
bestowed  their  favours  so  abundantly  upon  the  carpet,  that 
I  take  it  for  granted  the  Presidential  housemaids  have  high 
wages,  or,  to  speak  more  genteelly,  an  ample  amount  of 
"  compensation :  "  which  is  the  American  word  for  salary, 
in  trie  case  of  all  public  servants. 

We  had  not  waited  in  this  room  many  minutes,  before 
the  black  messenger  returned,  and  conducted  us  into 
another  of  smaller  dimensions,  where,  at  a  business-like 
table  covered  with  papers,  sat  the  President  himself.  He 
looked  somewhat  worn  and  anxious,  and  well  he  might; 
being  at  war  with  everybody — but  the  expression  of  his  face 
was  mild  and  pleasant,  and  his  manner  was  remarkably 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  125 

unaffected,  gentlemanly,  and  agreeable.  I  tliought  that  in 
his  whole  carriage  and  demeanour,  he  became  his  station 
singularly  well. 

Being  advised  that  the  sensible  etiquette  of  the  repub- 
lican court,  admitted  of  a  traveller,  like  myself,  declining, 
without  any  impropriety,  an  invitation  to  dinner,  which  did 
not  reach  me  until  I  had  concluded  my  arrangements  for 
leaving  Washington  some  days  before  that  to  which  it  re- 
ferred, I  only  returned  to  this  house  once.  It  was  on  the 
occasion  of  one  of  those  general  assemblies  which  are  held 
on  certain  nights,  between  the  hours  of  nine  and  twelve 
o'clock,  and  are  called,  rather  oddly.  Levees. 

I  went,  with  my  wife,  at  about  ten.  There  was  a  pretty 
dense  crowd  of  carriages  and  people  in  the  court-yard,  and 
so  far  as  I  could  make  out,  there  were  no  very  clear  regula- 
tions for  the  taking  up  or  setting  down  of  company.  There 
were  certainly  no  policemen  to  soothe  startled  horses,  either 
by  sawing  at  their  bridles  or  flourishing  truncheons  in  their 
eyes;  and  I  am  ready  to  make  oath  that  no  inoffensive  per- 
sons were  knocked  violently  on  the  head,  or  poked  acutely 
in  their  backs  or  stomachs;  or  brought  to  a  standstill  by 
any  such  gentle  means,  and  then  taken  into  custody  for  not 
moving  on.  But  there  was  no  confusion  or  disorder.  Our 
carriage  reached  the  porch  in  its  turn,  without  any  bluster- 
ing, swearing,  shouting,  backing,  or  other  disturbance :  and 
we  dismounted  with  as  much  ease  and  comfort  as  though 
we  had  been  escorted  by  the  whole  Metropolitan  Force  from 
A  to  Z  inclusive. 

The  suite  of  rooms  on  the  ground-floor,  were  lighted  up; 
and  a  military  band  was  playing  in  the  hall.  In  the  smaller 
drawing-rooom,  the  centre  of  a  circle  of  company,  were  the 
President  and  his  daughter-in-law,  who  acted  as  the  lady 
of  the  mansion:  and  a  very  interesting,  graceful,  and  ac- 
complished lady  too.  One  gentleman  who  stood  among 
this  group,  appeared  to  take  upon  himself  the  functions  of 
a  master  of  the  ceremonies.  I  saw  no  other  officers  or  at- 
tendants, and  none  were  needed. 

The  great  drawing-room,  which  I  have  already  mentioned, 
and  the  other  chambers  on  the  ground-floor,  were  crowded 
to  excess.  The  company  was  not,  in  our  sense  of  the  term, 
select,  for  it  comprehended  persons  of  very  many  grades 
and  classes;  nor  was  there  any  great  display  of  costly  at- 
tire :  indeed,  some  of  the  costumes  may  have  been,  for 


126  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

aught  I  know,  grotesque  enougli.  But  the  decorum  and 
propriety  of  behaviour  which  prevailed,  were  unbroken  by 
any  rude  or  disagreeable  incident;  and  every  man,  even 
among  the  miscellaneous  crowd  in  the  hall  who  were  ad- 
mitted without  any  orders  or  tickets  to  look  on,  appeared  to 
feel  that  he  was  a  part  of  the  Institution,  and  was  respon- 
sible for  its  preserving  a  becoming  character,  and  appearing 
to  the  best  advantage. 

That  these  visitors,  too,  whatever  their  station,  were  not 
without  some  refinement  of  taste  and  appreciation  of  intel- 
lectual gifts,  and  gratitude  to  those  men  who,  by  the  peace- 
ful exercise  of  great  abilities,  shed  new  charms  and  associ- 
ations upon  the  homes  of  their  countrymen,  and  elevate 
their  character  in  other  lands,  was  most  earnestly  testified 
by  their  reception  of  Washington  Irving,  my  dear  friend, 
who  had  recently  been  appointed  Minister  at  the  court  of 
Spain,  and  who  was  among  them  that  night,  in  his  new 
character,  for  the  first  and  last  time  before  going  abroad. 
I  sincerely  believe  that  in  all  the  madness  of  American 
politics,  few  public  men  would  have  been  so  earnestly,  de- 
votedly, and  affectionately  caressed,  as  this  most  charming 
writer:  and  I  have  seldom  respected  a  public  assembly 
more,  than  I  did  this  eager  throng,  when  I  saw  them  turn- 
ing with  one  mind  from  noisy  orators  and  ofl&cers  of  state, 
and  flocking  with  a  generous  and  honest  impulse  round 
the  man  of  quiet  pursuits :  proud  in  his  promotion  as  re- 
flecting back  upon  their  country :  and  grateful  to  him  with 
their  whole  hearts  for  the  store  of  graceful  fancies  he  had 
poured  out  among  them.  Long  may  he  dispense  such 
treasures  with  unsparing  hand ;  and  long  may  they  remem- 
ber him  as  worthily ! 

The  term  we  had  assigned  for  the  duration  of  our  stay 
in  Washington  was  now  at  an  end,  and  we  were  to  begin 
to  travel;  for  the  railroad  distances  we  had  traversed  yet, 
in  journeying  among  these  older  towns,  are  on  that  great 
continent  looked  upon  as  nothing. 

I  had  at  first  intended  going  South — to  Charleston.  But 
when  I  came  to  consider  the  length  of  time  which  this 
journey  would  occupy,  and  the  premature  heat  of  the 
season,  which  even  at  Washington  had  been  often  very  try- 
ing ;  and  weighed  moreover,  in  my  own  mind,  the  pain  of 
living  in  the  constant  contemplation  of  slavery,  against  the 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  127 

more  than  doubtful  chances  of  my  ever  seeing  it,  in  the 
time  I  had  to  spare,  stripped  of  the  disguises  in  which  it 
would  certainly  be  dressed,  and  so  adding  any  item  to  the 
host  of  facts  already  heaped  together  on  the  subject;  I  be- 
gan to  listen  to  old  whisperings  which  had  often  been  pres- 
ent to  me  at  home  in  England,  when  I  little  thought  of 
ever  being  here;  and  to  dream  again  of  cities  growing  up, 
like  palaces  in  fairy  tales,  among  the  wilds  and  forests  of 
the  West. 

The  advice  I  received  in  most  quarters  when  I  began  to 
yield  to  my  desire  of  travelling  towards  that  point  of  the 
compass  was,  according  to  custom,  sufficiently  cheerless: 
my  companion  being  threatened  with  more  perils,  dangers, 
and  discomforts,  than  I  can  remember  or  would  catalogue 
if  I  could;  but  of  which  it  will  be  sufficient  to  remark  that 
blowings-up  in  steamboats  and  breakings-down  in  coaches 
were  among  the  least.  But,  having  a  western  route 
sketched  out  for  me  by  the  best  and  kindest  authority  to 
which  I  could  have  resorted,  and  putting  no  great  faith  in 
these  discouragements,  I  soon  determined  on  my  plan  of 
action. 

This  was  to  travel  South,  only  to  Richmond  in  Virginia ; 
and  then  to  turn,  and  shape  our  course  for  the  Far  West ; 
whither  I  beseech  the  reader's  company,  in  a  new  chapter. 


CHAPTER    THE    NINTH. 

A  NIGHT  STEAMER  ON  THE  POTOMAC  RIVER— A  VIR- 
GINIA ROAD,  AND  A  BLACK  DRIVER— RICHMOND 
—BALTIMORE— THE  HARRISBURGH  MAIL,  AND  A 
GLIMPSE  OF  THE  CITY— A  CANAL-BOAT. 

We  were  to  proceed  in  the  first  instance  by  steamboat ; 
and  as  it  is  usual  to  sleep  on  board,  in  consequence  of  the 
starting-hour  being  four  o'clock  in  the  morning,  we  went 
down  to  where  she  lay,  at  that  very  uncomfortable  time  for 
such  expeditions  when  slippers  are  most  valuable,  and  a 
familiar  bed,  in  the  perspective  of  an  hour  or  two,  looks 
uncommonly  pleasant. 

It  is  ten  o'clock  at  night:  say  half-past  ten:  moonlighl^ 


128  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

warm,  and  dull  enough.  The  steamer  (not  unlike  a  child's 
Noah's  Ark  in  form,  with  the  machinery  on  the  top  of  the 
roof)  is  riding  lazily  up  and  down,  and  bumping  clumsily 
against  the  wooden  pier,  as  the  ripple  of  the  river  trifles 
with  its  unwieldy  carcase.  The  wharf  is  some  distance 
from  the  city.  There  is  nobody  down  here;  and  one  or 
two  dull  lamps  upon  the  steamer's  decks  are  the  only  signs 
of  life  remaining,  when  our  coach  has  driven  away.  As 
soon  as  our  footsteps  are  heard  upon  the  planks,  a  fat  ne- 
gress,  particularly  favoured  by  nature  in  respect  of  bustle, 
emerges  from  some  dark  stairs,  and  marshals  my  wife 
towards  the  ladies'  cabin,  to  which  retreat  she  goes  fol- 
lowed by  a  mighty  bale  of  cloaks  and  great-coats.  I  val- 
iantly resolve  not  to  go  to  bed  at  all,  but  to  walk  up  and 
down  the  pier  till  morning. 

I  begin  my  promenade — thinking  of  all  kinds  of  distant 
things  and  persons,  and  of  nothing  near — and  pace  up  and 
down  for  half-an-hour.  Then  I  go  on  board  again ;  and 
getting  into  the  light  of  one  of  the  lamps,  look  at  my  watch 
and  think  it  must  have  stopped;  and  wonder  what  has  be- 
come of  the  faithful  secretary  whom  I  brought  along  with 
me  from  Boston.  He  is  supping  with  our  late  landlord  (a 
Field  Marshal,  at  least,  no  doubt)  in  honour  of  our  depart- 
ure, and  may  be  two  hours  longer.  I  walk  again,  but  it 
gets  duller  and  duller :  the  moon  goes  down :  next  June 
seems  farther  off  in  the  dark,  and  the  echoes  of  my  foot- 
steps make  me  nervous.  It  has  turned  cold  too;  and  walk- 
ing up  and  down  without  any  companion  in  such  lonely 
circumstances,  is  but  poor  amusement.  So  I  break  my 
staunch  resolution,  and  think  it  may  be,  perhaps,  as  well 
to  go  to  bed. 

I  go  on  board  again;  open  the  door  of  the  gentlemen's 
cabin ;  and  walk  in.  Somehow  or  other — from  its  being  so 
quiet  I  suppose — I  have  taken  it  into  my  head  that  there 
is  nobody  there.  To  my  horror  and  amazement  it  is  full 
of  sleepers  in  every  stage,  shape,  attitude,  and  variety  of 
slumber :  in  the  berths,  on  the  chairs,  on  the  floors,  on  the 
tables,  and  particularly  round  the  stove,  my  detested  ene- 
my. I  take  another  step  forward,  and  slip  on  the  shining 
face  of  a  black  steward,  who  lies  rolled  in  a  blanket  on  the 
floor.  He  jumps  up,  grins,  half  in  pain  and  half  in  hos- 
pitality; whispers  my  own  name  in  my  ear;  and  groping 
among  the  sleepers,  leads  me  to  my  berth.     Standing  be- 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  12& 

side  it,  I  count  these  slumbering  passengers,  and  get  past 
forty.  There  is  no  use  in  going  further,  so  I  begin  to  un- 
dress. As  the  chairs  are  all  occupied,  and  there  is  nothing 
else  to  put  my  clothes  on,  I  deposit  them  upon  the  ground  : 
not  without  soiling  my  hands,  for  it  is  in  the  same  condi- 
tion as  the  carpets  in  the  Capitol,  and  from  the  same  cause. 
Having  but  partially  undressed,  I  clamber  on  my  shelf, 
and  hold  the  curtain  open  for  a  few  minutes  while  I  look 
round  on  all  my  fellow-travellers  again.  That  done,  I  let 
it  fall  on  them,  and  on  the  world :  turn  round :  and  go  to 
sleep. 

I  wake,  of  course,  when  we  get  under  weigh,  for  there  is 
a  good  deal  of  noise.  The  day  is  then  just  breaking.  Ev- 
erybody wakes  at  the  same  time.  Some  are  self-possessed 
directly,  and  some  are  much  perplexed  to  make  out  where 
they  are  until  they  have  rubbed  their  eyes,  and  leaning  on 
one  elbow,  looked  about  them.  Some  yawn,  some  groan, 
nearly  all  spit,  and  a  few  get  up.  I  am  among  the  risers : 
for  it  is  easy  to  feel,  witliout  going  into  the  fresh  air,  that 
the  atmosphere  of  the  cabin  is  vile  in  the  last  degree,  I 
huddle  on  my  clothes,  go  down  into  the  fore-cabin,  get 
shaved  by  the  barber,  and  wash  myself.  The  washing  and 
dressing  apparatus  for  the  passengers  generally,  consists  of 
two  jack-towels,  three  small  wooden  basins,  a  keg  of  water 
and  a  ladle  to  serve  it  out  with,  six  square  inches  of  look- 
ing-glass, two  ditto  ditto  of  yellow  soap,  a  comb  and  brush 
for  the  head,  and  nothing  for  the  teeth.  Everybody  uses 
the  comb  and  brush,  except  myself.  Everybody  stares  to 
see  me  using  my  own;  and  two  or  three  gentlemen  are 
strongly  disposed  to  banter  me  on  my  prejudices,  but  don't. 
When  I  have  made  my  toilet,  I  go  upon  the  hurricane-deck, 
and  set  in  for  two  hours  of  hard  walking  up  and  down. 
The  sun  is  rising  brilliantly ;  we  are  passing  Mount  Vernon, 
where  Washington  lies  buried ;  the  river  is  wide  and  rapid ; 
and  its  banks  are  beautiful.  All  the  glory  and  splendour 
of  the  day  are  coming  on,  and  growing  brighter  every 
minute. 

At  eight  o'clock,  we  breakfast  in  the  cabin  where  1  passed 
the  night,  but  the  windows  and  doors  are  all  thrown  open, 
and  now  it  is  fresh  enough.  There  is  no  hurry  or  greedi- 
ness apparent  in  the  despatch  of  the  meal.  It  is  longer 
than  a  travelling  breakfast  with  us;  more  orderly;  and 
more  polite 


130  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

Soon  after  nine  o'clock  we  come  to  Potomac  Creek,  where 
we  are  to  land:  and  then  comes  the  oddest  part  of  the 
journey.  Seven  stage-coaches  are  preparing  to  carry  us  on. 
Some  of  them  are  ready,  some  of  them  are  not  ready. 
Some  of  the  drivers  are  blacks,  some  whites.  There  are 
four  horses  to  each  coach,  and  all  the  horses,  harnessed  or 
unharnessed,  are  there.  The  passengers  are  getting  out  of 
the  steamboat,  and  into  the  coaches ;  the  luggage  is  being 
transferred  in  noisy  wheelbarrows ;  the  horses  are  fright- 
ened, and  impatient  to  start ;  the  black  drivers  are  chatter- 
ing to  them  like  so  many  monkeys ;  and  the  white  ones 
whooping  like  so  many  drovers :  for  the  main  thing  to  be 
done  in  all  kinds  of  hostlering  here,  is  to  make  as  much 
noise  as  possible.  The  coaches  are  something  like  the 
French  coaches,  but  not  nearly  so  good.  In  lieu  of  springs, 
they  are  hung  on  bands  of  the  strongest  leather.  There  is 
very  little  choice  or  difference  between  them ;  and  they  may 
be  likened  to  the  car  portion  of  the  swings  at  an  English 
fair,  roofed,  put  upon  axle-trees  and  wheels,  and  curtained 
with  painted  canvas.  They  are  covered  with  mud  from  the 
roof  to  the  wheel-tyre,  and  have  never  been  cleaned  since 
they  were  first  built. 

The  tickets  we  have  received  on  board  the  steamboat  are 
marked  No.  1,  so  we  belong  to  coach  No.  1.  I  throw  my 
coat  on  the  box,  and  hoist  my  wife  and  her  maid  into  the 
inside.  It  has  only  one  step,  and  that  being  about  a  yard 
from  the  ground,  is  usually  approached  by  a  chair :  when 
there  is  no  chair,  ladies  trust  in  Providence.  The  coach 
holds  nine  inside,  having  a  seat  across  from  door  to  door, 
where  we  in  England  put  our  legs :  so  that  there  is  only 
one  feat  more  difficult  in  the  performance  than  getting  in, 
and  that  is,  getting  out  again.  There  is  only  one  outside 
passenger,  and  he  sits  upon  the  box.  As  I  am  that  one, 
I  climb  up ;  and  while  they  are  strapping  the  luggage  on 
the  roof,  and  heaping  it  into  a  kind  of  tray  behind,  have  a 
good  opportunity  of  looking  at  the  driver. 

He  is  a  negro — very  black  indeed.  He  is  dressed  in  a 
coarse  pepper-and-salt  suit  excessively  patched  and  darned 
(particularly  at  the  knees),  grey  stockings,  enormous  un- 
blacked  high-low  shoes,  and  very  short  trousers.  He  has 
two  odd  gloves :  one  of  parti-coloured  worsted,  and  one  of 
leather.  He  has  a  very  short  whip,  broken  in  the  middle 
and  bandaged  up  with  string.     And  yet  he  wears  a  low- 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  JUtt 

crowned,  broad-brimmed,  black  hat:  faintly  shadowing 
forth  a  kind  of  insane  imitation  of  an  English  coachman ! 
But  somebody  in  authority  cries  "  Go  ahead ! "  as  I  am 
making  these  observations.  The  mail  takes  the  lead  in  a 
four -horse  waggon,  and  all  the  coaches  follow  in  proces- 
sion :  headed  by  No.  1. 

By  the  way,  whenever  an  Englishman  would  cry  "  All 
right ! "  an  American  cries  "  Go  ahead ! "  which  is  some- 
what expressive  of  the  national  character  of  the  two  coun- 
tries. 

The  first  half-mile  of  the  road  is  over  bridges  made  of 
loose  planks  laid  across  two  parallel  poles,  which  tilt  up  as 
the  wheels  roll  over  them;  and  iisr  the  river.  The  river  has 
a  clayey  bottom  and  is  full  of  holes,  so  that  half  a  horse  is 
constantly  disappearing  unexpectedly,  and  can't  be  found 
again  for  some  time. 

But  we  get  past  even  this,  and  come  to  the  road  itself, 
which  is  a  series  of  alternate  swamps  and  gravel-pits.  A 
tremendous  place  is  close  before  us,  the  black  driver  rolls 
his  eyes,  screws  his  mouth  up  very  round,  and  looks 
straight  between  the  two  leaders,  as  if  he  were  saying  to 
himself,  "  We  have  done  this  often  before,  but  now  I  think 
we  shall  have  a  crash."  He  takes  a  rein  in  each  hand; 
jerks  and  pulls  at  both;  and  dances  on  the  splashboard 
with  both  feet  (keeping  his  seat,  of  course)  like  the  late 
lamented  Ducrow  on  two  of  his  fiery  coursers.  We  come 
to  the  spot,  sink  down  in  the  mire  nearly  to  the  coach  win- 
dows, tilt  on  one  side  at  an  angle  of  forty-five  degrees,  and 
stick  there.  The  insides  scream  dismally;  the  coach  stops; 
the  horses  flounder;  all  the  other  six  coaches  stop;  and 
their  f our-and-twenty  horses  flounder  likewise :  but  merely 
for  company,  and  in  sympathy  with  ours.  Then  the  fol- 
lowing circumstances  occur. 

Black  Driver  (to  the  horses).     "  Hi ! " 

Nothing  happens.     Insides  scream  again. 

Black  Driver  (to  the  horses).     "  Ho!  " 

Horses  plunge,  and  splash  the  black  driver. 

Gentleman  inside  (looking  out).  "Why,  what  on 
airth " 

Gentleman  receives  a  variety  of  splashes  and  draws  his 
head  in  again,  without  finishing  his  question  or  waiting  for 
an  answer. 

Black  Driver  (still  to  the  horses).     "  Jiddy!  Jiddy!" 


1^  AMERICAIT  NOTES. 

Horses  pull  violently,  drag  the  coach  out  of  the  hole,  and 
draw  it  up  a  bank;  so  steep,  that  the  black  driver's  legs 
fly  into  the  air,  and  he  goes  back  among  the  luggage  on  the 
roof.  But  he  immediately  recovers  himself,  and  cries  (still 
to  the  horses), 

"Pill!" 

No  effect.  On  the  contrary,  the  coach  begins  to  roll 
back  upon  No.  2,  which  rolls  back  upon  No.  3,  which  rolls 
back  upon  No.  4,  and  so  on,  until  No.  7  is  heard  to  curse 
and  swear,  nearly  a  quarter  of  a  mile  behind. 

Black  Driver  (louder  than  before).     "Pill!" 

Horses  make  another  struggle  to  get  up  the  bank,  and 
again  the  coach  rolls  backward. 

Black  Driver  (louder  than  before).     " Pe-e-e-ill ! '' 

Horses  make  a  desperate  struggle. 

Black  Driver  (recovering  spirits).  "  Hi,  Jiddy,  Jiddy, 
Pill!" 

Horses  make  another  effort. 

Black  Driver  (with  great  vigour).  "Ally  Loo!  Hi. 
Jiddy,  Jiddy.     Pill.     Ally  Loo!" 

Horses  almost  do  it. 

Black  Driver  (with  his  eyes  starting  out  of  his  head). 
"  Lee,  den.  Lee,  dere.  Hi.  Jiddy,  Jiddy.  Pill.  Ally 
Loo.     Lee-e-e-e-e ! " 

They  run  up  the  bank,  and  go  down  again  on  the  other 
side  at  a  fearful  pace.  It  is  impossible  to  stop  them,  and 
at  the  bottom  there  is  a  deep  hollow,  full  of  water.  The 
coach  rolls  frightfully.  The  insides  scream.  The  mud 
and  water  fly  about  us.  The  black  driver  dances  like  a  mad- 
man. Suddenly  we  are  all  right  by  some  extraordinary 
means,  and  stop  to  breathe. 

A  black  friend  of  the  black  driver  is  sitting  on  a  fence. 
The  black  driver  recognises  him  by  twirling  his  head  round 
and  round  like  a  harlequin,  rolling  his  eyes,  shrugging  his 
shoulders,  and  grinning  from  ear  to  ear.  He  stops  short, 
turns  to  me,  and  says : 

"  We  shall  get  you  through  sa,  like  a  fiddle,  and  hope  a 
please  you  when  we  get  you  through  sa.  Old  'ooman  at 
home  Sir :  "  chuckling  very  much.  "Outside  gentleman  sa, 
he  often  remember  old  'ooman  at  home  sa,"  grinning  again. 

"Ay,  ay,  we'll  take  care  of  the  old  woman.  Don't  be 
afraid." 

The  black  driver  grins  again,  but  there  is  another  hole, 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  133 

and  beyond  that,  another  bank,  close  before  us.  So  he 
stops  short:  cries  (to  the  horses  again)  "Easy.  Easy  den. 
Ease.  Steady.  Hi.  Jiddy.  Pill.  Ally.  Loo,"  but 
never  "  Lee ! "  until  we  are  reduced  to  the  very  last  ex- 
tremity, and  are  in  the  midst  of  difficulties,  extrication 
from  vy'hich  appears  to  be  all  but  impossible. 

And  so  we  do  the  ten  miles  or  thereabouts  in  two  hours 
and  a  half;  breaking  no  bones,  though  bruising  a  great 
many;  and  in  short  getting  through  the  distance,  "like  a 
fiddle." 

This  singular  kind  of  coaching  terminates  at  Fredericks- 
burgh,  whence  there  is  a  railway  to  Richmond.  The  tract 
of  country  through  which  it  takes  its  course  was  once  pro- 
ductive :  but  the  soil  has  been  exhausted  by  the  system  of 
employing  a  great  amount  of  slave  labour  in  forcing  crops, 
without  strengthening  the  land :  and  it  is  noAV  little  better 
than  a  sandy  desert  overgrown  with  trees.  Dreary  and  un- 
interesting as  its  aspect  is,  I  was  glad  to  the  heart  to  find 
anything  on  which  one  of  the  curses  of  this  horrible  insti- 
tution has  fallen ;  and  had  greater  pleasure  in  contemplat- 
ing the  withered  ground,  than  the  richest  and  m.ost  thriv- 
ing cultivation  in  the  same  place  could  possibly  have 
afforded  me. 

In  this  district,  as  in  all  others  where  slavery  sits  brood- 
ing (I  have  frequently  heard  this  admitted,  even  by  those 
who  are  its  warmest  advocates)  there  is  an  air  of  ruin  and 
decay  abroad,  which  is  inseparable  from  the  system.  The 
barns  and  outhouses  are  mouldering  away;  the  sheds  are 
patched  and  half  roofless;  the  log  cabins  (built  in  Virginia 
with  external  chimneys  made  of  clay  or  wood)  are  squalid 
in  the  last  degree.  There  is  no  look  of  decent  comfort  any- 
where. The  miserable  stations  by  the  railway  side;  the 
great  wild  wood-yards,  whence  the  engine  is  supplied 
with  fuel;  the  negro  children  rolling  on  the  ground  be- 
fore the  cabin  doors,  with  dogs  and  pigs ;  the  biped  beasts 
of  burden  slinking  past:  gloom  and  dejection  are  upon 
them  all. 

In  the  negro  car  belonging  to  the  train  in  which  we  made 
this  journey,  were  a  mother  and  her  children  who  had  just 
been  purchased ;  the  husband  and  father  being  left  behind 
with  their  old  owner.  The  children  cried  the  whole  way, 
and  the  mother  was  misery's  picture.  The  champion  of 
Life,   Liberty,   and  the  Fursuit  of  Happiness,   who  had 


134  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

bought  them,  rode  in  the  same  train ;  and,  every  time  we 
stopped,  got  down  to  see  that  they  were  safe.  The  black 
in  Sinbad's  Travels  with  one  eye  in  the  middle  of  his  fore- 
head which  shone  like  a  burning  coal,  was  nature's  aristo- 
crat compared  with  this  white  gentleman* 

It  was  between  six  and  seven  o'clock  in  the  evening, 
when  we  drove  to  the  hotel :  in  front  of  which,  and  on  the 
top  of  the  broad  flight  of  steps  leading  to  the  door,  two  or 
three  citizens  were  balancing  themselves  on  rocking-chairs, 
and  smoking  cigars.  We  found  it  a  very  large  and  elegant 
establishment,  and  were  as  well  entertained  as  travellers 
need  deaice  to  be.  The  climate  being  a  thirsty  one,  there 
was  never,  at  any  hour  of  the  day,  a  scarcity  of  loungers  in 
the  spacious  bar,  or  a  cessation  of  the  mixing  of  cool 
liquors :  but  they  were  a  merrier  people  here,  and  had  mu- 
sical instruments  playing  to  them  o'  nights,  which  it  was 
a  treat  to  hear  again. 

The  next  day,  and  the  next,  we  rode  and  walked  about 
the  town,  which  is  delightfully  situated  on  eight  hills, 
overhanging  James  River;  a  sparkling  stream,  studded 
here  and  there  with  bright  islands,  or  brawling  over  broken 
rocks.  Although  it  was  yet  but  the  middle  of  March,  the 
weather  in  this  southern  temperature  was  extremely  warm; 
the  peach-trees  and  magnolias  were  in  full  bloom ;  and  the 
trees  were  green.  In  a  low  ground  among  the  hills,  is  a 
valley  known  as  "Bloody  Run,"  from  a  terrible  conflict 
with  the  Indians  which  once  occurred  there.  It  is  a  good 
place  for  such  a  struggle,  and,  like  every  other  spot  I  saw, 
associated  with  any  legend  of  that  wild  people  now  so 
rapidly  fading  from  the  earth,  interested  me  very  much. 

The  city  is  the  seat  of  the  local  parliament  of  Virginia; 
and  in  its  shady  legislative  halls,  some  orators  were  drow- 
sily holding  forth  to  the  hot  noonday.  By  dint  of  constant 
repetition,  however,  these  constitutional  sights  had  very 
little  more  interest  for  me  than  so  many  parochial  vestries ; 
and  I  was  glad  to  exchange  this  one  for  a  lounge  in  a  well- 
arranged  public  library  of  some  ten  thousand  volumes,  and 
a  visit  to  a  tobacco  manufactory,  where  the  workmen  were 
all  slaves. 

I  saw  in  this  place  the  whole  process  of  picking,  rolling, 
pressing,  drying,  packing  in  casks,  and  branding.  All  the 
tobacco  thus  dealt  with,  was  in  course  of  manufacture  for 
chewing;  and  one  would  have  supposed  there  was  enough 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  136 

In  that  one  storehouse  to  have  filled  even  the  compre- 
hensive jaws  of  America.  In  this  form,  the  weed  looks 
like  the  oilcake  on  which  we  fatten  cattle;  and  even 
without  reference  to  its  consequences,  is  sufficiently  unin- 
viting. 

Many  of  the  workmen  appeared  to  be  strong  men,  and  it 
is  hardly  necessary  to  add  that  they  were  all  labouring 
quietly,  then.  After  two  o'clock  in  the  day,  they  are  al- 
lowed to  sing,  a  certain  number  at  a  time.  The  hour  strik- 
ing while  I  was  there,  some  twenty  sang  a  hymn  in  parts, 
and  sang  it  by  no  means  ill ;  pursuing  their  work  mean- 
while. A  bell  rang  as  I  was  about  to  leave,  and  they  all 
poured  forth  into  a  building  on  the  opposite  side  of  the 
street  to  dinner.  I  said  several  times  that  I  should  like  to 
see  them  at  their  meal ;  but  as  the  gentleman  to  whom  I 
mentioned  this  desire  appeared  to  be  suddenly  taken  rather 
deaf,  I  did  not  pursue  the  request.  Of  their  appearance  I 
shall  have  something  to  say,  presently. 

On  the  following  day,  I  visited  a  plantation  or  farm,  of 
about  twelve  hundred  acres,  on  the  opposite  bank  of  the 
river.  Here  again,  although  I  went  down  with  the  owner 
of  the  estate,  to  *'the  quarter,"  as  that  part  of  it  in  which 
the  slaves  live  is  called,  I  was  not  invited  to  enter  into  any 
of  their  huts.  All  I  saw  of  them,  was,  that  they  were 
very  crazy,  wretched  cabins,  near  to  which  groups  of  half- 
naked  children  basked  in  the  sun,  or  wallowed  on  the  dusty 
ground.  But  I  believe  that  this  gentleman  is  a  considerate 
and  excellent  master,  who  inherited  his  fifty  slaves,  and  is 
neither  a  buyer  nor  a  seller  of  human  stock;  "and  I  am  sure, 
from  my  own  observation  and  conviction,  that  he  is  a  kind- 
hearted,  worthy  man. 

The  planter's  house  was  an  airy  rustic  dwelling,  that 
brought  Defoe's  description  of  such  places  strongly  to  my 
recollection.  The  day  was  very  warm,  but  the  blinds  being 
all  closed,  and  the  windows  and  doors  set  wide  open,  a 
shady  coolness  rustled  through  the  rooms,  which  was  ex- 
quisitely refreshing  after  the  glare  and  heat  without.  Be- 
fore the  windows  was  an  open  piazza,  where,  in  what  they 
call  the  hot  weather — whatever  that  may  be — they  sling 
hammocks,  and  drink  and  doze  luxuriously.  I  do  not 
know  how  their  cool  refections  may  taste  within  the  ham- 
mocks, but,  having  experience,  I  can  report  that,  out 
of  them,  the  mounds  of  ices  and  the  bowls  of  mint-julep  and 


136  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

sherry-cobbler  they  make  in  these  latitudes,  are  refresh- 
inents  never  to  be  thought  of  afterwards,  in  summer,  by 
those  who  would  preserve  contented  minds. 

There  are  two  bridges  across  the  river :  one  belongs  to 
the  railroad,  and  the  other,  which  is  a  very  crazy  affair,  is 
the  private  property  of  some  old  lady  in  the  neighbourhood, 
who  levies  tolls  upon  the  townspeople.  Crossing  this 
bridge,  on  my  way  back,  I  saw  a  notice  painted  on  the 
gate,  cautioning  all  persons  to  drive  slowly:  under  a  pen- 
alty, if  the  offender  were  a  white  man,  of  five  dollars;  if  a 
negro,  fifteen  stripes. 

The  same  decay  and  gloom  that  overhang  the  way  by 
which  it  is  approached,  hover  above  the  town  of  Richmond. 
There  are  pretty  villas  and  cheerful  houses  in  its  streets, 
and  Nature  smiles  upon  the  country  round;  but  jostling  its 
handsome  residences,  like  slavery  itself  going  hand  in  hand 
with  many  lofty  virtues,  are  deplorable  tenements,  fences 
unrepaired,  walls  crumbling  into  ruinous  heaps.  Hinting 
gloomily  .at  things  below  the  surface,  these,  and  many 
other  tokens  of  the  same  description,  force  themselves  upon 
the  notice,  and  are  remembered  with  depressing  influence, 
when  livelier  features  are  forgotten. 

To  those  who  are  happily  unaccustomed  to  them,  the 
countenances  in  the  streets  and  labouring-places,  too,  are 
shocking.  All  men  who  know  that  there  are  laws  against 
instructing  slaves,  of  which  the  pains  and  penalties  greatly 
exceed  in  their  amount  the  fines  imposed  on  those  who 
maim  and  torture  them,  must  be  prepared  to  find  their  faces 
very  low  in  the  scale  of  intellectual  expression.  But  the 
darkness — not  of  skin,  but  mind — which  meets  the  stran- 
ger's eye  at  every  turn;  the  brutalizing  and  blotting  out  of 
all  the  fairer  characters  traced  by  Nature's  hand;  immeas- 
urably outdo  his  worst  belief.  That  travelled  creation  of 
the  great  satirist's  brain,  who  fresh  from  living  among 
horses,  peered  from  a  high  casement  down  upon  his  own 
kind  with  trembling  horror,  was  scarcely  more  repelled  and 
daunted  by  the  sight,  than  those  who  look  upon  some  of 
these  faces  for  the  first  time  must  surely  be. 

I  left  the  last  of  them  behind  me  in  the  person  of  a 
wretched  drudge,  who,  after  running  to  and  fro  all  day  till 
midnight,  and  moping  in  his  stealthy  winks  of  sleep  upon 
the  stairs  betweenwhiles,  was  washing  the  dark  passages 
at  four  o'clock  in  the  morning;  and  went  upon  my  way 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  187 

with  a  grateful  heart  that  I  was  not  doomed  to  live  where 
slavery  was,  and  had  never  had  my  senses  blunted  to  its 
wrongs  and  horroi's  in  a  slave-rocked  cradle. 

It  had  been  my  intention  to  proceed  by  James  River  and 
Chesapeake  Bay  to  Baltimore;  but  one  of  the  steamboats 
being  absent  from  her  station  through  some  accident,  and 
the  means  of  conveyance  being  consequently  rendered  un- 
certain, we  returned  to  Washington  by  the  way  we  had 
come  (there  were  two  constables  on  board  the  steamboat, 
in  pursuit  of  runaway  slaves),  and  halting  there  again  for 
one  night,  went  on  to  Baltimore  next  afternoon. 

The  most  comfortable  of  all  the  hotels  of  which  I  had 
any  experience  in  the  United  States,  and  they  were  not  a 
few,  is  Barnum's  in  that  city :  where  the  English  traveller 
will  find  curtains  to  his  bed,  for  the  first  and  probably  the 
last  time,  in  America;  and  where  he  will  be  likely  to  have 
enough  water  for  washing  himself,  which  is  not  at  all  a 
common  case. 

This  capital  of  the  State  of  Maryland  is  a  bustling  busy 
town,  with  a  great  deal  of  traffic  of  various  kinds,  and  in 
particular  of  water  commerce.  That  portion  of  the  town 
which  it  most  favours  is  none  of  the  cleanest,  it  is  true ; 
but  the  upper  part  is  of  a  very  different  character,  and  has 
many  agreeable  streets  and  public  buildings.  The  Wash- 
ington Monument,  which  is  a  handsome  pillar  with  a  statue 
on  its  summit;  the  Medical  College;  and  the  Battle  Monu- 
ment in  memory  of  an  engagement  with  the  British  at 
North  Point ;  are  the  most  conspicuous  among  them. 

There  is  a  very  good  prison  in  this  city,  and  the  State 
Penitentiary  is  also  among  its  institutions.  In  this  latter 
establishment  there  were  two  curious  cases. 

One,  was  that  of  a  young  man,  who  had  been  tried  for 
the  murder  of  his  father.  The  evidence  was  entirely  cir- 
cumstantial, and  was  very  conflicting  and  doubtful;  nor 
was  it  possible  to  assign  any  motive  which  could  have 
tempted  him  to  the  commission  of  so  tremendous  a  crime. 
He  had  been  tried  twice ;  and  on  the  second  occasion  the 
jury  felt  so  much  hesitation  in  convicting  him,  that  they 
found  a  verdict  of  manslaughter,  or  murder  in  the  second 
degree;  which  it  could  not  possibly  be,  as  there  had,  be- 
yond all  doubt,  been  no  quarrel  or  provocation,  and  if  he 
were  guilty  at  all,  he  was  unquestionably  guilty  of  murdei 
in  its  broadest  and  worst  signification. 


138  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

The  remarkable  feature  in  the  case  was,  that  if  the  unfor- 
tunate deceased  were  not  really  murdered  by  this  own  son 
of  his,  he  must  have  been  murdered  by  his  own  brother. 
The  evidence  lay,  in  a  most  remarkable  manner,  between 
those  two.  On  all  the  suspicious  points,  the  dead  man's 
brother  was  the  witness;  all  the  explanations  for  the  pris- 
oner (some  of  them  extremely  plausible)  went,  by  construc- 
tion and  inference,  to  inculpate  hira  as  plotting  to  fix  the 
guilt  upon  his  nephew.  It  must  have  been  one  of  them : 
and  the  jury  had  to  decide  between  two  sets  of  suspicions, 
almost  equally  unnatural,  unaccountable,  and  strange. 

The  other  case,  was  that  of  a  man  who  once  went  to  a 
certain  distiller's  and  stole  a  copper  measure  containing  a 
quantity  of  liquor.  He  was  pursued  and  taken  with  the 
property  in  his  possession,  and  was  sentenced  to  two  years' 
imprisonment.  On  coming  out  of  the  jail,  at  the  expira- 
tion of  that  term,  he  went  back  to  the  same  distiller's  and 
stole  the  same  copper  measure  containing  the  same  quan- 
tity of  liquor.  There  was  not  the  slightest  reason  to  sup- 
pose that  the  man  wished  to  return  to  prison :  indeed  every- 
thing, but  the  commission  of  the  offence,  made  directly 
against  that  assumption.  There  are  only  two  ways  of 
accounting  for  this  extraordinary  proceeding.  One  is,  that 
after  undergoing  so  much  for  this  copper  measure  he  con- 
ceived he  had  established  a  sort  of  claim  and  right  to  it. 
The  other  that,  by  dint  of  long  thinking  about,  it  had 
become  a  monomania  with  him,  and  had  acquired  a  fas- 
cination which  he  found  it  impossible  to  resist :  swelling 
from  an  Earthly  Copper  Gallon  into  an  Ethereal  Golden 
Vat. 

After  remaining  here  a  couple  of  days  I  bound  myself  to 
a  rigid  adherence  to  the  plan  I  had  laid  down  so  recently, 
and  resolved  to  set  forward  on  our  western  journey  without 
any  more  delay.  Accordingly,  having  reduced  the  luggage 
within  the  smallest  possible  compass  (by  sending  back  to 
New  York,  to  be  afterwards  forwarded  to  us  in  Canada,  so 
much  of  it  as  was  not  absolutely  wanted) ;  and  having  pro- 
cured the  necessary  credentials  to  banking-houses  on  the 
way;  and  having  moreover  looked  for  two  evenings  at  the 
setting  sun,  with  as  well-defined  an  idea  of  the  country  be- 
fore us  as  if  we  had  been  going  to  travel  into  the  very  cen- 
tre of  that  planet;  we  left  Baltimore  by  another  railway  at 
half-past  eight  in  the  morning,  and  reached  the  town  of 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  189 

York,  some  sixty  miles  off,  by  the  early  dinner-time  of  the 
Hotel  which  was  the  starting-place  of  the  four-horse  coach, 
wherein  we  were  to  proceed  to  Harrisburgh. 

This  con/eyance,  the  box  of  which  I  was  fortunate 
enough  to  secure,  had  come  down  to  meet  us  at  the  rail- 
road station,  and  was  as  muddy  and  cumbersome  as  usual. 
As  more  passengers  were  waiting  for  us  at  the  inn-door, 
the  coachman  observed  under  his  breath,  in  the  usual  self- 
communicative  voice,  looking  the  while  at  his  mouldy  har 
ness  as  if  it  were  to  that  he  was  addressing  himself: 

"  I  expect  we  shall  want  the  big  coach." 

I  could  not  help  wondering  within  myself  what  the  size 
of  this  big  coach  might  be,  and  how  many  persons  it  might 
be  designed  to  hold;  for  the  vehicle  which  was  too  small 
for  our  purpose  was  something  larger  than  two  English 
heavy  night-coaches.  My  speculations  were  speedily  set 
at  rest,  however,  for  as  soon  as  we  had  dined,  there  came 
rumbling  up  the  street,  shaking  its  sides  like  a  corpulent 
giant,  a  kind  of  barge  on  wheels.  After  much  blundering 
and  backing,  it  stopped  at  the  door :  rolling  heavily  from 
side  to  side  when  its  other  motion  had  ceased,  as  if  it  had 
taken  cold  in  its  damp  stable,  and  between  that,  and  the 
having  been  required  in  its  dropsical  old  age  to  move  at 
any  faster  pace  than  a  walk,  were  distressed  by  shortness 
of  wind. 

"  If  here  ain't  the  Harrisburgh  mail  at  last,  and  dreadful 
bright  and  smart  to  look  at  too,"  cried  an  elderly  gentle- 
man in  some  excitement,  "  darn  my  mother ! " 

I  don't  know  what  the  sensation  of  being  darned  may  be, 
or  whether  a  man's  mother  has  a  keener  relish  or  disrelish 
of  the  process  than  anybody  else;  but  if  the  endurance  of 
this  mysterious  ceremony  by  the  old  lady  in  question  had 
depended  on  the  accuracy  of  her  son's  vision  in  respect  to 
the  abstract  brightness  and  smartness  of  the  Harrisburgh 
mail,  she  would  certainly  have  undergone  its  infliction. 
However,  they  packed  twelve  people  inside;  and  the  lug- 
gage (including  such  trifles  as  a  large  rocking-chair,  and  a 
good-sized  dining-table)  being  at  length  made  fast  upon  the 
roof,  we  started  off  in  great  state. 

At  the  door  of  another  hotel,  there  was  another  passen- 
ger to  be  taken  up. 

"  Any  room,  Sir?  "  cries  the  new  passenger  to  the  coach- 
man. 


140  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

"Well,  there's  room  enough,"  replies  the  coachman, 
without  getting  down  or  even  looking  at  him. 

"There  an't  no  room  at  all.  Sir,"  bawls  a  gentleman  in- 
side. Which  another  gentleman  (also  inside)  confirms,  b_y 
predicting  that  the  attempt  to  introduce  any  more  passen- 
gers "  won't  fit  nohow. " 

The  new  passenger,  without  any  expression  of  anxiety, 
looks  into  the  coach,  and  then  looks  up  at  the  coachman : 
"  Now,  how  do  you  mean  to  fix  it?  "  says  he,  after  a  pause : 
"for  I  must  go." 

The  coachman  employs  himself  in  twisting  the  lash  of 
his  whip  into  a  Icnot,  and  takes  no  more  notice  of  the  ques- 
tion :  clearly  signifying  that  it  is  anybody's  business  but 
his,  and  that  the  passengers  would  do  well  to  fix  it,  among 
themselves.  In  this  state  of  things,  matters  seem  to  be  ap- 
proximating to  a  fix  of  another  kind,  when  another  inside 
passenger  in  a  corner,  who  is  nearly  sufEocated,  cries  faintly, 

"I'll  get  out." 

This  is  no  matter  of  relief  or  self-congratulation  to  the 
driver,  for  his  immoveable  philosophy  is  perfectly  undis- 
turbed by  anything  that  happens  in  the  coach.  Of  all 
things  in  the  world,  the  coach  would  seem  to  be  the  very 
last  upon  his  mind.  The  exchange  is  made,  however,  and 
then  the  passenger  who  has  given  up  his  seat  makes  a  third 
upon  the  box,  seating  himself  in  what  he  calls  the  middle : 
that  is,  with  half  his  person  on  my  legs,  and  the  other  half 
on  the  driver's. 

"  Go  ahead,  cap'en,"  cries  the  colonel,  who  directs. 

"  G5-lang ! "  cries  the  cap'en  to  his  company,  the  horses, 
and  away  we  go. 

We  took  up  at  a  rural  bar-room,  after  we  had  gone  a  few 
miles,  an  intoxicated  gentleman,  who  climbed  upon  the  roof 
among  the  luggage,  and  subsequently  slipping  off  without 
hurting  himself,  was  seen  in  the  distant  perspective  reeling 
back  to  the  grog-shop  where  we  had  found  him.  We  also 
parted  with  more  of  our  freight  at  different  times,  so  that 
when  we  came  to  change  horses,  I  was  again  alone  outside. 

The  coachmen  always  change  with  the  horses,  and  are 
usually  as  dirty  as  the  coach.  The  first  was  dressed  like 
a  very  shabby  English  baker;  the  second  like  a  Russian 
peasant :  for  he  wore  a  loose  purple  camlet  robe,  with  a  fur 
collar,  tied  round  his  waist  with  a  parti-coloured  worsted 
sash;  grey  trousers;  light  blue  gloves;  and  a  cap  of  bear- 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  141 

skin.  It  had  by  this  time  come  on  to  rain  very  heavily, 
and  there  was  a  cold  damp  mist  besides,  which  penetrated 
to  the  skin.  I  was  very  glad  to  take  advantage  of  a  stop- 
page and  get  down  to  stretch  my  legs,  shake  the  water 
off  my  great-coat,  and  swallow  the  usual  anti-temperance 
recipe  for  keeping  out  the  cold. 

When  I  movmted  to  my  seat  again,  I  observed  a  new 
parcel  lying  on  the  coach  roof,  which  I  took  to  be  a  rather 
large  fiddle  in  a  brown  bag.  In  the  course  of  a  few  miles, 
however,  I  discovered  that  it  had  a  glazed  cap  at  one  end 
and  a  pair  of  muddy  shoes  at  the  other;  and  further  ob- 
servation demonstrated  it  to  be  a  small  boy  in  a  snuff-col- 
oured coat,  with  his  arms  quite  pinioned  to  his  sides  by 
deep  forcing  into  his  pockets.  He  was,  I  presume,  a  rela- 
tive or  friend  of  the  coachman's,  as  he  lay  atop  of  the 
luggage  with  his  face  towards  the  rain;  and  except  when 
a  change  of  position  brought  his  shoes  in  contact  with  my 
hat,  he  appeared  to  be  asleep.  At  last,  on  some  occasion 
of  our  stopping,  this  thing  slowly  upreared  itself  to  the 
height  of  three  feet  six,  and  fixing  its  eyes  on  me,  observed 
in  piping  accents,  with  a  complaisant  yawn  half-quenched 
in  an  obliging  air  of  friendly  patronage,  "  Well  now,  stran- 
ger, I  guess  you  find  this  a' most  like  an  English  arternoon, 
hey?  " 

The  scenery,  which  had  been  tame  enough  at  first,  was, 
for  the  last  ten  or  twelve  miles,  beautiful.  Our  road  wound 
through  the  pleasant  valley  of  the  Susquehanna;  the  river, 
dotted  with  innumerable  green  islands,  lay  upon  our  right; 
and  on  the  left,  a  steep  ascent,  craggy  with  broken  rock, 
and  dark  with  pine  trees.  The  mist,  wreathing  itself  into 
a  hundred  fantastic  shapes,  moved  solemnly  upon  the  water ; 
and  the  gloom  of  evening  gave  to  all  an  air  of  mystery  and 
silence  which  greatly  enhanced  its  natural  interest. 

.  VVe  crossed  this  river  by  a  wooden  bridge,  roofed  and 
covered  in  on  all  sides,  and  nearly  a  mile  in  length.  It 
was  profoundly  dark;  perplexed,  with  great  beams,  cross- 
ing and  recrossing  it  at  every  possible  angle;  and  through 
the  broad  chinks  and  crevices  in  the  floor,  the  rapid  river 
gleamed,  far  down  below,  like  a  legion  of  eyes.  We  had 
no  lamps;  and  as  the  horses  stumbled  and  floundered 
through  this  place,  towards  the  distant  speck  of  dying  light, 
it  seemed  interminable.  I  really  could  not  at  first  perauade 
myself  as  we  rumbled  heavily  on,  filling  the  bridge  with 


14i*  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

hollow  noises,  and  I  held  down  my  head  to  save  it  from  the 
rafters  above,  but  that  I  was  in  a  painful  dream ;  for  I  have 
often  dreamed  of  toiling  through  such  places,  and  as  often 
argued,  even  at  the  time,  "this  cannot  be  reality." 

At  length,  however,  we  emerged  upon  the  streets  of 
Harrisburgh,  whose  feeble  lights,  reflected  dismally  from 
the  wet  ground,  did  not  shine  out  upon  a  very  cheerful 
city.  We  were  soon  established  in  a  snug  hotel,  which, 
though  smaller  and  far  less  splendid  than  many  we  put  up 
at,  is  raised  above  them  all  in  my  remembrance,  by  having 
for  its  landlord  the  most  obliging,  considerate,  and  gentle- 
manly person  I  ever  had  to  deal  with. 

As  we  were  not  to  proceed  upon  our  journey  until  the 
afternoon,  I  walked  out,  after  breakfast  the  next  morning, 
to  look  about  me :  and  was  duly  shown  a  model  prison  on 
the  solitary  system,  just  erected,  and  as  yet  without  an  in- 
mate; the  trunk  of  an  old  tree  to  which  Harris,  the  first 
settler  here  (afterwards  buried  under  it),  was  tied  by  hos- 
tile Indians,  with  his  funeral  pile  about  him,  when  he  was 
saved  by  the  timely  appearance  of  a  friendly  party  on  the 
opposite  shore  of  the  river;  the  local  legislature  (for  there 
was  another  of  those  bodies  here,  again,  in  full  debate) ; 
and  the  other  curiosities  of  the  town. 

I  was  very  much  interested  in  looking  over  a  number  of 
treaties  made  from  time  to  time  with  the  poor  Indians, 
signed  by  the  different  chiefs  at  the  period  of  their  ratifi- 
cation, and  preserved  in  the  office  of  the  Secretary  to  the 
Commonwealth.  These  signatures,  traced  of  course  by 
their  own  hands,  are  rough  drawings  of  the  creatures  or 
weapons  they  were  called  after.  Thus,  the  Great  Turtle 
makes  a  crooked  pen-and-ink  outline  of  a  great  turtle;  the 
Buffalo  sketches  a  buffalo ;  the  War  Hatchet  sets  a  rough 
image  of  that  weapon  for  his  mark.  So  with  the  Arrow, 
the  Fish,  the  Scalp,  the  Big  Canoe,  and  all  of  them. 

I  could  not  but  think — as  I  looked  at  these  feeble  and 
tremulous  productions  of  hands  which  could  draw  the  long- 
est arrow  to  the  head  in  a  stout  elk-horn  bow,  or  split  a 
bead  or  feather  with  a  rifle-ball — of  Crabbe's  musings  over 
the  Parish  Register,  and  the  irregular  scratches  made  with 
a  pen,  by  men  who  would  plough  a  lengthy  furrow  straight 
from  end  to  end.  ISTor  could  I  help  bestowing  many  sor- 
rowful thoughts  upon  the  simple  warriors  whose  hands  and 
hearts  were  set  there,  in  all  truth  and  honesty ;  and  who 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  143 

only  learned  in  course  of  time  from  white  men  how  to 
break  their  faith,  and  quibble  out  of  forms  and  bonds.  T 
wondered,  too,  how  many  times  the  credulous  Big  Turtle, 
or  trusting  Little  Hatchet,  had  put  his  mark  to  treaties 
which  were  falsely  read  to  him ;  and  had  signed  away,  he 
knew  not  what,  until  it  went  and  cast  him  loose  upon  the 
new  possessors  of  the  land,  a  savage  indeed. 

Our  host  announced,  before  our  early  dinner,  that  some 
members  of  the  legislative  body  proposed  to  do  us  the  hon- 
our of  calling.  He  had  kindly  yielded  up  to  us  his  wife's 
own  little  parlour,  and  when  I  begged  that  he  would  show 
them  in,  I  saw  him  look  with  painful  apprehension  at 
its  pretty  carpet ;  though,  being  otherwise  occupied  at  the 
time,  the  cause  of  his  uneasiness  did  not  occur  to  me. 

It  certainly  would  have  been  more  pleasant  to  all  parties 
concerned,  and  would  not,  I  think,  have  compromised  their 
independence  in  any  material  degree,  if  some  of  these  gen- 
tlemen had  not  only  yielded  to  the  prejudice  in  favour  of 
spittoons,  but  had  abandoned  themselves,  for  the  moment, 
even  to  the  conventional  absurdity  of  pocket-handker- 
chiefs. 

It  still  continued  to  rain  heavily,  and  when  we  went 
down  to  the  Canal-Boat  (for  that  was  the  mode  of  convey- 
ance by  which  we  were  to  proceed)  after  dinner,  the  weather 
was  as  unpromising  and  obstinately  wet  as  one  would  desire 
to  see.  Nor  was  the  sight  of  this  canal-boat,  in  which  we 
were  to  spend  three  or  four  days,  by  any  means  a  cheerful 
one ;  as  it  involved  some  uneasy  speculations  concerning  the 
disposal  of  the  passengers  at  night,  and  opened  a  wide  field 
of  inquiry  touching  the  other  domestic  arrangements  of  the 
establishment,  which  was  sufficiently  disconcerting. 

However,  there  it  was — a  barge  with  a  little  house  in  it, 
viewed  from  the  outside ;  and  a  caravan  at  a  fair,  viewed 
from  within:  the  gentlemen  being  accommodated,  as  the 
spectators  usually  are,  in  one  of  those  locomotive  museums 
of  penny  wonders ;  and  the  ladies  being  partitioned  off  by 
a  red  curtain,  after  the  manner  of  the  dwarfs  and  giants  in 
the  same  establishments,  whose  private  lives  are  passed  in 
rather  close  exclusiveness. 

We  sat  here,  looking  silently  at  the  row  of  little  tables, 
which  extended  down  both  side  of  the  cabin,  and  listening 
to  the  rain  as  it  dripped  and  pattered  on  the  boat,  and 
plashed  with  a  dismal  merriment  in  the  water,  until  the 


144  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

arrival  of  the  railway  train,  for  whose  final  contribution  to 
our  stock  of  passengers,  our  departure  was  alone  deferred. 
It  brought  a  great  many  boxes,  which  were  bumped  and 
tossed  upon  the  roof,  almost  as  painfully  as  if  they  had 
been  deposited  on  one's  own  head,  without  the  intervention 
of  a  porter's  knot;  and  several  damp  gentlemen,  whose 
clothes,  on  their  drawing  round  the  stove,  began  to  steam 
again.  No  doubt  it  woiild  have  been  a  thought  more  com- 
fortable if  the  driving  rain,  which  now  poured  down  more 
soakingly  than  ever,  had  admitted  of  a  window  being 
opened,  or  if  our  number  had  been  something  less  than 
thirty;  but  there  was  scarcely  time  to  think  as  much,  when 
a  train  of  three  horses  was  attached  to  the  tow-rope,  the 
boy  upon  the  leader  smacked  his  whip,  the  rudder  creaked 
and  groaned  complainingly,  and  we  had  begun  our  journey. 


CHAPTEK    THE    TENTH. 

SOME  FURTHER  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  CANAL-BOAT,  ITS 
DOMESTIC  ECONOMY,  AND  ITS  PASSENGERS- 
JOURNEY  TO  PITTSBURG  ACROSS  THE  ALLEGHANY 
MOUNTAINS— PITTSBURG. 

As  it  continued  to  rain  most  perseveringly,  we  all  re- 
mained below :  the  damp  gentlemen  round  the  stove  gradu- 
ally becoming  mildewed  by  the  action  of  the  fire;  and  the 
dry  gentlemen  lying  at  full  length  upon  the  seats,  or  slum- 
bering uneasily  with  their  faces  on  the  tables,  or  walking 
up  and  down  the  cabin,  which  it  was  barely  possible  for  a 
man  of  the  middle  height  to  do,  without  making  bald 
places  on  his  head  by  scraping  it  against  the  roof.  At  about 
six  o'clock,  all  the  small  tables  were  put  together  to  form 
one  long  table,  and  everybody  sat  down  to  tea,  coffee,  bread, 
butter,  salmon,  shad,  liver,  steak,  potatoes,  pickles,  ham, 
chops,  black  puddings,  and  sausages. 

"  Will  you  try,"  said  my  opposite  neighbour,  handing  me 
a  dish  of  potatoes,  broken  up  in  milk  and  butter,  "  will  you 
try  some  of  these  fixings?  " 

There  are  few  words  which  perform  such  various  duties 
as  this  word  "fix."     It  is  the  Caleb  Quotem  of  the  Anieri- 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  145 

can  vocabulary.  You  call  upon  a  gentleman  in  a  country 
town,  and  his  help  informs  you  that  he  is  "  fixing  himself  " 
just  now,  but  will  be  down  directly :  by  which  you  are  to 
understand  that  he  is  dressing.  You  inquire,  on  board  a 
steamboat,  of  a  fellow-passenger,  whether  breakfast  will  be 
ready  soon,  and  he  tells  you  he  should  think  so,  for  when 
he  was  last  below,  they  were  "  fixing  the  tables : "  in  other 
words,  laying  the  cloth.  You  beg  a  porter  to  collect  your 
luggage,  and  he  entreats  you  not  to  be  uneasy,  for  he'll  "  fix 
it  presently:"  and  if  you  complain  of  indisposition,  you 
are  advised  to  have  recourse  to  Doctor  So-and-so,  who  will 
"  fix  you  "  in  no  time. 

One  night,  I  ordered  a  bottle  of  mulled  wine  at  an  hotel 
where  I  was  staying,  and  waited  a  long  time  for  it;  at 
length  it  was  put  upon  the  table  with  an  apology  from  the 
landlord  that  he  feared  it  wasn't  "  fixed  properly,"  And 
I  recollect  once,  at  a  stage-coach  dinner,  overhearing  a  very 
stern  gentleman  demand  of  a  waiter  who  presented  him 
with  a  plate  of  underdone  roast  beef,  "  whether  he  called 
that,  fixing  God  A'mighty's  vittles?" 

"  There  is  no  doubt  that  the  meal,  at  which  the  invitation 
was  tendered  to  me  which  has  occasioned  this  digression, 
was  disposed  of  somewhat  ravenously ;  and  that  the  gentle- 
men thrust  the  broad-bladed  knives  and  the  two-pronged 
forks  further  down  their  throats  than  I  ever  saw  the  same 
weapons  go  before,  except  in  the  hands  of  a  skilful  juggler: 
but  no  man  sat  down  until  the  ladies  were  seated ;  or  omit- 
ted any  little  act  of  politeness  which  could  contribute  to 
their  comfort.  Nor  did  I  ever  once,  on  any  occasion,  any- 
where, during  my  rambles  in  America,  see  a  woman  ex- 
posed to  the  slightest  act  of  rudeness,  incivility,  or  even 
inattention. 

By  the  time  the  meal  was  over,  the  rain,  which  seemed 
to  have  worn  itself  out  by  coming  down  so  fast,  was  nearly 
over  too;  and  it  became  feasible  to  goon  deck:  which  was 
a  great  relief,  notwithstanding  its  being  a  very  small  deck, 
and  being  rendered  still  smaller  by  the  luggage,  which  was 
heaped  together  in  the  middle  under  a  tarpaulin  covering; 
leaving,  on  either  side,  a  path  so  narrow,  that  it  became  a 
science  to  walk  to  and  fro  without  tumbling  overboard  into 
the  canal.  It  was  somewhat  embarrassing  at  first,  too,  to 
have  to  duck  nimbly  every  five  minutes  whenever  the  man 
at  the-  helm  cried  "  Bridge ! "  and  sometimeSj  when  the  crj 
10 


146  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

was  "  Low  Bridge,"  to  lie  down  nearly  flat.  But  custom 
familiarizes  one  to  anything,  and  there  were  so  many 
bridges  that  it  took  a  very  short  time  to  get  used  to  this. 

As  night  came  on,  and  we  drew  in  sight  of  the  first  range 
of  hills,  which  are  the  outposts  of  the  Alleghany  Moun- 
tains, the  scenery,  which  had  been  uninteresting  hitherto, 
became  more  bold  and  striking.  The  wet  ground  reeked 
and  smoked,  after  the  heavy  fall  of  rain;  and  the  croaking 
of  the  frogs  (whose  noise  in  these  parts  is  almost  incredi- 
ble) sounded  as  though  a  million  of  fairy  teams  with  bells, 
were  travelling  through  the  air,  and  keeping  pace  with  us. 
The  night  was  cloudy  yet,  but  moonlight  too :  and  when 
we  crossed  the  Susquehanna  river — over  which  there  is  an 
extraordinary  wooden  bridge  with  two  galleries,  one  above 
the  other,  so  that  even  there,  two  boat  teams  meeting  may 
pass  without  confusion — it  was  wild  and  grand. 

I  have  mentioned  my  having  been  in  some  uncertainty 
and  doubt,  at  first,  relative  to  the  sleeping  arrangements  on 
board  this  boat.  I  remained  in  the  same  vague  state  of 
mind  until  ten  o'clock  or  thereabouts,  when  going  below,  I 
found  suspended  on  either  side  of  the  cabin,  three  long 
tiers  of  hanging  book-shelves,  designed  apparently  for  vol- 
umes of  the  small  octavo  size.  Looking  with  greater  at- 
tention at  these  contrivances  (wondering  to  find  such  liter- 
ary preparations  in  such  a  place),  I  descried  on  each  shelf 
a  sort  of  microscopic  sheet  and  blanket ;  then  I  began  dimly 
to  comprehend  that  the  passengers  were  the  library,  and 
that  they  were  to  be  arranged,  edgewise,  on  these  shelves, 
till  morning. 

I  was  assisted  to  this  conclusion  by  seeing  some  of  them 
gathered  round  the  master  of  the  boat,  at  one  of  the  tables, 
drawing  lots  with  all  the  anxieties  and  passions  of  game- 
sters depicted  in  their  countenances;  while  others,  with 
small  pieces  of  cardboard  in  their  hands,  were  groping 
among  the  shelves  in  search  of  numbers  corresponding  with 
those  they  had  drawn.  As  soon  as  any  gentleman  found 
his  number,  he  took  possession  of  it  by  immediately  un- 
dressing himself  and  crawling  into  bed.  The  rapidity  with 
which  an  agitated  gambler  subsided  into  a  snoring  slum- 
berer,  was  one  of  the  most  singular  effects  I  have  ever  wit- 
nessed. As  to  the  ladies,  they  were  already  abed,  behind 
the  red  curtain,  which  was  carefully  drawn  and  pinned  up 
the  centre;  though  as  every  cough,  or  sneeze,  or  whisper, 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  147 

behind  this  curtain,  was  perfectly  audible  before  it,  we  had 

still  a  live  consciousness  of  their  society. 

The  politeness  of  the  person  in  authority  had  secured  to 
me  a  shelf  in  a  nook  near  this  red  curtain,  in  some  degree 
removed  from  the  great  body  of  sleepers :  to  which  place  I 
retired,  with  many  acknowledgments  to  him  for  his  atten- 
tion. I  found  it,  on  after-measurement,  just  the  width  of 
an  ordinary  sheet  of  Bath  post  letter-paper;  and  I  was  at 
first  in  some  uncertainty  as  to  the  best  means  of  getting 
into  it.  But  the  shelf  being  a  bottom  one,  I  finally  deter- 
mined on  lying  upon  the  floor,  rolling  gently  in,  stopping 
immediately  I  touched  the  mattress,  and  remaining  for 
the  night  with  that  side  uppermost,  whatever  it  might  be. 
Luckily,  I  came  upon  my  back  at  exactly  the  right  mo- 
ment. I  was  much  alarmed  on  looking  upward,  to  see,  by 
the  shape  of  his  half  yard  of  sacking  (which  his  weight 
had  bent  into  an  exceedingly  tight  bag),  that  there  was  a 
very  heavy  gentleman  above  me,  whom  the  slender  cords 
seemed  quite  incapable  of  holding ;  and  I  could  not  help 
reflecting  upon  the  grief  of  my  wife  and  family  in  the  event 
of  his  coming  down  in  the  night.  But  as  I  could  not  have 
got  up  again  without  a  severe  bodily  struggle,  which  might 
have  alarmed  the  ladies;  and  as  I  had  nowhere  to  go 
to,  even  if  I  had ;  I  shut  my  eyes  upon  the  danger,  and 
remained  there. 

One  of  two  remarkable  circumstances  is  indisputably  a 
fact,  with  reference  to  that  class  of  society  who  travel  in 
these  boats.  Either  they  carry  their  restlessness  to  such  a 
pitch  that  they  never  sleep  at  all ;  or  they  expectorate  in 
dreams,  which  would  be  a  remarkable  mingling  of  the  real 
and  ideal.  All  night  long,  and  every  night,  on  this  canal, 
there  was  a  perfect  storm  and  tempest  of  spitting ;  and  once 
my  coat,  being  in  the  very  centre  of  a  hurricane  sustained 
by  five  gentlemen  (which  moved  vertically,  strictly  carry- 
ing out  Eeid's  Theory  of  the  Law  of  Storms),  I  was  fain 
the  next  morning  to  lay  it  on  the  deck,  and  rub  it  down 
with  fair  water  before  it  was  in  a  condition  to  be  worn 
again. 

Between  five  and  six  o'clock  in  the  morning  we  got  up, 
and  some  of  us  went  on  deck,  to  give  them  an  opportunity 
of  taking  the  shelves  down;  while  others,  the  morning 
being  very  cold,  crowded  round  the  rusty  stove,  cherishing 
the  newly-kindled  fire,  and   filling  the  grate  with  those 


148  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

voluntary  contributions  of  which  they  had  been  so  liberal 
all  night.  The  washing  accommodations  were  primitive. 
There  was  a  tin  ladle  chained  to  the  deck,  with  which  ev- 
ery gentleman  who  thought  it  necessary  to  cleanse  himself 
(many  were  superior  to  this  weakness),  fished  the  dirty 
water  out  of  the  canal,  and  poured  it  into  a  tin  basin,  se- 
cured in  like  manner.  There  was  also  a  jack-towel.  And, 
hanging  up  before  a  little  looking-glass  in  the  bar,  in  the 
immediate  vicinity  of  the  bread  and  cheese  and  biscuits, 
were  a  public  comb  and  hair-brush. 

At  eight  o'clock,  the  shelves  being  taken  down  and  put 
away  and  the  tables  joined  together,  everybody  sat  down 
to  the  tea,  cotfee,  bread,  butter,  salmon,  shad,  liver,  steak, 
potatoes,  pickles,  ham,  chops,  black  puddings,  and  sau- 
sages, all  over  again.  Some  were  fond  of  compounding  this 
variety,  and  having  it  all  on  their  plates  at  once.  As  each 
gentleman  got  through  his  own  personal  amount  of  tea, 
coffee,  bread,  butter,  salmon,  shad,  liver,  steak,  potatoes, 
pickles,  ham,  chops,  black  puddings,  and  sausages,  he  rose 
up  and  walked  off.  When  everybody'had  done  with  every- 
thing, the  fragments  were  cleared  away :  and  one  of  the 
waiters  appearing  anew  in  the  character  of  a  barber,  shaved 
such  of  the  company  as  desired  to  be  shaved ;  while  the  re- 
mainder looked  on,  or  yawned  over  their  newspapers.  Din- 
ner was  breakfast  again,  without  the  tea  and  coffee ;  and 
supper  and  breakfast  were  identical. 

There  was  a  man  on  board  this  boat,  with  a  light  fresh- 
coloured  face,  and  a  pepper-and-salt  suit  of  clothes,  who 
was  the  most  inquisitive  fellow  that  can  possibly  be  im- 
agined. He  never  spoke  otherwise  than  interrogatively. 
He  was  an  embodied  inquiry.  Sitting  down  or  standing 
up,  still  or  moving,  walking  the  deck  or  taking  his  meals, 
there  he  was,  with  a  great  note  of  interrogation  in  each 
eye,  two  in  his  cocked  ears,  two  more  in  his  turned-up  nose 
and  chin,  at  least  half  a  dozen  more  about  the  corners  of 
his  mouth,  and  the  largest  one  of  all  in  his  hair,  which 
was  brushed  pertly  off  his  forehead  in  a  flaxen  clump.  Ev- 
ery button  in  his  clothes  said,  "Eh?  What's  that?  Did 
you  speak?  Say  that  again,  will  you?  "  He  was  always 
wide  awake,  like  the  enchanted  bride  who  drove  her  hus- 
band frantic;  always  restless ;  always  thirsting  for  answers ; 
perpetually  seeking  and  never  finding.  There  never  was 
such  a  curious  man. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  U9 

I  wore  a  fur  great-coat  at  that  time,  and  before  we  were 
well  clear  of  the  wharf,  he  questioned  me  concerning  it, 
and  its  price,  and  where  I  bought  it,  and  when,  and  what 
fur  it  was,  and  what  it  weighed,  and  what  it  cost.  Then 
he  took  notice  of  my  watch,  and  asked  me  what  that  cost, 
and  whether  it  was  a  French  watch,  and  where  I  got  it, 
and  how  I  got  it,  and  whether  I  bought  it  or  had  it  given 
me,  and  how  it  went,  and  where  the  keyhole  was,  and 
when  I  wound  it,  every  night  or  every  morning,  and 
whether  I  ever  forgot  to  wind  it  at  all,  and  if  I  did,  what 
then?  Where  had  I  been  to  last,  and  where  was  I  going 
next,  and  where  was  I  going  after  that,  and  had  I  seen  the 
President,  and  what  did  he  say,  and  what  did  I  say,  and 
what  did  he  say  when  I  had  said  that?  Eh?  Lor  now ! 
do  tell ! 

Finding  that  nothing  would  satisfy  him,  I  evaded  his  ques- 
tions after  the  first  score  or  two,  and  in  particular  pleaded 
ignorance  respecting  the  name  of  the  fur  whereof  the  coat 
was  made.  I  am  unable  to  say  whether  this  was  the  rea- 
son, but  that  coat  fascinated  him  ever  afterwards;  he 
usually  kept  close  behind  me  as  I  walked,  and  moved  as  I 
moved,  tliat  he  might  look  at  it  the  better;  and  he  fre- 
quently dived  into  narrow  places  after  me  at  the  risk  of  his 
life,  that  he  might  have  the  satisfaction  of  passing  his  hand 
up  tlie  back,  and  rubbing  it  the  wrong  way. 

We  had  another  odd  specimen  on  board,  of  a  different 
kind.  This  was  a  thin-faced,  spare-figured  man  of  middle 
age  and  stature,  dressed  in  a  dusty  drabbish-coloured  suit, 
such  as  I  never  saw  before.  He  was  perfectly  quiet  during 
the  first  part  of  the  journey :  indeed  I  don't  remember  hav- 
ing so  much  as  seen  him  until  he  was  brought  out  by  cir- 
cumstances, as  great  men  often  are.  The  conjunction  of 
events  which  made  him  famous,  happened,  briefly,  thus. 

The  canal  extends  to  the  foot  of  the  mountain,  and  there, 
of  course,  it  stops;  the  passengers  being  conveyed  across  it 
by  land  carriage,  and  taken  on  afterwards  by  another  canal- 
boat,  the  counterpart  of  the  first,  which  awaits  them  on  the 
other  side.  There  are  two  canal  lines  of  passage-boats; 
one  is  called  The  Express,  and  one  (a  cheaper  one)  The 
Pioneer.  The  Pioneer  gets  first  to  the  mountain,  and  waits 
for  the  Express  i)eople  to  come  up ;  both  sets  of  passengers 
being  conveyed  across  it  at  the  same  time.  We  were  the 
Express  company  5  but  when  we  had  crossed  the  mountain, 


150  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

and  had  come  to  the  second  boat,  the  proprietors  took  it 
into  their  heads  to  draft  all  the  Pioneers  into  it  likewise, 
so  that  we  were  five-and-forty  at  least,  and  the  accession  of 
passengers  was  not  at  all  of  that  kind  which  improved  the 
prospect  of  sleeping-  at  night.  Our  people  grumbled  at 
this,  as  people  do  in  such  cases ;  but  suffered  the  boat  to  be 
towed  off  with  the  whole  freight  aboard  nevertheless ;  and 
away  we  went  down  the  canal.  At  home,  I  should  have 
protested  lustily,  but  being  a  foreigner  here,  I  held  my 
peace.  Not  so  this  passenger.  He  cleft  a  path  among  the 
people  on  deck  (we  were  nearly  all  on  deck),  and  without 
addressing  anybody  whomsoever,  soliloquised  as  follows : 

"This  may  suit  you,  this  may,  but  it  don't  suit  me. 
This  may  be  all  very  well  with  Down  Easters,  and  men  of 
Boston  raising,  but  it  won't  suit  my  figure  no  how;  and  no 
two  ways  about  that ;  and  so  I  tell  you.  Now!  I'm  from 
the  brown  forests  of  the  Mississippi,  /  am,  and  when  the 
sun  shines  on  me,  it  does  shine — a  little.  It  don't  glimmer 
where  1  live,  the  sun  don't.  No.  I'm  a  brown  forester, 
I  am.  I  an't  a  Johnny  Cake.  There  are  no  smooth  skins 
where  I  live.  We're  rough  men  there.  Rather.  If  Down 
Easters  and  men  of  Boston  raising  like  this,  I'm  glad  of  it, 
but  I'm  none  of  that  raising  nor  of  that  breed.  No.  This 
company  wants  a  little  fixing,  it  does.  I'm  the  wrong  sort 
of  man  for  'em,  /  am.  They  won't  like  me,  they  won't. 
This  is  piling  of  it  up,  a  little  too  mountainotls,  this  is." 
At  the  end  of  every  one  of  these  short  sentences  he  turned 
upon  his  heel,  and  walked  the  other  way ;  checking  himself 
abruptly  when  he  had  finished  another  short  sentence,  and 
turning  back  again. 

It  is  impossible  for  me  to  say  what  terrific  meaning  was 
hidden  in  the  words  of  this  brown  forester,  but  I  know  that 
the  other  passengers  looked  on  in  a  sort  of  admiring  horror, 
and  that  presently  the  boat  was  put  back  to  the  wharf,  and 
as  many  of  the  Pioneers  as  could  be  coaxed  or  bullied  into 
going  away,  were  got  rid  of. 

When  we  started  again,  some  of  the  boldest  spirits  on 
board,  made  bold  to  say  to  the  obvious  occasion  of  this  im- 
provement in  our  prospects,  "  Much  obliged  to  you.  Sir ;  " 
whereunto  the  brown  forester  (waving  his  hand,  and  still 
walking  up  and  down  as  before)  replied,  "No  you  an't. 
You're  none  o'  my  raising.  You  may  act  for  yourselves, 
you  may.     I  have  pinted  out  the  way.     Down  Easters  and 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  151 

Johnny  Cakes  can  follow  if  they  please.  I  an't  a  Johnny 
Cake,  I  an't.  I  am  from  the  brown  forests  of  the  Missis- 
sippi, I  am  " — and  so  on,  as  before.  He  was  unanimously 
voted  one  of  the  tables  for  his  bed  at  night — there  is  a 
great  contest  for  the  tables — in  consideration  of  his  pub- 
lic services :  and  he  had  the  warmest  corner  by  the  stove 
throughout  the  rest  of  the  journey.  But  I  never  could  find 
out  that  he  did  anything  except  sit  there;  nor  did  I  hear 
him  speak  again  until,  in  the  midst  of  the  bustle  and  tur- 
moil of  getting  the  luggage  ashore  in  the  dark  at  Pittsburg, 
I  stumbled  over  him  as  he  sat  smoking  a  cigar  on  the  cabin 
steps,  and  heard  him  muttering  to  himself,  with  a  short 
laugh  of  defiance,  "  I  an't  a  Johnny  Cake,  I  an't.  I'm 
from  the  brown  forests  of  the  Mississippi,  /  am,  damme ! " 
I  am  inclined  to  argue  from  this,  that  he  had  never  left 
off  saying  so ;  but  I  could  not  make  an  affidavit  of  that  part 
of  the  story,  if  required  to  do  so  by  my  Queen  and  Country. 

As  we  have  not  reached  Pittsburg  yet,  however,  in  the 
order  of  our  narrative,  I  may  go  on  to  remark  that  break- 
fast was  perhaps  the  least  desirable  meal  of  the  day,  as  in 
addition  to  the  many  savoury  odours  arising  from  the  eat- 
ables already  mentioned,  there  were  whiffs  of  gin,  whiskey, 
brandy,  and  rum,  from  the  little  bar  hard  by,  and  a  decided 
seasoning  of  stale  tobacco.  Many  of  the  gentlemen  passen- 
gers were  far  from  particular  in  respect  of  their  linen,  which 
was  in  some  cases  as  yellow  as  the  little  rivulets  that  had 
trickled  from  the  corners  of  their  mouths  in  chewing,  and 
dried  there.  Nor  was  the  atmosphere  quite  free  from 
zephyr  whisperings  of  the  thirty  beds  which  had  just  been 
cleared  away,  and  of  which  we  were  further  and  more 
pressingly  reminded  by  the  occasional  appearance  on  the 
table-cloth  of  a  kind  of  Game,  not  mentioned  in  the  Bill  of 
Fare. 

And  yet  despite  these  oddities — and  even  they  had,  for 
me  at  least,  a  humour  of  their  own — there  was  much  in  this 
mode  of  travelling  which  I  heartily  enjoyed  at  the  time, 
and  look  back  upon  with  great  pleasure.  Even  the  running 
up^  bare-necked,  at  five  o'clock  in  the  morning,  from  the 
tainted  cabin 'to  the  dirty  deck;  scooping  up  the  icy  water, 
plunging  one's  head  into  it,  and  drawing  it  out,  all  fresh 
and  glowing  with  the  cold;  was  a  good  thing.  The  fast, 
brisk  walk  upon  the  towing-path,  between  that  time  and 
breakfast,  when  every  vein  and  artery  seemed  to  tingle 


152  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

with  health ;  the  exquisite  beauty  of  the  opening  day,  when 
light  came  gleaming  off  from  everything ;  the  lazy  motion 
of  the  boat,  when  one  lay  idly  on  the  deck,  looking  through, 
rather  than  at,  the  deep  blue  sky ;  the  gliding  on,  at  night, 
so  noiselessly,  past  frowning  hiils,  sullen  with  dark  trees, 
and  sometimes  angry  in  one  red  burning  spot  high  up,  where 
unseen  men  lay  crouching  round  a  fire;  the  shining  out  of 
the  bright  stars,  undisturbed  by  noise  of  wheels  or  steam, 
or  any  other  sound  than  the  liquid  rippling  of  the  water  as 
the  boat  went  on :  all  these  were  pure  delights. 

Then,  there  were  new  settlements  and  detached  log- 
cabins  and  frame-houses,  full  of  interest  for  strangers  from 
an  old  country :  cabins  with  simple  ovens,  outside,  made  of 
clay ;  and  lodgings  for  the  pigs,  nearly  as  good  as  many  of 
the  human  quarters ;  broken  windows,  patched  with  worn- 
out  hats,  old  clothes,  old  boards,  fragments  of  blankets 
and  paper ;  and  home-made  dressers  standing  in  the  open 
air  without  the  door,  whereon  was  ranged  the  household 
store,  not  hard  to  count,  of  earthen  jars  and  pots.  The  eye 
was  pained  to  see  the  stumps  of  great  trees  thickly  strewn 
in  every  field  of  wheat,  and  seldom  to  lose  the  eternal 
swamp  and  dull  morass,  with  hundreds  of  rotten  trunks 
and  twisted  branches  steeped  in  its  unwholesome  water. 
It  was  quite  sad  and  oppressive,  to  come  upon  great  tracts 
where  settlers  had  been  burning  down  the  trees,  and  where 
their  wounded  bodies  lay  about,  like  those  of  murdered 
creatures,  while  here  and  there  some  charred  and  blackened 
giant  reared  aloft  two  withered  arms,  and  seemed  to  call 
down  curses  on  his  foes.  Sometimes,  at  night,  the  way 
wound  through  some  lonely  gorge,  like  a  mountain  pass  in 
Scotland,  shining  and  coldly  glittering  in  the  light  of  the 
moon,  and  so  closed  in  by  high  steep  hills  all  round,  that 
there  seemed  to  be  no  egress  save  through  the  narrower  path 
by  which  we  had  come,  until  one  rugged  hillside  seemed 
to  open,  and,  shutting  out  the  moonlight  as  we  passed 
into  its  gloomy  throat,  wrapped  our  new  course  in  shade 
and  darkness. 

We  had  left  Harrisburgh  on  Friday.  On  Sunday  morn- 
ing we  arrived  at  the  foot  of  the  mountain,  which  is  crossed 
by  railroad.  There  are  ten  inclined  planes ;  five  ascending, 
and  five  (descending;  the  carriages  are  dragged  up  the 
former,  and  let  slowly  down  the  latter,  by  means  of  sta- 
tionary engines;  the  comparatively  level  spaces  between- 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  158 

being  traversed,  sometimes  by  horse,  and  sometimes  by  en- 
gine power,  as  the  case  demands.  Occasionally  the  rails 
are  laid  upon  the  extreme  verge  of  a  giddy  precipice ;  and 
looking  from  the  carriage  window,  the  traveller  gazes  sheer 
down,  without  a  stone  or  scrap  of  fence  between,  into  the 
mountain  depths  below.  The  journey  is  very  carefully 
made,  however ;  only  two  carriages  travelling  together ;  and 
while  proper  precautions  are  taken,  is  not  to  be  dreaded  for 
its  dangers. 

It  was  very  pretty  travelling  thus,  at  a  rapid  pace  along 
the  heights  of  the  mountain  in  a  keen  wind,  to  look  down 
into  a  valley  full  of  light  and  softness :  catching  glimpses, 
through  the  tree-tops,  of  scattered  cabins ;  children  running 
to  the  doors ;  dogs  bursting  out  to  bark,  whom  we  could  see 
without  hearing ;  terrified  pigs  scampering  homewards ;  fam- 
ilies sitting  out  in  their  rude  gardens ;  cows  gazing  upward 
with  a  stupid  indifference ;  men  in  their  shirt-sleeves  look- 
ing on  at  their  unfinished  houses,  planning  out  to-morrow's 
work;  and  we  riding  onward,  high  above  them,  like  a 
whirlwind.  It  was  amusing,  too,  when  we  had  dined,  and 
rattled  down  a  steep  pass,  having  no  other  moving  power 
than  the  weight  of  the  carriages  themselves,  to  see  the  en- 
gine released,  long  after  us,  come  buzzing  down  alone,  like 
a  great  insect,  its  back  of  green  and  gold  so  shining  in  the 
sun,  that  if  it  had  spread  a  pair  of  wings  and  soared  away, 
no  one  would  have  had  occasion,  as  I  fancied,  for  the  least 
surprise.  But  it  stopped  short  of  us  in  a  very  business- 
like manner  when  we  reached  the  canal;  and,  before  we  left 
the  wharf,  went  panting  up  this  hill  again,  with  the  pas- 
sengers who  had  waited  our  arrival  for  the  means  of  trav- 
ersing the  road  by  which  we  had  come. 

On  the  Monday  evening,  furnace  fires  and  clanking  ham- 
mers on  the  banks  of  the  canal,  warned  us  that  we  ap- 
proached the  termination  of  this  part  of  our  journey.  After 
going  through  another  dreamy  place — a  long  aqueduct 
across  the  Alleghany  River,  which  was  stranger  than  the 
bridge  at  Harrisburgh,  being  a  vast  low  wooden  chamber 
full  of  water — we  emerged  upon  that  ugly  confusion  of 
backs  of  buildings  and  crazy  galleries  and  stairs,  which  al- 
ways abuts  on  water,  whether  it  be  river,  sea,  canal,  or 
ditch  :  and  were  at  Pittsburg. 

Pittsburg  is  like  Birmingham  in  England;  at  least  its 
towns-people  say  so.     Setting  aside  the  streets,  the  shops, 


164  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

tlie  houses,  waggons,  factories,  public  buildings,  and  popu- 
lation, perhaps  it  may  be.  It  certainly  has  a  great  quan- 
tity of  smoke  hanging  about  it,  and  is  famous  for  its 
ironworks.  Besides  the  prison  to  which  I  have  already  re- 
ferred, this  town  contains  a  pretty  arsenal  and  other  insti- 
tutions. It  is  very  beautifully  situated  on  the  Alleghany 
Kiver,  over  which  there  are  two  bridges;  and  the  villas  of 
the  wealthier  citizens  sprinkled  about  the  high  grounds  in 
the  neighbourhood,  are  pretty  enough.  We  lodged  at  a 
most  excellent  hotel,  and  were  admirably  served.  As  usual, 
it  was  full  of  boarders,  was  very  large,  and  had  a  broad 
colonnade  to  every  story  of  the  house. 

We  tarried  here,  three  days.  Our  next  point  was  Cin- 
cinnati :  and  as  this  was  a  steamboat  journey,  and  Western 
steamboats  usually  blow  up  one  or  two  a  week  in  the  sea- 
son, it  was  advisable  to  collect  opinions  in  reference  to  the 
comparative  safety  of  the  vessels  bound  that  way,  then  ly- 
ing in  the  river.  One  called  The  Messenger  was  the  best 
recommended.  She  had  been  advertised  to  start  positively, 
every  day  for  a  fortnight  or  so,  and  had  not  gone  yet,  nor 
did  her  captain  seem  to  have  any  very  fixed  intention  on 
the  subject.  But  this  is  the  custom :  for  if  the  law  were  to 
bind  down  a  free  and  independent  citizen  to  keep  his  word 
with  the  public,  what  would  become  of  the  liberty  of  the 
subject?  Besides,  it  is  in  the  way  of  trade.  And  if  pas- 
sengers be  decoyed  in  the  way  of  trade,  and  people  be 
inconvenienced  in  the  way  of  trade,  what  man,  who  is  a 
sharp  tradesman  himself,  shall  say  "  We  must  put  a  stop  to 
this"? 

Impressed  by  the  deep  solemnity  of  the  public  announce- 
ment, I  (being  then  ignorant  of  these  usages)  was  for  hur- 
rying on  board  in  a  breathless  state,  immediately;  but  re- 
ceiving private  and  confidential  information  that  the  boat 
would  certainly  not  start  until  Friday,  April  the  First,  we 
made  ourselves  very  comfortable  in  the  meanwhile,  and 
went  on  board  at  noon  that  day. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  155 


CHAPTER    THE    ELEVENTH. 

T^ROM  PITTSBURG  TO  CINCINNATI  IN  A  WESTERN 
STEAMBOAT— CINCINNATI. 

The  Messenger  was  one  among  a  crowd  of  high-pressure 
steamboats,  clustered  together  by  the  wharf-side,  which, 
looked  down  upon  from  the  rising  ground  that  forms  the 
lauding- place,  and  backed  by  the  lofty  bank  on  the  opposite 
side  of  the  river,  appeared  no  larger  than  so  many  floating 
models.  She  had  some  forty  passengers  on  board,  exclu- 
sive of  the  poorer  persons  on  the  lower  deck;  and  in  half 
an  hour,  or  less,  proceeded  on  her  way. 

We  had,  for  ourselves,  a  tiny  state-room  with  two  berths 
in  it,  opening  out  of  the  ladies'  cabin.  There  was  undoubt- 
edly something  satisfactory  in  this  "  location,"  inasmuch  as 
it  was  in  the  stern,  and  we  had  been  a  great  many  times 
very  gravely  recommended  to  keep  as  far  aft  as  possible, 
"  because  the  steamboats  generally  blew  up  forward."  Nor 
was  this  an  unnecessary  caution,  as  the  occurrences  and  cir- 
cumstances of  more  than  one  such  fatality  during  our  stay 
sufficiently  testified.  Apart  from  this  source  of  self-con- 
gratulation, it  was  an  unspeakable  relief  to  have  anyplace, 
no  matter  how  confined,  where  one  could  be  alone;  and  as 
the  row  of  little  chambers  of  which  this  was  one,  had  each 
a  second  glass-door  besides  that  in  the  ladies'  cabin,  which 
opened  on  a  narrow  gallery  outside  the  vessel,  where  the 
other  passengers  seldom  came,  and  where  one  could  sit  in 
peace  and  gaze  upon  the  shifting  prospect,  we  took  posses- 
sion of  our  new  quarters  with  much  pleasure. 

If  the  native  packets  I  have  already  described  be  unlike 
anything  we  are  in  the  habit  of  seeing  on  water,  these 
Western  vessels  are  still  more  foreign  to  all  the  ideas  we 
are  accustomed  to  entertain  of  boats.  I  hardly  know  what 
to  liken  them  to,  or  how  to  describe  them. 

In  the  first  place,  they  have  no  mast,  cordage,  tackle, 
rigging,  or  other  such  boat-like  gear;  nor  have  they  any- 
thing in  their  shape  at  all  calculated  to  remind  one  of  a 
boat's  head,  stern,  sides,  or  keel.  Except  that  they  are 
in  the  water,  and  display  a  couple  of  paddle-boxes,  they 


156  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

might  be  intended,  for  anything  that  appears  to,  the  con- 
trary, to  perform  some  unknown  service,  high  and  dry, 
upon  a  mountain  top.  There  is  no  visible  deck,  even: 
nothing  but  a  long,  black,  ugly  roof,  covered  with  burnt- 
out  feathery  sparks;  above  which  tower  two  iron  chimneys, 
and  a  hoarse  escape- valve,  and  a  glass  steerage-house. 
Then,  in  order  as  the  eye  descends  towards  the  water,  are 
the  sides,  and  doors,  and  windows  of  the  state-rooms,  jum- 
bled as  oddly  together  as  though  they  formed  a  small  street, 
built  by  the  varying  tastes  of  a  dozen  men :  the  whole  is 
supported  on  beams  and  pillars  resting  on  a  dirty  barge, 
but  a  few  inches  above  the  water's  edge :  and  in  the  narrow 
space  between  this  upper  structure  and  this  barge's  deck, 
are  the  furnace  fires  and  machinery,  open  at  the  sides  to 
every  wind  that  blows,  and  every  storm  of  rain  it  drives 
along  its  path. 

Passing  one  of  these  boats  at  night,  and  seeing  the  great 
body  of  fire,  exposed  as  I  have  just  described,  that  rages 
and  roars  beneath  the  frail  pile  of  painted  wood :  the  ma- 
chinery, not  warded  off  or  guarded  in  any  way,  but  doing 
its  work  in  the  midst  of  the  crowd  of  idlers  and  emigrants 
and  children,  who  throng  the  lower  deck;  under  the  man- 
agement, too,  of  reckless  men  whose  acquaintance  with  its 
mysteries  may  have  been  of  six  months'  standing:  one  feels 
directly  that  the  wonder  is,  not  that  there  should  be  so 
many  fatal  accidents,  but  that  any  journey  should  be  safely 
made. 

Within,  there  is  one  long  narrow  cabin,  the  whole  length 
of  the  boat;  from  which  the  state-rooms  open,  on  both 
sides.  A  small  portion  of  it  at  the  stern  is  partitioned  off 
for  the  ladies;  and  the  bar  is  at  the  opposite  extreme. 
There  is  a  long  table  down  the  centre,  and  at  either  end  a 
stove.  The  washing  apparatus  is  forward,  on  the  deck.  It 
is  a  little  better  than  on  board  the  canal-boat,  but  not 
much.  In  all  modes  of  travelling,  the  American  customs, 
with  reference  to  the  means  of  personal  cleanliness  and 
vholesome  ablution,  are  extremely  negligent  and  filthy; 
and  I  strongly  incline  to  the  belief  that  a  considerable 
amount  of  illness  is  referable  to  this  cause. 

We  are  to  be  on  board  the  Messenger  three  days :  arriv- 
ing at  Cincinnati  (barring  accidents)  on  Monday  morning. 
There  are  three  meals  a  day.  Breakfast  at  seven,  dinner  at 
half-past  twelve,  supper  about  six.     At  each,  there  are 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  157 

a  great  many  small  dishes  and  plates  upon  the  table,  with 
very  little  in  them;  so  that  although  there  is  every  ap- 
pearance of  a  mighty  "spread,"  there  is  seldom  really 
more  than  a  joint:  except  for  those  who  fancy  slices  of 
beetroot,  shreds  of  dried  beef,  complicated  entanglements 
of  yellow  pickle;  maize,  Indian  corn,  apple-sauce,  and 
pumpkin. 

Some  people  fancy  all  these  little  dainties  together  (and 
sweet  preserves  beside),  by  way  of  relish  to  their  roast  pig. 
They  are  generally  those  dyspeptic  ladies  and  gentlemen 
who  eat  unheard-of  quantities  of  hot  corn-bread  (almost  as 
good  for  the  digestion  as  a  kneaded  pincushion),  for  break- 
fast, and  for  supper.  Those  who  do  not  observe  this  cus- 
tom, and  who  help  themselves  several  times  instead,  usually 
suck  their  knives  and  forks  meditatively,  until  they  have 
decided  what  to  take  next:  then  pull  them  out  of  their 
mouths;  put  them  in  the  dish;  help  themselves;  and  fall 
to  work  again.  At  dinner,  there  is  nothing  to  drink  upon 
the  table,  but  great  jugs  full  of  cold  water,  Nobody  says 
anything,  at  any  meal,  to  anybody.  All  the  passengers  are 
very  dismal,  and  seem  to  have  tremendous  secrets  weighing 
on  their  minds.  There  is  no  conversation,  no  laughter,  no 
cheerfulness,  no  sociality,  except  in  spitting;  and  that  is 
done  in  silent  fellowship  round  the  stove,  when  the  meal  is 
over.  Every  man  sits  down,  dull  and  languid;  swallows 
his  fare  as  if  breakfasts,  dinners,  and  suppers,  were  neces- 
sities of  nature  never  to  be  coupled  with  recreation  or  en- 
joyment; and  having  bolted  his  food  in  a  gloomy  silence, 
bolts  himself,  in  the  same  state.  But  for  these  animal  ob- 
servances, you  might  suppose  the  whole  male  portion  of 
the  company  to  be  the  melancholy  gliosts  of  departed  book- 
keepers, who  had  fallen  dead  at  the  desk :  such  is  their 
weary  air  of  business  and  calculation.  Undertakers  on 
duty  would  be  sprightly  beside  them;  and  a  collation  of 
funeral  baked-meats,  in  comparison  with  these  meals,  would 
be  a  sparkling  festivity. 

The  people  are  all  alike,  too.  There  is  no  diversity  of 
character.  They  travel  about  on  the  same  errands,  say  and 
do  the  same  things  in  exactly  the  same  manner,  and  follow 
in  the  same  dull  cheerless  round.  All  down  the  long  table, 
there  is  scarcely  a  man  who  is  in  anything  different  from 
his  neighbour.  It  is  quite  a  relief  to  have,  sitting  opposite, 
that  little  girl  of  fifteen  with  the  loquacious  chin :  who,  to 


lt)»  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

do  her  justice,  acts  up  to  it,  and  fully  identifies  Nature's 
handwriting,  for  of  all  the  small  chatterboxes  that  ever  in- 
vaded the  repose  of  a  drowsy  ladies'  cabin,  she  is  the  first 
and  foremost.  The  beautiful  girl,  who  sits  a  little  beyond 
her — further  down  the  table  there — married  the  young  man 
with  the  dark  whiskers,  who  sits  beyond  her,  only  last 
month.  They  are  going  to  settle  in  the  very  Far  West, 
where  he  has  lived  four  years,  but  where  she  has  never 
been.  They  were  both  overturned  in  a  stage-coach  the 
other  day  (a  bad  omen  anywhere  else,  where  overturns  are 
not  so  common),  and  his  head,  which  bears  the  marks  of  a 
recent  wound,  is  bound  up  still.  She  was  hurt  too,  at  the 
same  time,  and  lay  insensible  for  some  days;  bright  as  her 
eyes  are,  now. 

Further  down  still,  sits  a  man  who  is  going  some  miles 
beyond  their  place  of  destination,  to  "improve"  a  newly- 
discovered  copper  mine.  He  carries  the  village — that  is  to 
be — with  him :  a  few  frame  cottages,  and  an  apparatus  for 
smelting  the  copper.  He  carries  its  people  too.  They  are 
partly  American  and  partly  Irish,  and  herd  together  on 
the  lower  deck;  where  they  amused  themselves  last  even- 
ing till  the  night  was  pretty  far  advanced,  by  alternately 
firing  off  pistols  and  singing  hymns. 

They,  and  the  very  few  who  have  been  left  at  table 
twenty  minutes,  rise,  and  go  away.  We  do  so  too;  and 
passing  through  our  little  state-room,  resume  ou.r  seats  in 
the  quiet  gallery  without. 

A  fine  broad  river  always,  but  in  some  parts  much  wider 
than  in  others :  and  then  there  is  usually  a  green  island, 
covered  with  trees,  dividing  it  into  two  streams.  Occa- 
sionally, we  stop  for  a  few  minutes,  maybe  to  take  in  wood, 
maybe  for  passengers,  at  some  small  town  or  village  (I 
ought  to  say  city,  every  place  is  a  city  here) ;  but  the  banks 
are  for  the  most  part  deep  solitudes,  overgrown  with  trees, 
which,  hereabouts,  are  already  in  leaf  and  very  green.  For 
miles,  and  miles,  and  miles,  these  solitudes  are  unbroken 
by  any  sign  of  human  life  or  trace  of  human  footstep;  nor 
is  anything  seen  to  move  about  them  but  the  blue  jay, 
whose  colour  is  so  bright,  and  yet  so  delicate,  that  it  looks 
like  a  flying  flower  At  lengthened  intervals  a  log  cabin, 
with  its  little  space  of  cleared  land  about  it,  nestles  under 
a  rising  ground,  and  sends  its  thread  of  blue  smoke  curling 
up  into  the  sky.     It  stands  in  the  corner  of  the  poor  field 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  159 

of  wheat,  which  is  full  of  great  unsightly  stumps,  like 
earthy  butchers' -blocks.  Sometimes  the  ground  is  only 
just  now  cleared :  the  felled  trees  lying  yet  upon  the  soil ; 
and  the  log- house  only  this  morning  begun.  As  we  pass 
this  clearing,  the  settler  leans  upon  his  axe  or  hammer,  and 
looks  wistfully  at  the  people  from  the  world.  The  chil- 
dren creep  out  of  the  temporary  hut,  which  is  like  a  gipsy 
tent  upon  the  groimd,  and  clap  their  hands  and  shout. 
The  dog  only  glances  round  at  us;  and  then  looks  up  into 
his  master's  face  again,  as  if  he  were  rendered  uneasy  by 
any  suspension  of  the  common  business,  and  had  nothing 
more  to  do  with  pleasurers.  And  still  there  is  the  same, 
eternal  foreground.  The  river  has  washed  away  its  banks, 
and  stately  trees  have  fallen  down  into  the  stream.  Some 
have  been  there  so  long,  that  they  are  mere  dry  grizzly 
skeletons.  Some  have  just  toppled  over,  and  having  earth 
yet  about  their  roots,  are  bathing  their  green  heads  in  the 
river,  and  putting  forth  new  shoots  and  branches.  Some 
are  almost  sliding  down,  as  you  look  at  them.  And  some 
were  drowned  so  long  ago,  that  their  bleached  arms  start 
out  from  the  middle  of  the  current,  and  seem  to  try  to  grasp 
the  boat,  and  drag  it  under  water. 

Through  such  a  scene  as  this,  the  unwieldy  machine 
takes  its  hoarse  sullen  way :  venting,  at  every  revolution 
of  the  paddles,  a  loud  high-pressure  blast;  enough,  one 
would  think,  to  waken  up  the  host  of  Indians  who  lie  buried 
in  a  great  mound  yonder:  so  old,  that  mighty  oaks  and 
other  forest  trees  have  struck  their  roots  into  its  earth;  and 
so  high,  that  it  is  a  hill,  even  among  the  hills  that  Nature 
planted  round  it.  The  river,  as  though  it  shared  one's 
feelings  of  compassion  for  the  extinct  tribes  who  lived  so 
pleasantly  here,  in  their  blessed  ignorance  of  white  exist- 
ence, hundreds  of  years  ago,  steals  out  of  its  way  to  ripple 
near  this  mound:  and  there  are  few  places  where  the  Ohio 
sparkles  more  brightly  than  in  Big  Grave  Creek. 

All  this  I  see,  as  I  sit  in  the  little  stern- gallery  men- 
tioned just  now.  Evening  slowly  steals  upon  the  land- 
scape, and  changes  it  before  me,  when  we  stop  to  set  some 
emigrants  ashore. 

Five  men,  as  many  women,  and  a  little  girl.  All  their 
worldly  goods  are  a  bag,  a  large  chest,  and  an  old  chair: 
one,  old,  high-backed,  rush-bottomed  chair:  a  solitary  set- 
tler in  itself.     They  are  rowed  ashore  in  the  boat,  while 


160  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

the  vessel  stands  a  little  off  awaiting  its  return,  the  water 
being  shallow.  They  are  landed  at  the  foot  of  a  high  bank, 
on  the  summit  of  which  are  a  few  log  cabins,  attainable 
only  by  a  long  winding  path.  It  is  growing  dusk;  but  the 
sun  is  very  red,  and  shines  in  the  water  and  on  some  of  the 
tree-tops,  like  fire. 

The  men  get  out  of  the  boat  first;  help  out  the  women; 
take  out  the  bag,  the  chest,  the  chair;  bid  the  rowers 
"good-bye;  "  and  shove  the  boat  off  for  them.  At  the  first 
plash  of  the  oars  in  the  water,  the  ojdest  woman  of  the 
party  sits  down  in  the  old  chair,  close  to  the  water's  edge, 
without  speaking  a  word.  None  of  the  others  sit  down, 
though  the  chest  is  large  enough  for  many  seats.  They  all 
stand  where  they  landed,  as  if  stricken  into  stone;  and  look 
after  the  boat.  So  they  remain,  quite  still  and  silent:  the 
old  woman  and  her  old  chair,  in  the  centre;  the  bag  and 
chest  upon  the  shore,  without  anybody  heeding  them :  all 
eyes  fixed  upon  the  boat.  It  comes  alongside,  is  made 
fast,  the  men  jump  on  board,  the  engine  is  put  in  motion, 
and  we  go  hoarsely  on  again.  There  they  stand  yet,  with- 
out the  motion  of  a  hand.  I  can  see  them  through  my 
glass,  when,  in  the  distance  and  increasing  darkness,  they 
are  mere  specks  to  the  eye :  lingering  there  still :  the  old 
woman  in  the  old  chair,  and  all  the  rest  about  her :  not 
stirring  in  the  least  degree.     And  thus  I  slowly  lose  them. 

The  night  is  dark,  and  we  proceed  within  the  shadow  of 
the  wooded  bank,  which  makes  it  darker.  After  gliding 
past  the  sombre  maze  of  boughs  for  a  long  time,  we  come 
upon  an  open  space  where  the  tall  trees  are  burning.  The 
shape  of  every  branch  and  twig  is  expressed  in  a  deep  red 
glow,  and  as  the  light  wind  stirs  and  ruffles  it,  they  seem 
to  vegetate  in  fire.  It  is  such  a  sight  as  we  read  of  in 
legends  of  enchanted  forests :  saving  that  it  is  sad  to  see 
these  noble  works  wasting  away  so  awfully,  alone;  and  to 
think  how  many  years  must  come  and  go  before  the  magic 
that  created  them  will  rear  their  like  upon  this  ground 
again.  But  the  time  will  come :  and  when,  in  their  changed 
ashes,  the  growth  of  centuries  unborn  has  struck  its  roots, 
the  restless  men  of  distant  ages  will  repair  to  these  again 
unpeopled  solitudes;  and  their  fellows,  in  cities  far  away, 
that  slumber  now,  perhaps,  beneath  the  rolling  sea,  will 
read,  in  language  strange  to  any  ears  in  being  now,  but 
very  old  to  them,  of  primeval  forests  where  the  axe  was 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  161 

never  heard,  and  where  the  jungled  ground  was  never  trod- 
den by  a  liuman  foot. 

Midnight  and  sleep  blot  out  these  scenes  and  thoughts : 
and  when  the  morning  shines  again,  it  gilds  the  housetops 
of  a  lively  city,  before  whose  broad  paved  wharf  the  boat  is 
moored;  with  other  boats,  and  flags,  and  moving  wheels, 
and  hum  of  men  around  it;  as  though  there  were  not  a  sol- 
itary or  silent  rood  of  ground  within  the  compass  of  a 
thousand  miles. 

Cincinnati  is  a  beautiful  city;  cheerful,  thriving,  and  ani- 
mated. I  have  not  often  seen  a  place  that  commends  itself 
so  favourably  and  pleasantly  to  a  stranger  at  the  first  glance 
as  this  does :  with  its  clean  houses  of  red  and  white,  its 
well-paved  roads,  and  footways  of  bright  tile.  Nor  does  it 
become  less  prepossessing  on  a  closer  acquaintance.  The 
streets  are  broad  and  airy,  the  shops  extremely  good,  the 
private  residences  remarkable  for  their  elegance  and  neat- 
ness. There  is  something  of  invention  and  fancy  in  the 
varying  styles  of  these  latter  erections,  which,  after  the 
dull  company  of  the  steamboat,  is  perfectly  delightful,  as 
conveying  an  assurance  that  there  are  such  qualities  still  in 
existence.  The  disposition  to  ornament  these  pretty  villas 
and  render  them  attractive,  leads  to  the  culture  of  trees 
and  flowers,  and  the  laying  out  of  well-kept  gardens,  the 
sight  of  which,  to  those  who  walk  along  the  streets,  is  in- 
expressibly refreshing  and  agreeable.  I  was  quite  charmed 
with  the  appearance  of  the  town,  and  its  adjoining  suburb 
of  Mount  Auburn ;  from  which  the  city,  lying  in  an  amphi- 
theatre of  hills,  forms  a  picture  of  remarkable  beauty,  and 
is  seen  to  great  advantage. 

There  happened  to  be  a  great  Temperance  Convention 
held  here  on  the  day  after  our  arrival;  and  as  the  order  of 
march  brought  the  procession  under  the  windows  of  the 
hotel  in  which  we  lodged,  when  they  started  in  the  morn- 
ing, I  had  a  good  opportunity  of  seeing  it  It  comprised 
several  thousand  men ;  the  members  of  various  "  Washing- 
ton Auxiliary  Temperance  Societies;  "  and  was  marshalled 
by  officers  on  horseback,  who  cantered  briskly  up  and  down 
the  line,  with  scarves  and  ribbons  of  bright  colours  flutter- 
ing out  behind  them  gaily.  There  were  bauds  of  music  too, 
and  banners  out  of  number;  and  it  was  a  fresh,  holiday- 
looking  concourse  altogether. 

I  was   particularly  pleased  to  see  the   Irishmen,  who 


162  AMERICAN   NOTES. 

formed  a  distinct  society  among  themselves,  and  mustered 
very  strong  Avith  their  green  scarves;  carrying  their  national 
Harp  and  their  Portrait  of  Father  Mathew,  high  above  the 
people's  heads.  They  looked  as  jolly  and  good-humoured 
as  ever;  and,  Working  the  hardest  for  their  living  and  do- 
ing any  kind  of  sturdy  labour  that  came  in  their  way,  were 
the  most  independent  fellows  there,  I  thought. 

The  banners  were  very  well  painted,  and  flaunted  down 
the  street  famously.  There  was  the  smiting  of  the  rock, 
and  the  gushing  forth  of  the  waters;  and  there  was  a  tem- 
perate man  with  "  considerable  of  a  hatchet "  (as  the  stand- 
ard bearer  would  probably  have  said),  aiming  a  deadly  blow 
at  a  serpent  which  was  apparently  about  to  spring  upon 
him  from  the  top  of  a  barrel  of  spirits.  But  the  chief  feat- 
ure of  this  part  of  the  show  was  a  huge  allegorical  device, 
borne  among  the  ship-carpenters,  on  one  side  whereof  the 
steamboat  Alcohol  was  represented  bursting  her  boiler  and 
exploding  with  a  great  crash,  while  upon  the  other,  the 
good  ship  Temperance  sailed  away  with  a  fair  wind,  to  the 
heart's  content  of  the  captain,  crew,  and  passengers. 

After  going  round  the  town,  the  procession  repaired  to  a 
certain  appointed  place,  where,  as  the  printed  programme 
set  forth,  it  would  be  received  by  the  children  of  the  dif- 
ferent free  schools,  "singing  Temperance  Songs."  I  was 
prevented  from  getting  there,  in  time  to  hear  these  Little 
Warblers,  or  to  report  upon  this  novel  kind  of  vocal  enter- 
tainment :  novel,  at  least,  to  me :  but  I  found,  in  a  large 
open  space,  each  society  gathered  round  its  own  banners, 
and  listening  in  silent  attention  to  its  own  orator.  The 
speeches,  judging  from  the  little  I  could  hear  of  them, 
were  certainly  adapted  to  the  occasion,  as  having  that  de- 
gree of  relationship  to  cold  water  which  wet  blankets  may 
claim :  but  the  main  thing  was  the  conduct  and  appearance 
of  the  audience  throughout  the  day;  and  that  was  admi- 
rable and  full  of  promise. 

Cincinnati  is  honourably  famous  for  its  free-schools,  of 
which  it  has  so  many  that  no  person's  child  among  its  pop- 
ulation can,  by  possibility,  want  the  means  of  education, 
which  are  extended,  upon  an  average,  to  four  thousand 
pupils,  annually.  I  was  only  present  in  one  of  these  estab- 
lishments during  the  hours  of  instruction.  In  the  boys'  de- 
partment, which  was  full  of  little  urchins  (varying  in  their 
ages,  I  should  say,  from  six  years  old  to  ten  or  twelve), 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  163 

the  master  offered  to  institute  an  extemporary  examination 
of  the  pupils  in  algebra;  a  proposal,  which,  as  I  was  by 
no  means  confident  of  my  ability  to  detect  mistakes  in  that 
science,  I  declined  with  some  alarm.  In  the  girls'  school, 
reading  was  proposed;  and  as  I  felt  tolerably  equal  to  that 
art,  I  expressed  my  willingness  to  hear  a  class.  Books  were 
distributed  accordingly,  and  some  half-dozen  girls  relieved 
each  other  in  reading  paragraphs  from  English  History. 
But  it  was  a  dry  compilation,  infinitely  above  their  powers; 
and  when  they  had  blundered  through  three  or  four  dreary 
passages  concerning  the  Treaty  of  Amiens,  and  other  thrill- 
ing topics  of  the  same  nature  (obviously  without  compre- 
hending ten  words),  I  expressed  myself  quite  satisfied.  It 
is  very  possible  that  they  only  mounted  to  this  exalted  stave 
in  the  Ladder  of  Learning  for  the  astonishment  of  a  visitor; 
and  that  at  other  times  they  keep  upon  its  lower  rounds; 
but  I  should  have  been  much  better  pleased  and  satisfied 
if  I  had  heard  them  exercised  in  simpler  lessons,  which 
they  understood. 

As  in  every  other  place  I  visited,  the  Judges  here  were 
gentlemen  of  high  character  and  attainments.  I  was  in 
one  of  the  courts  for  a  few  minutes,  and  found  it  like  those 
to  which  I  have  already  referred.  A  nuisance  cause  was 
trying;  there  were  not  many  spectators;  and  the  witnesses, 
counsel,  and  jury,  formed  a  sort  of  family  circle,  suffi- 
ciently jocose  and  snug. 

The  society  with  which  I  mingled  was  intelligent,  cour- 
teous, and  agreeable.  The  inhabitants  of  Cincinnati  are 
proud  of  their  city,  as  one  of  the  most  interesting  in  Amer- 
ica :  and  with  good  reason :  for  beautiful  and  thriving  as  it 
is  now,  and  containing,  as  it  does,  a  population  of  fifty 
thousand  souls,  but  two-and-fifty  years  have  passed  away 
since  the  ground  on  which  it  stands  (bought  at  that  time 
for  a  few  dollars)  was  a  wild  wood,  and  its  citizens  were 
but  a  handful  of  dwellers  in  scattered  log  huts  upon  the 
river's  shore. 


164  AMERICAN  NOTES. 


CHAPTER    THE    TWELFTH. 

FROM  CINCINNATI  TO  LOUISVILLE  IN  ANOTHER  WEST- 
ERN STEAMBOAT;  AND  FROM  LOUISVILLE  TO  ST. 
LOUIS  IN  ANOTHER— ST.   LOUIS. 

Leaving  Cincinnati  at  eleven  o'clock  in  the  forenoon, 
we  embarked  for  Louisville  in  the  Pike  steamboat,  which, 
carrying  the  mails,  was  a  packet  of  a  much  better  class 
than  that  in  which  we  had  come  from  Pittsburg.  As  this 
passage  does  not  occupy  more  than  twelve  or  thirteen  hours, 
we  arranged  to  go  ashore  that  night :  not  coveting  the  dis- 
tinction of  sleeping  in  a  state-room,  when  it  was  possible 
to  sleep  anywhere  else. 

There  chanced  to  be  on  board  this  boat,  in  addition  to 
the  usual  dreary  crowd  of  passengers,  one  Pitchlynn,  a 
chief  of  the  Choctaw  tribe  of  Indians,  who  sent  in  his  card 
to  me,  and  with  whom  I  had  the  pleasure  of  a  long  conver- 
sation. 

He  spoke  English  perfectly  well,  though  he  had  not  be- 
gun to  learn  the  language,  he  told  me,  until  he  was  a  young 
man  grown.  He  had  read  many  books;  and  Scott's  poetry 
appeared  to  have  left  a  strong  impression  on  his  mind: 
especially  the  opening  of  The  Lady  of  the  Lake,  and  the 
great  battle  scene  in  Marmion,  in  which,  no  doubt  from  the 
congeniality  of  the  subjects  to  his  own  pursuits  and  tastes, 
he  had  great  interest  and  delight.  He  appeared  to  under- 
stand correctly  all  he  had  read;  and  whatever  fiction  had 
enlisted  his  sympathy  in  its  belief,  had  done  so  keenly  and 
earnestly,  I  might  almost  say  fiercely.  He  was  dressed  in 
our  ordinary  every-day  costume,  which  hung  about  his  fine 
figure  loosely,  and  with  indifferent  grace.  On  my  telling 
him  that  I  regretted  not  to  see  him  in  his  own  attire,  he 
threw  up  his  right  arm,  for  a  moment,  as  though  he  were 
brandishing  some  heavy  weapon,  and  answered,  as  he  let  it 
fall  again,  that  his  race  were  losing  many  things  beside 
their  dress,  and  would  soon  be  seen  upon  the  earth  no  more : 
but  he  wore  it  at  home,  he  added  proudly. 

He  told  me  that  he  had  been  away  from  his  home,  west  of 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  165 

the  Mississippi,  seventeen  months :  and  was  now  returning. 
He  had  been  chiefly  at  Washington  on  some  negotiations 
pending  between  his  Tribe  and  the  Government:  which 
were  not  settled  yet  (he  said  in  a  melancholy  way) ,  and  he 
feared  never  would  be :  for  what  could  a  few  poor  Indians 
do,  against  such  well-skilled  men  of  business  as  the  whites? 
He  had  no  love  for  Washington;  tired  of  towns  and  cities 
very  soon;  and  longed  for  the  Forest  and  the  Prairie. 

I  asked  him  what  he  thought  of  Congress?  He  answered, 
with  a  smile,  that  it  wanted  dignity,  in  an  Indian's  eyes. 

He  would  very  much  like,  he  said,  to  see  England  before 
he  died;  and  spoke  with  much  interest  about  the  great 
things  to  be  seen  there.  When  I  told  him  of  that  chamber 
in  the  British  Museum  wherein  are  preserved  household 
memorials  of  a  race  that  ceased  to  be,  thousands  of  years 
ago,  he  was  very  attentive,  and  it  was  not  hard  to  see  that 
he  had  a  reference  in  his  mind  to  the  gradual  fading  away 
of  his  own  people. 

This  led  us  to  speak  of  Mr.  Catlin's  gallery,  which  he 
praised  highly :  observing  that  his  own  portrait  was  amons; 
the  collection,  and  that  all  the  likenesses  were  "elegant." 
Mr.  Cooper,  he  said,  had  painted  the  Eed  Man  well;  and 
so  would  I,  he  knew,  if  I  would  go  home  with  him  and 
hunt  buffaloes,  which  he  was  quite  anxious  I  should  do. 
When  I  told  him  that  supposing  I  went,  I  should  not  be 
very  likely  to  damage  the  buffaloes  much,  he  took  it  as  a 
great  joke  and  laughed  heartily. 

He  was  a  remarkably  handsome  man :  some  years  past 
forty  I  should  judge;  with  long  black  hair,  an  aquiline 
nose,  broad  cheek-bones,  a  sunburnt  complexion,  and  a  very 
bright,  keen,  dark,  and  piercing  eye.  There  were  but 
twenty  thousand  of  the  Choctaws  left,  he  said,  and  their 
number  was  decreasing  every  dav.  A  few  of  his  brother 
chiefs  had  been  obliged  to  become  civilised,  and  to  make 
themselves  acquainted  with  what  the  whites  knew,  for  it 
was  their  only  chance  of  existence.  But  they  were  not 
many;  and  the  rest  were  as  they  always  had  been.  He 
dwelt  on  this :  and  said  several  times  that  unless  they  tried 
to  assimilate  themselves  to  their  conquerors,  they  must  be 
swept  away  before  the  strides  of  civilised  society. 

When  we  shook  hands  at  parting,  I  told  him  he  must 
come  to  England,  as  he  longed  to  see  the  land  so  much : 
that  I  should  hope  to  see  him  there,  one  day :  and  that  1 


166  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

could  promise  him  he  would  be  well  received  and  kindly 
treated.  He  was  evidently  pleased  by  this  assurance, 
though  he  rejoined  with  a  good-humoured  smile  and  an 
arch  shake  of  his  head,  that  the  English  used  to  be  very 
fond  of  the  Red  Men  when  they  wanted  their  help,  but  had 
not  cared  much  for  them,  since. 

He  took  his  leave;  as  stately  and  complete  a  gentle- 
man of  Nature's  making,  as  ever  I  beheld;  and  moved 
among  the  people  in  the  boat,  another  kind  of  being.  He 
sent  me  a  lithographed  portrait  of  himself  soon  after- 
wards; very  like,  though  scarcely  handsome  enough;  which 
I  have  carefully  preserved  in  memory  of  our  brief  ac- 
quaintance. 

There  was  nothing  very  interesting  in  the  scenery  of  this 
day's  journey,  which  brought  us,  at  midnight,  to  Louis- 
ville. We  slept  at  the  Gait  Hoase;  a  splendid  hotel; 
and  were  as  handsomely  lodged  as  though  we  had  been  in 
Paris,  rather  than  hundreds  of  miles  beyond  the  Alle- 
ghanies. 

The  city  presenting  no  objects  of  sufficient  interest  to  de- 
tain us  on  our  way,  we  resolved  to  proceed  next  day  by  an- 
other steamboat,  the  Fulton,  and  to  join  it,  about  noon,  at 
a  suburb  called  Portland,  where  it  would  be  delayed  some 
time  in  passing  through  a  canal. 

The  interval,  after  breakfast,  we  devoted  to  riding 
through  the  town,  which  is  regular  and  cheerful :  the  streets 
being  laid  out  at  right  angles,  and  planted  with  young 
trees.  The  buildings  are  smoky  and  blackened,  from  the 
use  of  bituminous  coal,  but  an  Englishman  is  well  used  to 
that  appearance,  and  indisposed  to  quarrel  with  it.  There 
did  not  appear  to  be  much  business  stirring;  and  some  un- 
finished buildings  and  improvements  seemed  to  intimate 
that  the  city  had  been  overbuilt  in  the  ardour  of  "going 
ahead,"  and  was  suffering  under  the  re-action  consequent 
upon  such  feverish  forcing  of  its  powers. 

On  our  way  to  Portland,  we  passed  a  "Magistrate's  of- 
fice," which  amused  me,  as  looking  far  more  like  a  dame 
school  than  any  police  establishment :  for  this  awful  Insti- 
tution was  nothing  but  a  little  lazy,  good-for-nothing  front 
parlour,  open  to  the  street;  wherein  two  or  three  figures  (I 
presume  the  magistrate  and  his  myrmidons)  were  basking 
in  the  sunshine,  the  very  effigies  of  langour  and  repose.  It 
was  a  perfect  picture  of  Justice  retired  from  business  for 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  167 

want  of  customers;  her  sword  and  scales  sold  off;  napping 
comfortably  with  her  legs  upon  the  table. 

Here,  as  elsewhere  in  these  parts,  the  road  was  perfectly 
alive  with  pigs  of  all  ages;  lying  about  in  every  direction, 
fast  asleep;  or  grunting  along  in  quest  of  hidden  dainties. 
I  had  always  a  sneaking  kindness  for  these  odd  animals, 
and  found  a  constant  source  of  amusement,  when  all  others 
failed,  in  watching  their  proceedings.  As  we  were  riding 
along  this  morning,  I  observed  a  little  incident  between 
two  youthful  pigs,  which  was  so  very  human  as  to  be  inex- 
pressibly comical  and  grotesque  at  the  time,  though  I  dare 
say,  in  telling,  it  is  tame  enough. 

One  young  gentleman  (a  very  delicate  porker  with  sev- 
eral straws  sticking  about  his  nose,  betokening  recent  in- 
vestigations in  a  dunghill)  was  walking  deliberately  on, 
profoundly  thinking,  when  suddenly  his  brother,  who  was 
lying  in  a  miry  hole  unseen  by  him,  rose  up  immediately 
before  his  startled  eyes,  ghostly  with  damp  mud.  Never 
was  pig's  whole  mass  of  blood  so  turned.  He  started  back 
at  least  three  feet,  gazed  for  a  moment,  and  then  shot  off 
as  hard  as  he  could  go :  his  excessively  little  tail  vibrating 
with  speed  and  terror  like  a  distracted  pendulum.  But  be- 
fore he  had  gone  very  far,  he  began  to  reason  with  himself 
as  to  the  nature  of  this  frightful  appearance;  and  as  he 
reasoned,  he  relaxed  his  speed  by  gradual  degrees;  until  at 
last  he  stopped,  and  faced  about.  There  was  his  brother, 
with  the  mud  upon  him  glazing  in  the  sun,  yet  staring  out 
of  the  very  same  hole,  perfectly  amazed  at  his  proceedings ! 
He  was  no  sooner  assured  of  this;  and  he  assured  himself 
so  carefully  that  one  may  almost  say  he  shaded  his  eyes 
with  his  hand  to  see  the  better;  than  he  came  back  at  a 
round  trot,  pounced  upon  him,  and  summarily  took  off  a 
piece  of  his  tail;  as  a  caution  to  him  to  be  careful  what  he 
was  about  for  the  future,  and  never  to  play  tricks  with  his 
family  any  more. 

We  found  the  steamboat  in  the  canal,  waiting  for  the 
slow  process  of  getting  through  the  lock,  and  went  on 
board,  where  we  shortly  afterwards  had  a  new  kind  of  vis- 
itor in  the  person  of  a  certain  Kentucky  Giant  whose  name 
is  Porter,  and  who  is  of  the  moderate  height  of  seven  feet 
eight  inches,  in  his  stockings. 

There  never  was  a  race  of  people  who  so  completely  gave 
the  lie  to  history  as  these  giants,  or  whom  all  the  chron- 


168  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

ielers  have  so  cruelly  libelled.  Instead  of  roaring  and 
ravaging  about  the  world,  constantly  catering  for  their  canni- 
bal larders,  and  perpetually  going  to  market  in  an  unlaw- 
ful manner,  they  are  the  meekest  people  in  any  man's  ac- 
quaintance :  rather  inclining  to  milk  and  vegetable  diet,  and 
bearing  anything  for  a  quiet  life.  So  decidedly  are  amia- 
bility and  mildness  their  characteristics,  that  I  confess  I 
look  upon  that  youth  who  distinguished  himself  by  the 
slaughter  of  these  inoffensive  persons,  as  a  false-hearted 
brigand,  who,  pretending  to  philanthropic  motives,  was  se- 
cretly influenced  only  by  the  wealth  stored  up  within  their 
castles,  and  the  hope  of  plunder.  And  I  lean  the  more  to 
this  opinion  from  finding  that  even  the  historian  of  those 
exploits,  with  all  his  partiality  for  his  hero,  is  fain  to  ad- 
mit that  the  slaughtered  monsters  in  question  were  of  a 
very  innocent  and  simple  turn;  extremely  guileless  and 
ready  of  belief;  lending  a  credulous  ear  to  the  most  im- 
probable tales;  suffering  themselves  to  be  easily  entrapped 
into  pits;  and  even  (as  in  the  case  of  the  Welsh  Giant), 
with  an  excess  of  the  hospitable  politeness  of  a  landlord, 
ripping  themselves  open,  rather  than  hint  at  the  possibility 
of  their  guests  being  versed  in  the  vagabond  arts  of  sleight- 
of-hand  and  hocus-pocus. 

The  Kentucky  Giant  was  but  another  illustration  of  the 
truth  of  this  position.  He  had  a  weakness  in  the  region  of 
the  knees,  and  a  trustfulness  in  his  long  face,  which  ap- 
pealed even  to  five-feet-nine  for  encouragement  and  sup- 
port. He  was  only  twenty-five  years  old,  he  said,  and  had 
grown  recently,  for  it  had  been  found  necessary  to  make  an 
addition  to  the  legs  of  his  inexpressibles.  At  fifteen  he 
was  a  short  boy,  and  in  those  days  his  English  father  and 
his  Irish  mother  had  rather  snubbed  him,  as  being  too 
small  of  stature  to  sustain  the  credit  of  the  family.  He 
added  that  his  health  had  not  been  good,  though  it  was 
better  now;  but  short  people  are  not  wanting  who  whisper 
that  he  drinks  too  hard. 

I  understand  he  drives  a  hackney-coach,  though  how  he 
does  it,  unless  he  stands  on  the  footboard  behind,  and  lies 
along  the  roof  upon  his  chest,  with  his  chin  in  the  box,  it 
would  be  difficult  to  comprehend.  He  brought  his  gun 
with  him,  as  a  curiosity.  Christened  "The  Little  Rifle," 
and  displayed  outside  a  shop-window,  it  would  make  the 
fortune  of  any  retail  business  in  Holborn.     When  he  had 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  '169 

shown  himself  and  talked  a  little  while,  he  withdrew  with 
his  pocket-instrument,  and  went  bobbing  down  the  cabin, 
among  men  of  six  feet  high  and  upwards,  like  a  lighthouse 
walking  among  lamp-posts. 

Within  a  few  minutes  afterwards,  we  were  out  of  the 
canal,  and  in  the  Ohio  river  again. 

The  arrangements  of  the  boat  were  like  those  of  the  Mes- 
senger, and  the  passengers  were  of  the  same  order  of  peo- 
ple. We  fed  at  the  same  times,  on  the  same  kind  of  viands, 
in  the  same  dull  manner,  and  with  the  same  observances. 
The  company  appeared  to  be  oppressed  by  the  same  tre- 
mendous concealments,  and  had  as  little  capacity  of  enjoy- 
ment or  light-heartedness.'  I  never  in  my  life  did  see  such 
listless,  heavy  dulness  as  brooded  over  these  meals:  the 
very  recollection  of  it  weighs  me  down,  and  makes  me,  for 
the  moment,  wretched.  Reading  and  writing  on  my  knee, 
in  our  little  cabin,  I  really  dreaded  the  coming  of  the  hour 
that  summoned  us  to  table;  and  was  as  glad  to  escape  from 
it  again,  as  if  it  had  been  a  penance  or  a  punishment. 
Healthy  cheerfulness  and  good  spirits  forming  a  part  of 
the  banquet,  I  could  soak  my  crusts  in  the  fountain  with 
Le  Sage's  strolling  player,  and  revel  in  their  glad  enjoy- 
ment: but  sitting  down  with  so  many  fellow-animals  to 
ward  off  thirst  and  hunger  as  a  business;  to  empty,  each 
creature,  his  Yahoo's  trough  as  quickly  as  he  can,  and  then 
slink  sullenly  away;  to  have  these  social  sacraments 
stripped  of  everything  but  the  mere  greedy  satisfaction  of 
the  natural  cravings;  goes  so  against  the  grain  with  me, 
that  I  seriously  believe  the  recollection  of  these  funeral 
feasts  will  be  a  waking  nightmare  to  me  all  my  life. 

There  was  some  relief  in  this  boat,  too,  which  there  had 
not  been  in  the  other,  for  the  captain  (a  blunt  good-natured 
fellow)  had  his  handsome  wife  with  him,  who  was  disposed 
to  be  lively  and  agreeable,  as  were  a  few  other  lady-pas- 
sengers who  had  their  seats  about  us  at  the  same  end  of  the 
table.  But  nothing  could  have  made  head  against  the  de- 
pressing influence  of  the  general  body.  There  was  a  mag- 
netism of  dulness  in  them  which  would  have  beaten  down 
the  most  facetious  companion  that  the  earth  ever  knew. 
A  jest  would  have  been  a  crime,  and  a  smile  would  have 
faded  into  a  grinning  horror.  Such  deadly  leaden  people; 
such  systematic  plodding  weary  insupportable  heaviness; 
such  a  mass  of  animated  indigestion  in  respect  of  all  that 


ISt)  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

was  genial,  jovial,  frank,  social,  or  hearty;  never,  sure, 
was  brought  together  elsewhere  since  the  world  began. 

Nor  was  the  scenery,  as  we  approached  the  junction  of 
the  Ohio  and  Mississippi  rivers,  at  all  inspiriting  in  its  in- 
fluence. The  trees  were  stunted  in  their  growth;  the  banks 
were  low  and  flat;  the  settlements  and  log  cabins  fewer  in 
number :  their  inhabitants  more  wan  and  wretched  than  any 
we  had  encountered  yet.  No  songs  of  birds  were  in  the 
air,  no  pleasant  scents,  no  moving  lights  and  shadows  from 
swift  passing  clouds.  Hour  after  hour,  the  changeless 
glare  of  the  hot,  unwinking  sky  shone  upon  the  same  mo- 
notonous objects.  Hour  after  hour,  the  river  rolled  along, 
as  wearily  and  slowly  as  the  tim'e  itself. 

At  length,  upon  the  morning  of  the  third  day,  we  arrived 
at  a  spot  so  much  more  desolate  than  any  we  had  yet  be- 
held, that  the  forlornest  places  we  had  passed  were,  in 
comparison  with  it,  full  of  interest.  At  the  junction  of  the 
two  rivers,  on  ground  so  flat  and  low  and  marshy,  that  at 
certain  seasons  of  the  year  it  is  inundated  to  the  house-tops, 
lies  a  breeding-place  of  fever,  ague,  and  death;  vaunted  in 
England  as  a  mine  of  Golden  Hope,  and  speculated  in,  on 
the  faith  of  monstrous  representations,  to  many  people's 
ruin.  A  dismal  swamp,  on  which  the  half-built  houses  rot 
away :  cleared  here  and  there  for  the  space  of  a  few  yards; 
and  teeming,  then,  with  rank  unwholesome  vegetation,  in 
whose  baleful  shade  the  wretched  wanderers  who  are 
tempted  hither,  droop,  and  die,  and  lay  their  bones;  the 
hateful  Mississippi  circling  and  eddying  before  it,  and  turn- 
ing off  upon  its  southern  course  a  slimy  monster  hideous  to 
behold;  a  hotbed  of  disease,  an  ugly  sepulchre,  a  grave  un- 
cheered  by  any  gleam  of  promise :  a  place  without  one  sin- 
gle quality,  in  earth  or  air  or  water,  to  commend  it :  such 
is  this  dismal  Cairo. 

But  what  words  shall  describe  the  Mississippi,  great  fa- 
ther of  rivers,  who  (praise  be  to  Heaven)  has  no  young 
children  like  him !  An  enormous  ditch,  sometimes  two  or 
three  miles  wide,  running  liquid  mud,  six  miles  an  hour : 
its  strong  and  frothy  current  choked  and  obstructed  every- 
where by  huge  logs  and  whole  forest  trees :  now  twining 
themselves  together  in  great  rafts,  from  the  interstices  of 
which  a  sedgy  lazy  foam  works  up,  to  float  upon  the  water's 
top ;  now  rolling  past  like  monstrous  bodies,  their  tangled 
roots  showing  like  matted  hair;  now  glancing  singly  by 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  171 

like  giant  leeches;  and  now  writhing  round  and  round  in 
the  vortex  of  some  small  whirlpool,  like  wounded  snakes. 
The  banks  low,  the  trees  dwarfish,  the  marshes  swarming 
with  frogs,  the  wretched  cabins  few  and  far  apart,  their  in- 
mates hollow-cheeked  and  pale,  the  weather  very  hot,  mos- 
quitoes penetrating  into  every  crack  and  crevice  of  the  boat, 
mud  and  slime  on  everything :  nothing  pleasant  in  its  as- 
pect, but  the  harmless  lightning  which  flickers  every  night 
iipon  the  dark  horizon. 

For  two  days  we  toiled  up  this  foul  stream,  striking  con- 
stantly against  the  floating  timber,  or  stopping  to  avoid 
those  more  dangerous  obstacles,  the  snags,  or  sawyers, 
which  are  the  hidden  trunks  of  trees  that  have  their  roots 
below  the  tide.  When  the  nights  are  very  dark,  the  look- 
out stationed  in. the  head  of  the  boat,  knows  by  the  ripple 
of  the  water  if  any  great  impediment  be  near  at  hand,  and 
rings  a  bell  beside  him,  which  is  the  signal  for  the  engine 
to  be  stopped :  but  always  in  the  night  this  bell  has  work 
to  do,  and  after  every  ring,  there  comes  a  blow  which  ren- 
ders it  no  easy  matter  to  remain  in  bed. 

The  decline  of  day  here  was  very  gorgeous;  tinging  the 
firmament  deeply  with  red  and  gold,  up  to  the  very  key- 
stone of  the  arch  above  us.  As  the  sun  went  down  behind 
the  bank,  the  slightest  blades  of  grass  upon  it  seemed  to 
become  as  distinctly  visible  as  the  arteries  in  the  skeleton 
of  a  leaf;  and  when,  as  it  slowly  sank,  the  red  and  golden 
bars  upon  the  water  grew  dimmer,  and  dimmer  yet,  as  if 
they  were  sinking  too;  and  all  the  glowing  colours  of  de- 
parting day  paled,  inch  by  inch,  before  the  sombre  night; 
the  scene  became  a  thousand  times  more  lonesome  and  more 
dreary  than  before,  and  all  its  influences  darkened  with  the 
sky. 

We  drank  the  muddy  water  of  this  river  while  we  were 
upon  it.  It  is  considered  wholesome  by  the  natives,  and  is 
something  more  opaque  than  gruel.  I  have  seen  water  like 
it  at  the  Filter-shops,  but  nowhere  else. 

On  the  fourth  night  after  leaving  Louisville,  we  reached 
St.  Louis,  and  here  I  witnessed  the  conclusion  of  an  inci- 
dent, trifling  enough  in  itself,  but  very  pleasant  to  see, 
which  had  interested  me  during  the  whole  journey. 

There  was  a  little  woman  on  board,  with  a  little  baby; 
and  both  little  woman  and  little  child  were  cheerful,  good' 
looking,  bright-eyed,  and  fair  to  see.     The  little  woman 


172  .  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

had  been  passing  a  long  time  with  her  sick  mother  in  New 
York,  and  had  left  her  home  in  St.  Louis,  in  that  condi- 
tion in  which  ladies  who  truly  love  their  lords  desire  to  be. 
The  baby  was  born  in  her  mother's  house;  and  she  had 
not  seen  her  husband  (to  whom  she  was  now  returning),  for 
twelve  months :  having  left  him  a  month  or  two  after  their 
marriage. 

Well,  to  be  sure,  there  never  was  a  little  woman  so  full 
of  hope,  and  tenderness,  and  love,  and  anxiety,  as  this  lit- 
tle woman  was :  and  all  day  long  she  wondered  whether 
"  He  "  would  be  at  the  wharf;  and  whether  "  He  "  had  got 
her  letter;  and  whether,  if  she  seut  the  baby  ashore  by 
somebody  else,  "  He "  would  know  it,  meeting  it  in  the 
street :  which,  seeing  that  he  had  never  set  eyes  upon  it  in 
his  life,  was  not  very  likely  in  the  abstract,  but  was  prob- 
able enough,  to  the  young  mother.  She  wa's  such  an  artless 
little  creature;  and  was  in  such  a  sunny,  beaming,  hopeful 
state;  and  let  out  all  this  matter  clinging  close  about  her 
heart,  so  freely;  that  all  the  other  lady  passengers  entered 
into  the  spirit  of  it  as  much  as  she;  and  the  captain  (who 
heard  all  about  it  from  his  wife)  was  wondrous  sly,  I 
promise  you:  inquiring,  every  time  we  met  at  table,  as  in 
forgetfulness,  whether  she  expected  anybody  to  meet  her 
at  St.  Louis,  and  whether  she  would  want  to  go  ashore  the 
night  we  reached  it  (but  he  supposed  she  wouldn't),  and 
cutting  many  other  dry  jokes  of  that  nature.  There  was 
one  little  weazen,  dried-apple-faced  old  woman,  who  took 
occasion  to  doubt  the  constancy  of  husbands  in  such  cir- 
cumstances of  bereavement;  and  there  was  another  lady 
(with  a  lap  dog)  old  enough  to  moralize  on  the  lightness  of 
human  affections,  and  yet  not  so  old  that  she  could  help 
nursing  the  baby,  now  and  then,  or  laughing  with  the  rest, 
when  the  little  woman  called  it  by  its  father's  name,  and 
asked  it  all  manner  of  fantastic  questions  concerning  him 
in  the  joy  of  her  heart. 

It  was  something  of  a  blow  to  the  little  woman,  that 
when  we  were  within  twenty  miles  of  our  destination,  it 
became  clearly  necessary  to  put  this  baby  to  bed.  But  she 
got  over  it  with  the  same  good  humovir;  tied  a  handkerchief 
round  her  head;  and  came  out  into  the  little  gallery  with 
the  rest.  Then,  such  an  oracle  as  she  became  in  reference 
to  the  localities !  and  such  facetiousness  as  was  displayed 
by  the  married  ladies !  and  such  sympathy  as  was  ?ho,vn 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  173 

by  the  single  ones !  and  such  peals  of  laughter  as  the  little 
woman  herself  (who  would  just  as  soon  have  cried)  greeted 
every  jest  with ! 

At  last,  there  were  the  lights  of  St,  Louis,  and  here  was 
the  wharf,  and  those  were  the  steps :  and  the  little  woman 
covering  her  face  with  her  hands,  and  laughing  (or  seeming 
to  laugh)  more  than  ever,  ran  into  her  own  cabin,  and  shut 
herself  up.  I  have  no  doubt  that  in  the  charming  incon- 
sistency of  such  excitement,  she  stopped  her  ears,  lest  she 
should  hear  "  Him  "  asking  for  her :  but  I  did  not  see  her 
do  it. 

Then,  a  great  crowd  of  people  rushed  on  board,  though 
the  boat  was  not  yet  made  fast,  but  was  wandering  about, 
among  the  other  boats,  to  find  a  landing-place :  and  every- 
body looked  for  the  husband :  and  nobody  saw  him :  when, 
in  the  midst  of  us  all— Heaven  knows  how  she  ever  got 
there — there  was  the  little  woman  clinging  with  both  arms 
tight  round  the  neck  of  a  fine,  good-looking,  sturdy  young 
fellow!  and  in  a  moment  afterwards,  there  she  was  again, 
actually  clapping  her  little  hands  for  joy,  as  she  dragged 
him  through  the  small  door  of  her  small  cabin,  to  look  at 
the  baby  as  he  lay  asleep ! 

We  went  to  a  large  hotel,  called  the  Planter's  House : 
built  like  an  English  hospital,  with  long  passages  and  bare 
walls,  and  skylights  above  the  room-doors  for  the  free  cir- 
culation of  air.  There  were  a  great  many  boarders  in  it; 
and  as  many  lights  sparkled  and  glistened  from  the  win- 
dows down  into  the  street  below,  when  we  drove  up,  as  if 
it  had  been  illuminated  on  some  occasion  of  rejoicing.  It 
is  an  excellent  house,  and  the  proprietors  have  most  boun- 
tiful notions  of  providing  the  creature  comforts.  Dining 
alone  with  my  wife  in  our  own  room,  one  day,  I  counted 
fourteen  dishes  on  the  table  at  once. 

In  the  old  French  portion  of  the  town,  the  thoroughfares 
are  narrow  and  crooked,  and  some  of  tlie  houses  are  very 
quaint  and  picturesque  :  being  built  of  wood,  with  tumble- 
down galleries  before  the  windows,  approachable  by  stairs 
or  rather  ladders  from  the  street.  There  are  queer  little 
barbers'  shops  and  drinking-houses  too,  in  this  quarter; 
and  abundance  of  crazy  old  tenements  with  blinking  case- 
ments, such  as  may  be  seen  in  Flanders.  Some  of  these 
ancient  habitations,  with  high  garret  gable-windows  perk- 


174  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

ing  into  the  roofs,  have  a  kind  of  French  shrug  about  them^ 
and  being  lop-sided  with  age,  appear  to  hold  their  heads 
askew,  besides,  as  if  they  were  grimacing  in  astonishment 
at  the  American  Improvements. 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  say,  that  these  consist  of  wharfs 
and  warehouses,  and  new  buildings  in  all  directions;  and 
of  a  great  many  vast  plans  which  are  still  "progressing." 
Already,  however,  some  very  good  houses,  broad  streets, 
and  marble-fronted  shops,  have  gone  so  far  ahead  as  to  be 
in  a  state  of  completion;  and  the  town  bids  fair  in  a  few 
years  to  improve  considerably :  though  it  is  not  likely  ever 
to  vie,  in  point  of  elegance  or  beauty,  with  Cincinnati. 

The  Roman  Catholic  religion,  introduced  here  by  the 
early  French  settlers,  prevails  extensively.  Among  the 
public  institutions  are  a  Jesuit  college;  a  convent  for  "the 
Ladies  of  the  Sacred  Heart;  "  and  a  large  chapel  attached 
to  the  college,  which  was  in  course  of  erection  at  the  time 
of  my  visit,  and  was  intended  to  be  consecrated  on  the  sec- 
ond of  December  in  the  present  year.  The  architect  of 
this  building  is  one  of  the  reverend  fathers  of  the  school, 
and  the  works  proceed  under  his  sole  direction.  The  organ 
will  be  sent  from  Belgium. 

In  addition  to  these  establishments,  there  is  a  Roman 
Catholic  cathedral,  dedicated  to  Saint  Francis  Xavier;  and 
a  hospital,  founded  by  the  munificence  of  a  deceased  resi- 
dent, who  was  a  member  of  that  church.  It  also  sends 
missionaries  from  hence  among  the  Indian  tribes. 

The  Unitarian  Church  is  represented,  in  this  remote 
place,  as  in  most  other  parts  of  America,  by  a  gentleman  of 
great  worth  and  excellence.  The  poor  have  good  reason  to 
remember  and  bless  it;  for  it  befriends  them,  and  aids  the 
cause  of  rational  education,  without  any  sectarian  or  selfish 
views.  It  is  liberal  in  all  its  actions;  of  kind  construction; 
and  of  wide  benevolence. 

There  are  three  free-schools  already  erected,  and  in  full 
operation,  in  this  city.  A  fourth  is  building,  and  will  soon 
be  opened. 

Ko  man  ever  admits  the  unhealthiness  of  the  place  he 
dwells  in  (unless  he  is  going  away  from  it),  and  I  shall 
therefore,  I  have  no  doubt,  be  at  issue  with  the  inhabitants 
of  St.  Louis,  in  questioning  the  perfect  salubrity  of  its  cli- 
mate, and  in  hinting  that  I  think  it  must  rather  dispose  to 
fever,  in  the  summer  and  autumnal  seasons.     Just  adding. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  176 

that  it  is  very  hot,  lies  among  great  rivers,  and  has  vast 
tracts  of  undrained  swampy  land  around  it,  I  leave  the 
reader  to  form  his  own  opinion. 

As  I  had  a  great  desire  to  see  a  Prairie  before  turning 
back  from  the  furthest  point  of  my  wanderings;  and  as 
some  gentlemen  of  the  town  had,  in  their  hospitable  con- 
sideration, an  equal  desire  to  gratify  me;  a  day  was  fixed, 
before  my  departure,  for  an  expedition  to  the  Looking-Glass 
Prairie,  which  is  within  thirty  miles  of  the  town.  Deem- 
ing it  possible  that  my  readers  may  not  object  to  know  what 
kind  of  thing  such  a  gipsy  party  may  be  at  that  distance 
from  home,  and  among  what  sort  of  objects  it  moves,  I  will 
describe  the  jaunt  in  another  chapter. 


CHAPTER    THE   THIRTEENTH. 

A  JAUNT  TO  THE  LOOKING-GLASS  PRAIRIE  AND 
BACK. 

I  MAT  premise  that  the  word  Prairie  is  variously  pro- 
nounced paraaer,  parearer,  and  paroarer.  The  latter  mode 
of  pronunciation  is  perhaps  the  most  in  favour. 

We  were  fourteen  in  all,  and  all  young  men :  indeed  it 
is  a  singular  though  very  natural  feature  in  the  society  of 
these  distant  settlements,  that  it  is  mainly  composed  of  ad- 
venturous persons  in  the  prime  of  life,  and  has  very  few 
grey  heads  among  it.  There  were  no  ladies :  the  trip  being 
a  fatiguing  one :  and  we  were  to  start  at  five  o'clock  in  the 
morning,  punctually. 

I  was  called  at  four,  that  I  might  be  certain  of  keeping 
nobody  waiting;  and  having  got  some  bread  and  milk  for 
breakfast,  threw  up  the  window  and  looked  down  into  the 
street,  expecting  to  see  the  whole  party  busily  astir,  and 
great  preparations  going  on  below.  But  as  everything  was 
very  quiet,  and  the  street  presented  that  hopeless  aspect 
with  which  five  o'clock  in  the  morning  is  familiar  else- 
where, I  deemed  it  as  well  to  go  to  bed  again,  and  went 
accordingly. 

I  awoke  again  at  seven  o'clock,  and  by  that  time  the 
party  had  assembled,  and  were  gathered  round,  one  light 
carriage,  with  a  very  stout  axletree;    one  something  od 


178  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

wheels  like  an  amateur  carrier's  <5art;  one  double  phaeton 
of  great  antiquity  and  unearthly  coustruction;  one  gig  with 
a  great  hole  in  its  back  and  a  broken  head;  and  one  rider 
on  horseback  who  was  to  go  on  before.  I  got  into  the  first 
coach  with  three  companions;  the  rest  bestowed  themselves 
in  the  other  vehicles ;  two  large  baskets  were  made  fast  to 
the  lightest;  two  large  stone  jars  in  wicker  cases,  techni- 
cally known  as  demi-johns,  were  consigned  to  the  "  least 
rowdy  "  of  the  party  for  safe-keeping;  and  the  procession 
moved  off  to  the  ferry-boat,  in  which  it  was  to  cross  the 
river  bodily,  men,  horses,  carriages,  and  all,  as  the  manner 
in  these  parts  is. 

We  got  over  the  river  in  due  course,  and  mustered  again 
before  a  little  wooden  box  on  wheels,  hove  down  all  aslant 
in  a  morass,  with  "merchant  tailor"  painted  in  very 
large  letters  over  the  door,  flaving  settled  the  order  of 
proceeding,  and  the  road  to  be  taken,  we  started  off  once 
more  and  began  to  make  our  way  through  an  ill-favoured 
Black  Hollow,  called,  less  expressively,  the  American 
Bottom. 

The  previous  day  had  been — not  to  say  hot,  for  the  term 
is  weak  and  lukewarm  in  its  power  "of  conveying  an  idea  of 
the  temperature.  The  town  had  been  on  fire ;  in  a  blaze. 
But  at  night  it  had  come  on  to  rain  in  torrents,  and  all 
night  long  it  had  rained  without  cessation.  We  had  a  pair 
of  very  strong  horses,  but  travelled  at  the  rate  of  little 
more  than  a  couple  of  miles  an  hour,  through  one  unbroken 
slough  of  black  mud  and  water.  It  had  no  variety  but  in 
depth.  Now  it  was  only  half  over  the  wheels,  now  it  hid 
the  axletree,  and  now  the  coach  sank  down  in  it  almost  to 
the  windows.  The  air  resounded  in  all  directions  with  the 
loud  chirping  of  the  frogs,  who,  with  the  pigs  (a  coarse, 
ugly  breed,  as  unwholesome-looking  as  though  they  were 
the  spontaneous  growth  of  the  country),  had  the  whole 
scene  to  themselves.  Here  and  there  we  passed  a  log  hut; 
but  the  wretched  cabins  were  wide  apart  and  thinly  scat- 
tered, for  though  the  soil  is  very  rich  in  this  place,  few 
people  can  exist  in  such  a  deadly  atmosphere.  On  either 
side  of  the  track,  if  it  deserve  the  name,  was  the  thick 
"  bush ; "  and  everywhere  was  stagnant,  slimy,  rotten,  filthy 
water. 

As  it  is  the  custom  in  these  parts  to  give  a  horse  a  gallon 
or  so  of  cold  water  whenever  he  is  in  a  foam  with  heat,  we 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  177 

halted  for  that  purpose,  at  a  log  inn  in  the  wood,  far  re- 
moved from  any  other  residence.  It  consisted  of  one  room, 
bare-roofed  and  bare-walled  of  covirse,  with  a  loft  above. 
The  ministering  priest  was  a  swarthy  young  savage,  in  a 
shirt  of  cotton  print  like  bed-furniture,  and  a  pair  of  ragged 
trousers.  There  were  a  couple  of  young  boys,  too,  nearly 
naked,  lying  idly  by  the  well;  and  they,  and  he,  and  the 
traveller  at  the  inn,  turned  out  to  look  at  us. 

The  traveller  was  an  old  man  with  a  grey  gristly  beard 
two  inches  long,  a  shaggy  moustache  of  the  same  hue,  and 
enormous  eyebrows;  which  almost  obscured  his  lazy,  semi- 
drunken  glance,  as  he  stood  regarding  us  with  folded  arms : 
poising  himself  alternately  upon  his  toes  and  heels.  On 
being  addressed  by  one  of  the  party,  he  drew  nearer,  and 
said,  rubbing  his  chin  (which  scraped  under  his  horny 
hand  like  fresh  gravel  beneath  a  nailed  shoe),  that  he  was 
from  Delaware,  and  had  lately  bought  a  farm  "down 
there,"  pointing  into  one  of  the  marshes  where  the  stunted 
trees  were  thickest.  He  was  "going,"  he  added,  to  St. 
Louis,  to  fetch  his  family,  whom  he  had  left  behind;  but 
he  seemed  in  no  great .  hurry  to  bring  on  these  encum- 
brances, for  when  we  moved  away,  he  loitered  back  into 
the  cabin,  and  was  plainly  bent  on  stopping  there  so  long 
as  his  money  lasted.  He  was  a  great  politician  of  course, 
and  explained  his  opinions  at  some  length  to  one  of  our 
company ;  but  I  only  remember  that  he  concluded  with  two 
sentiments,  one  of  which  was,  Somebody  for  ever !  and  the 
other.  Blast  everybody  else !  which  is  by  no  means  a  bad 
abstract  of  the  general  creed  in  these  matters. 

When  the  horses  were  swollen  out  to  about  twice  their 
natural  dimensions  (there  seems  to  be  an  idea  here,  that 
this  kind  of  inflation  improves  their  going),  we  went  for- 
ward again,  through  mud  and  mire,  and  damp,  and  fester- 
ing heat,  and  brake  and  bush,  attended  always  by  the 
music  of  the  frogs  and  pigs,  until  nearly  noon,  when  we 
halted  at  a  place  called  Belleville. 

Belleville  was  a  small  collection  of  wooden  houses,  hud- 
died  together  in  the  very  heart  of  the  bush  and  swamp. 
Many  of  them  had  singularly  bright  doors  of  red  and  yel- 
low; for  the  place  had  been  lately  visited  by  a  travelling 
painter,  "who  got  along,"  as  I  was  told,  "by  eating  his 
way."  The  criminal  court  was  sitting,  and  was  at  that 
moment  trying  some  criminals  for  horse- stealing :  with 
12 


1V»  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

whom  it  would  most  likely  go  hard :  for  live  stock  of  all 
kinds  being  necessarily  very  much  exposed  in  the  woods,  is 
held  by  the  community  in  rather  higher  value  than  human 
life;  and  for  this  reason,  juries  generally  make  a  point  of 
finding  all  men  indicted  for  cattle-stealing,  guilty,  whether 
or  no. 

The  horses  belonging  to  the  bar,  the  judge,  and  witnesses, 
were  tied  to  temporary  racks  set  up  roughly  in  the  road ; 
by  which  is  to  be  understood,  a  forest  path,  nearly  knee- 
deep  in  mud  and  slime. 

There  was  an  hotel  in  this  place,  which,  like  all  hotels 
in  America,  had  its  large  dining-room  for  the  public  table. 
It  was  an  odd,  shambling,  low-roofed  outhouse,  half-cow- 
shed and  half-kitchen,  with  a  coarse  brown  canvas  table- 
cloth, and  tin  sconces  stuck  against  the  walls,  to  hold  can- 
dles at  supper-time.  The  horseman  had  gone  forward  to 
have  coffee  and  some  eatables  prepared,  and  they  were  by 
this  time  nearly  ready.  He  had  ordered  "wheat-bread 
and  chicken  fixings,"  in  preference  to  "corn-bread  and 
common  doings."  The  latter  kind  of  refection  includes 
only  pork  and  bacon.  The  former  comprehends  broiled 
ham,  sausages,  veal  cutlets,  steaks,  and  such  other  viands 
of  that  nature  as  may  be  supposed,  by  a  tolerably  wide 
poetical  construction,  to  "  fix  "  a  chicken  comfortably  in  the 
digestive  organs  of  any  lady  or  gentleman. 

On.  one  of  the  door-posts  at  this  inn,  was  a  tin  plate, 
whereon  was  inscribed  in  characters  of  gold  "  Doctor  Cro- 
cus; "  and  on  a  sheet  of  paper,  pasted  up  by  the  side  of 
this  plate,  was  a  written  announcement  that  Dr.  Crocus 
would  that  evening  deliver  a  lecture  on  Phrenology  for  the 
benefit  of  the  Belleville  public;  at  a  charge,  for  admission, 
of  so  much  a  head. 

Straying  up  stairs,  during  the  preparation  of  the  chicken 
fixings,  I  happened  to  pass  the  Doctor's  chamber;  and  as 
the  door  stood  wide  open,  and  the  room  was  empty,  I  made 
bold  to  peep  in. 

It  was  a  bare,  unfurnished,  comfortless  room,  Avith  an 
unframed  portrait  hanging  up  at  the  head  of  the  bed ;  a 
likeness,  I  take  it,  of  the  Doctor,  for  the  forehead  was  fully 
displayed,  and  great  stress  was  laid  by  the  artist  upon  its 
phrenological  developments.  The  bed  itself  was  covered 
with  an  old  patchwork  counterpane.  The  room  was  desti- 
tute of  carpet  or  of  curtain.     There  was  a  damp  fireplace 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  179 

without  any  stove,  full  of  wood  ashes ;  a  chair,  and  a  very 
small  table ;  and  on  the  last-named  piece  of  furniture  was 
displayed,  in  grand  array,  the  Doctor's  library,  consisting 
of  some  half-dozen  greasy  old  books. 

Now,  it  certainly  looked  about  the  last  apartment  on  the 
whole  earth  out  of  which  any  man  would  be  likely  to  get 
anything  to  do  him  good.  But  the  door,  as  I  have  said, 
stood  coaxingly  open,  and  plainly  said  in  conjunction  with 
the  chair,  the  portrait,  the  table,  and  the  books,  "  Walk  in, 
gentlemen,  walk  in!  Don't  be  ill,  gentlemen,  when  you 
may  be  well  in  no  time.  Doctor  Crocus  is  here,  gentlemen, 
the  celebrated  Doctor  Crocus !  Doctor  Crocus  has  come  all 
this  way  to  cure  you,  gentlemen.  If  you  haven't  heard  of 
Doctor  Crocus,  it's  your  fault,  gentlemen,  who  live  a  little 
way  out  of  the  world  here :  not  Doctor  Crocus's.  Walk  in, 
gentlemen,  walk  in !  " 

In  the  passage  below,  when  I  went  down  stairs  again, 
was  Doctor  Crocus  himself.  A  crowd  had  flocked  in  from 
the  Court  House,  and  a  voice  from  among  them  called  out 
to  the  landlord,  "Colonel!  introduce  Doctor  Crocus." 

"Mr.  Dickens,"  says  the  colonel,  "Doctor  Crocus." 

Upon  which  Doctor  Crocus,  who  is  a  tall,  fine-looking 
Scotchman,  but  rather  fierce  and  warlike  in  appearance  for 
a  professor  of  the  peaceful  art  of  healing,  bursts  out  of  the 
concourse  with  his  right  arm  extended,  and  his  chest  thrown 
out  as  far  as  it  will  possibly  come,  and  says : 

"  Your  countryman,  Sir ! " 

Whereupon  Doctor  Crocus  and  I  shake  hands;  and  Doc- 
tor Crocus  looks  as  if  I  didn't  by  any  means  realize  his  ex- 
pectations, which,  in  a  linen  blouse,  and  a  great  straw  hat 
with  a  green  ribbon,  and  no  gloves,  and  my  face  and  nose 
profusely  ornamented  with  the  stings  of  mosquitoes  and  the 
bites  of  bugs,  it  is  very  likely  I  did  not. 

"  Long  in  these  parts.  Sir?  "  says  I. 

"Three  or  four  months,  Sir,"  says  the  Doctor. 

"Do  you  think  of  soon  returning  to  the  old  country. 
Sir?  "  says  I. 

Doctor  Crocus  makes  no  verbal  answer,  but  gives  me 
an  imploring  look,  which  says  so  plainly  "  Will  you  ask  me 
that  again,  a  little  louder,  if  you  please?  "  that  I  repeat 
the  question. 

"  Think  of  soon  returning  to  the  old  country,  Sir !  "  re- 
peats the  Doctor. 


180  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

"To  the  old  country,  Sir,"  I  rejoin. 

Doctor  Crocus  looks  round  upon  the  crowd  to  observe  the 
effect  he  produces,  rubs  his  hands,  and  says,  in  a  very  loud 
voice : 

"Not  yet  awhile,  Sir,  not  yet.  "You  won't  catch  me  at 
that  just  yet,  Sir.  I  am  a  little  too  fond  of  freedom  foi 
that,  Sir.  Ha,  ha!  It's  not  so  easy  for  a  man  to  tear  him- 
self from  a  free  country  such  as  this  is.  Sir.  Ha,  ha !  No, 
no!  Ha,  ha!  None  of  that,  till  one's  obliged  to  do  it. 
Sir.     No,  no!" 

As  Doctor  Crocus  says  these  latter  words,  he  shakes  his 
head,  knowingly,  and  laughs  again.  Many  of  the  bystand- 
ers shake  their  heads  in  concert  with  the  Doctor,  and  laugh 
too,  and  look  at  each  other  as  much  as  to  say,  "  A  pretty 
bright  and  first-rate  sort  of  chap  is  Crocus ! "  and  unless 
I  am  very  much  mistaken,  a  good  many  people  went  to 
the  lecture  that  night,  who  never  thought  about  phre- 
nology, or  about  Doctor  Crocus  either,  in  all  their  lives 
before. 

From  Belleville,  we  went  on,  through  the  same  desolate 
kind  of  waste,  and  constantly  attended,  without  the  interval 
of  a  moment,  by  the  same  music;  until,  at  three  o'clock  in 
the  afternoon,  we  halted  once  more  at  a  village  called  Leb- 
anon to  inflate  the  horses  again,  and  give  them  some  com 
besides :  of  which  they  stood  much  in  need.  Pending  this 
ceremony,  I  walked  into  the  village,  where  I  met  a  full- 
sized  dwelling-house  coming  down-hill  at  a  round  trot, 
drawn  by  a  score  or  more  of  oxen. 

The  public-house  was  so  very  clean  and  good  a  one,  that 
the  managers  of  the  jaunt  resolved  to  return  to  it  and  put 
up  there  for  the  night,  if  possible.  This  course  decided  on, 
and  the  horses  being  well  refreshed,  we  again  pushed  for- 
ward, and  came  upon  the  Prairie  at  sunset. 

It  would  be  difficult  to  say  why,  or  how — though  it  was 
possibly  from  having  heard  and  read  so  much  about  it — but 
the  effect  on  me  was  disappointment.  Looking  towards  the 
setting  sun,  there  lay,  stretched  out  before  my  view,  a  vast 
expanse  of  level  ground ;  unbroken,  save  by  one  thin  line 
of  trees,  which  scarcely  amounted  to  a  scratch  upon  the 
great  blank;  until  it  met  the  glowing  sky,  wherein  it  seemed 
to  dip :  mingling  with  its  rich  colours,  and  mellowing  in  its 
distant  blue.  There  it  lay,  a  tranquil  sea  or  lake  without 
water,  if  such  a  simile  be  admissible,  with  the  day  going 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  181 

iown  upon  it :  a  few  birds  wheeling  here  and  there :  and 
solitude  and  silence  reigning  paramount  around.  But  the 
grass  was  not  yet  high;  there  were  bare  black  patches  on 
the  ground;  and  the  few  wild  flowers  that  the  eye  could 
see,  were  poor  and  scanty.  Great  as  the  picture  was,  its 
very  flatness  and  extent,  which  left  nothing  to  the  imagina- 
tion tamed  it  down  and  cramped  its  interest.  I  felt  little 
of  that  sense  of  freedom  and  exhilaration  which  a  Scottish 
heath  inspires,  or  even  our  English  downs  awaken.  It  was 
lonely  and  wild,  but  oppressive  in  its  barren  monotony.  I 
felt  that  in  traversing  the  Prairies,  I  could  never  abandon 
myself  to  the  scene,  forgetful  of  all  else;  as  I  should  do 
instinctively,  were  the  heather  underneath  my  feet,  or  an 
iron-bound  coast  beyond;  but  should  often  glance  towards 
the  distant  and  frequently-receding  line  of  the  horizon,  and 
wish  it  gained  and  passed.  It  is  not  a  scene  to  be  forgot- 
ten, but  it  is  scarcely  one,  I  think  (at  all  events,  as  I  saw 
it),  to  remember  with  much  pleasure,  or  to  covet  the  look- 
iug-on  again,  in  after  life. 

We  encamped  near  a  solitary  log-house,  for  the  sake  of 
its  water,  and  dined  upon  the  plain.  The  baskets  contained 
roast  fowls,  buffalo's  tongue  (an  exquisite  dainty,  by  the 
way),  ham,  bread,  cheese,  and  butter;  biscuits,  champagne, 
sherry;  lemons  and  sugar  for  punch;  and  abundance  of 
rough  ice.  The  meal  was  delicious,  and  the  entertainers 
were  the  soul  of  kindness  and  good  humour.  I  have  often 
recalled  that  cheerful  party  to  my  pleasant  recollection 
since,  and  shall  not  easily  forget,  in  junketings  near  home 
with  friends  of  older  date,  my  boon  companions  on  the 
Prairie. 

Returning  to  Lebanon  that  night,  we  lay  at  the  little  inn 
at  which  we  had  halted  in  the  afternoon.  In  point  of 
cleanliness  and  comfort  it  would  have  suifered  by  no  com- 
parison with  any  village  alehouse,  of  a  homely  kind,  in 
England. 

Rising  at  five  o'clock  next  morning,  I  took  a  walk  about 
the  village :  none  of  the  houses  were  strolling  about  to-day, 
but  it  was  early  for  them  yet,  perhaps :  and  then  amused 
myself  by  lounging  in  a  kind  of  farm-yard  behind  the  tav- 
ern, of  which  the  leading  features  were,  a  strange  jumble 
of  rough  sheds  for  stables;  a  rude  colonnade,  built  as  a 
cool  place  of  summer  resort;  a  deep  well;  a  great  earthen 
mound  for  keeping  vegetables  in,  in  winter  time;  and  a 


182  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

pigeon-house,  whose  little  apertures  looked,  as  they  do  in 
all  pigeon-houses,  very  much  too  small  for  the  admission 
of  the  plump  and  swelling-breasted  birds  who  were  strut- 
ting about  it,  though  they  tried  to  get  in  ever  so  hard. 
That  interest  exhausted,  I  took  a  survey  of  the  inn's  two 
parlours,  which  were  decorated  with  coloured  prints  of 
Washington,  and  President  Madison,  and  of  a  white-faced 
young  lady  (much  speckled  by  the  flies),  who  held  up  her 
gold  neck-chain  for  the  admiration  of  the  spectator,  and 
informed  all  admiring  comers  that  she  was  "  Just  Seven- 
teen : "  although  I  should  have  thought  her  older.  In  the 
best  room  were  two  oil  portraits  of  the  kitcat  size,  repre- 
senting the  landlord  and  his  infant  son;  both  looking  as 
bold  as  lions,  and  staring  out  of  the  canvas  with  an  inten- 
sity that  would  have  been  cheap  at  any  price.  They  were 
painted,  I  think,  by  the  artist  who  had  touched  up  the 
Belleville  doors  with  red  and  gold;  for  I  seemed  to  recog- 
nise his  style  immediately. 

After  breakfast,  we  started  to  return  by  a  different  way 
from  that  which  we  had  taken  yesterday,  and  coming  up  at 
ten  o'clock  with  an  encampment  of  German  emigrants  car- 
rying their  goods  in  carts,  who  had  made  a  rousing  fire 
which  they  were  just  quitting,  stopped  there  to  refresh. 
And  very  pleasant  the  fire  was ;  for,  hot  though  it  had  been 
yesterday,  it  was  quite  cold  to-day,  and  the  wind  blew 
keenly.  Looming  in  the  distance,  as  we  rode  along,  was 
another  of  the  ancient  Indian  burial-places,  called  The 
Monks'  Mound;  in  memory  of  a  body  of  fanatics  of  the  or- 
der of  La  Trappe,  who  founded  a  desolate  convent  there, 
many  years  ago,  when  there  were  no  settlers  within  a  thou- 
sand miles,  and  were  all  swept  off  by  the  pernicious  climate : 
in  which  lamentable  fatality,  few  rational  people  will  sup- 
pose, perhaps,  that  society  experienced  any  very  severe 
deprivation. 

The  track  of  to-day  had  the  same  features  as  the  track 
of  yesterday.  There  was  the  swamp,  the  bush,  the  per- 
petual chorus  of  frogs,  the  rank  unseemly  growth,  the  un- 
wholesome steaming  earth.  Here  and  there,  and  frequently 
too,  we  encountered  a  solitary  broken-down  waggon,  full  of 
some  new  settler's  goods.  It  was  a  pitiful  sight  to  see  one 
of  these  vehicles  deep  in  the  mire;  the  axle-ti-ee  broken;  a 
wheel  lying  idly  by  its  side;  the  man  gone  miles  away,  to 
look  for  assistance;  the  woman  seated  among  their  wander- 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  183 

ing  household  gods  with  a  baby  at  her  breast,  a  picture  of 
forlorn,  dejected  patience;  the  team  of  oxen  crouching  down 
mournfully  in  the  mud,  and  breathing  forth  such  clouds  of 
vapour  from  their  mouths  and  nostrils,  that  all  the  damp 
mist  and  fog  around  seemed  to  have  come  direct  from 
them. 

In  due  time  we  mustered  once  again  before  the  merchant 
tailor's,  and  having  done  so,  crossed  over  to  the  city  in  the 
ferry-boat :  passing,  on  the  way,  a  spot  called  Bloody  Island, 
the  duelling- ground  of  St.  Louis,  and  so  designated  in  hon- 
our of  the  last  fatal  combat  fought  there,  which  was  with 
pistols,  breast  to  breast.  Both  combatants  fell  dead  upon 
the  ground;  and  possibly  some  rational  people  may  think 
of  them,  as  of  tlie  gloomy  madman  on  the  Monks'  Mound, 
that  they  were  no  great  loss  to  the  community. 


CHAPTER    THE    FOURTEENTH. 

RETURN  TO  CINCINNATI— A  STAGE-COACH  RIDE  FROM 
THAT  CITY  TO  COLUMBUS,  AND  THENCE  TO  SAN- 
DUSKY—SO,  BY  LAKE  ERIE,  TO  THE  FALLS  OF 
NIAGARA. 

As  I  had  a  desire  to  travel  through  the  interior  of  the 
State  of  Ohio,  and  to  "strike  the  lakes,"  as  the  phrase  is, 
at  a  small  town  called  Sandusky,  to  which  that  route  would 
conduct  us  on  our  way  to  Niagara,  we  had  to  return  from 
St.  Louis  by  the  way  we  had  come,  and  to  retrace  our  former 
track  as  far  as  Cincinnati. 

The  day  on  which  we  were  to  take  leave  of  St.  Louis 
being  very  fine;  and  the  steamboat,  which  was  to  have 
started  I  don't  know  how  early  in  the  morning,  postponing, 
for  the  third  or  fourth  time,  her  departure  until  the  after- 
noon; we  rode  forward  to  an  old  French  .village  on  the 
river,  called  properly  Carondelet,  and  nicknamed  Vide 
Poche,  and  arranged  that  the  packet  should  call  for  us 
there. 

The  place  consisted  of  a  few  poor  cottages,  and  two  or 
three  public-houses;  the  state  of  whose  larders  certainly 
seemed  to  justify  the  second  designation  of  the  village,  for 


184  AMERICAN  NOTES 

there  was  nothing  to  eat  in  any  of  them.  At  length,  how 
ever,  by  going  back  some  half  a  mile  or  so,  we  found  a  sol- 
itary house  where  ham  and  coffee  were  procurable;  and 
there  we  tarried  to  await  the  advent  of  the  boat,  which 
would  come  in  sight  from  the  green  before  the  door,  a  long 
way  off. 

It  was  a  neat,  unpretending  village  tavern,  and  we  took 
our  repast  in  a  quaint  little  room  with  a  bed  in  it,  deco- 
rated with  some  old  oil  paintings,  which  in  their  time  had 
probably  done  duty  in  a  Catholic  chapel  or  monastery.  The 
fare  was  very  good,  and  served  with  great  cleanliness. 
The  house  was  kept  by  a  characteristic  old  couple,  with 
whom  we  had  a  long  talk,  and  who  were  perhaps  a  very 
good  sample  of  that  kind  of  people  in  the  West. 

The  landlord  was  a  dry,  tough,  hard-faced  old  fellow 
(not  so  very  old  either,  for  he  was  but  just  turned  sixty,  I 
should  think),  who  had  been  out  with  the  militia  in  the 
last  war  with  England,  and  had  seen  all  kinds  of  service, — 
except  a  battle;  and  he  had  been  very  near  seeing  that,  he 
added :  very  near.  He  had  all  his  life  been  restless  and 
locomotive,  with  an  irresistible  desire  for  change;  and  was 
still  the  son  of  his  old  self :  for  if  he  had  nothing  to  keep 
him  at  home,  he  said  (slightly  jerking  his  hat  and  his 
thumb  towards  the  window  of  the  room  in  which  the  old 
lady  sat,  as  we  stood  talking  in  front  of  the  house),  he 
would  clean  up  his  musket,  and  be  off  to  Texas  to-morrow 
morning.  He  was  one  of  the  very  many  descendants  of 
Cain  proper  to  this  continent,  who  seem  destined  from  their 
birth  to  serve  as  pioneers  in  the  great  human  army;  who 
gladly  go  on  from  year  to  year  extending  its  outposts,  and 
leaving  home  after  home  behind  them;  and  die  at  last, 
utterly  regardless  of  their  graves  being  left  thousands  of 
miles  behind,  by  the  wandering  generation  who  succeed. 

His  wife  was  a  domesticated  kind-hearted  old  soul,  who 
had  come  with  him  "from  the  queeu  oity  of  the  world," 
which,  it  seemed,  was  Philadelphia;  but  had  no  love  for 
this  Western  gountry,  and  indeed  had  little  reason  to  bear 
it  any;  having  seen  her  children,  one  by  one,  die  here  of 
fever,  in  the  full  prime  and  beauty  of  their  youth.  Her 
heart  was  sore,  she  said,  to  think  of  them;  and  to  talk  on 
this  theme,  even  to  strangers,  in  that  blighted  place,  so  far 
from  her  old  home,  eased  it  somewhat,  and  became  a  mel- 
ancholy pleasure. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  185 

The  boat  appearing  towards  evening,  we  bade  adieu  to 
the  poor  old  lady  and  her  vagrant  spouse,  and  making  for 
the  nearest  landing-place,  were  soon  on  board  The  Messen- 
ger again,  in  our  old  cabin,  and  steaming  down  the  Missis- 
sippi. 

If  the  coming  up  this  river,  slowly  making  head  against 
the  stream,  be  an  irksome  journey,  the  shooting  down  it 
with  the  turbid  current  is  almost  worse;  for  then  the  boat, 
proceeding  at  the  rate  of  twelve  or  fifteen  miles  an  hour, 
has  to  force  its  passage  through  a  labyrinth  of  floating  logs, 
which,  in  the  dark,  it  is  often  impossible  to  see  beforehand 
or  avoid.  All  that  night;  the  bell  was  never  silent  for  five 
minutes  at  a  time;  and  .after  every  ring  the  vessel  reeled 
again,  sometimes  beneath  a  single  blow,  sometimes  beneath 
a  dozen  dealt  in  quick  succession,  the  lightest  of  which 
seemed  more  than  enough  to  beat  in  her  frail  keel,  as 
though  it  had  been  pie-crust.  Looking  down  upon  the 
filthy  river  after  dark,  it  seemed  to  be  alive  with  monsters, 
as  these  black  masses  rolled  upon  the  surface,  or  came 
starting  up  again,  head  first,  when  the  boat,  in  ploughing 
her  way  among  a  shoal  of  such  obstructions,  drove  a  few 
among  them  for  the  moment  under  water.  Sometimes  the 
engine  stopped  during  a  long  interval,  and  then  before  her 
and  behind,  and  gathering  close  about  her  on  all  sides, 
were  so  many  of  these  ill-favoured  obstacles  that  she  was 
fairly  hemmed  in;  the  centre  of  a  floating  island;  and  was 
constrained  to  pause  until  they  parted  somewhere,  as  dark 
clouds  will  do  before  the  wind,  and  opened  by  degrees  a 
channel  out. 

In  good  time  next  morning,  however,  we  came  again  in 
sight  of  the  detestable  morass  called  Cairo;  and  stopping 
there,  to  take  in  wood,  lay  alongside  a  barge,  whose  start- 
ing timbers  scarcely  held  together.  It  was  moored  to  the 
bank,  and  on  its  side  was  painted  "Coffee  House;  "  that 
being,  I  suppose,  the  floating  paradise  to  which  the  people 
fly  for  shelter  when  they  lose  their  houses  for  a  month  or 
two  beneath  the  hideous  waters  of  the  Mississippi.  But 
looking  southward  from  this  point,  we  had  the  satisfaction 
of  seeing  that  intolerable  river  dragging  its  slimy  length 
and  ugly  freight  abruptly  off  towards  New  Orleans;  and 
passing  a  yellow  line  which  stretched  across  the  current, 
were  again  upon  the  clear  Ohio,  never,  I  trust,  to  see  the 
Mississippi  more,  saving  in  troubled  dreams  and  night- 


186  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

mares.  Leaving  it  for  the  company  of  its  sparkling 
neighbour,  was  like  the  transition  from  pain  to  ease, 
or  the  awakening  from  a  horrible  vision  to  cheerful  reali- 
ties. 

We  arrived  at  Louisville  on  the  fourth  night,  and  gladly- 
availed  ourselves  of  its  excellent  hotel.  Next  day  we  went 
on  in  the  Ben  Franklin,  a  beautiful  mail  steamboat,  and 
reached  Cincinnati  shortly  after  midnight.  Being  by  this 
time  nearly  tired  of  sleeping  upon  shelves,  we  had  remained 
awake  to  go  ashore  straightway;  and  groping  a  passage 
across  the  dark  decks  of  other  boats,  and  among  labyrinths 
of  engine- machinery  and  leaking  casks  of  molasses,  we 
reached  the  streets,  knocked  up  the  porter  at  the  hotel  where 
we  had  stayed  before,  and  were,  to  our  great  joy,  safely 
housed  soon  afterwards. 

We  rested  but  one  day  at  Cincinnati,  and  then  resumed 
our  journey  to  Sandusky.  As  it  comprised  two  varieties  of 
stage-coach  travelling,  which,  with  those  I  have  already 
glanced  at,  comprehend  the  main  characteristics  of  this 
mode  of  transit  in  America,  I  will  take  the  reader  as  our 
fellow-passenger,  and  pledge  myself  to  perform  the  dis- 
tance with  all  possible  despatch. 

Our  place  of  destination  in  the  first  instance  is  Columbus. 
It  is  distant  about  a  hundred  and  twenty  miles  from  Cin- 
cinnati, but  there  is  a  macadamised  road  (rare  blessing!) 
the  whole  way,  and  the  rate  of  travelling  upon  it  is  six 
miles  an  hour. 

We  start  at  eight  o'clock  in  the  morning,  in  a  great  mail- 
coach,  whose  huge  cheeks  are  so  very  ruddy  and  plethoric, 
that  it  appears  to  be  troubled  with  a  tendency  of  blood  to 
the  head.  Dropsical  it  certainly  is,  for  it  will  hold  a  dozen 
passengers  inside.  But,  wonderful  to  add,  it  is  very  clean 
and  bright,  being  nearly  new;  and  rattles  through  the  streets 
of  Cincinnati  gaily. 

Our  way  lies  through  a  beautiful  country,  richly  culti- 
vated, and  luxuriant  in  its  promise  of  an  abundant  harvest. 
Sometimes  we  pass  a  field  where  the  strong  bristling  stalks 
of  Indian  corn  look  like  a  crop  of  walking-sticks,  and  some- 
times an  enclosure  where  the  green  wheat  is  springing  up 
among  a  labyrinth  of  stumps;  the  primitive  worm-fence  is 
universal,  and  an  ugly  thing  it  is;  but  the  farms  are  neatly 
kept,  and,  save  for  these  differences,  one  might  be  travel- 
ling just  now  in  Kent. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  187 

We  often  stop  to  water  at  a  roadside  inn,  wliich  is  al- 
ways dull  and  silent.  The  coachman  dismounts  and  fills 
his  bucket,  and  holds  it  to  the  horses'  heads.  There  is 
scarcely  ever  any  one  to  help  him;  there  are  seldom  any 
loungers  standing  round;  and  never  any  stable-company 
with  jokes  to  crack.  Sometimes,  when  we  have  changed 
our  team,  there  is  a  difficulty  in  starting  again,  arising  out 
of  the  prevalent  mode  of  breaking  a  young  horse :  which  is 
to  catch  him,  harness  him  against  his  will,  and  put  him  in 
a  stage-coach  without  further  notice :  but  we  get  on  some- 
how or  other,  after  a  great  many  kicks  and  a  violent  strug- 
gle; and  jog  on  as  before  again. 

Occasionally,  when  we  stop  to  change,  some  two  or  three 
half-drunken  loafers  will  come  loitering  out  with  their 
hands  in  their  pockets,  or  will  be  seen  kicking  their  heels 
in  rocking-chairs,  or  lounging  on  the  window-sill,  or  sitting 
on  a  rail  within  the  colonnade :  they  have  not  often  anything 
to  say  though,  either  to  us  or  to  each  other,  but  sit  there, 
idly  staring  at  the  coach  and  horses.  The  landlord  of  the 
inn  is  usually  among  them,  and  seems,  of  all  the  party,  to 
be  the  least  connected  with  the  business  of  the  house.  In- 
deed he  is  with  reference  to  the  tavern,  what  the  driver  is 
in  relation  to  the  coach  and  passengers :  whatever  happens 
in  his  sphere  of  action,  he  is  quite  indifferent,  and  perfectly 
easy  in  his  miud. 

The  frequent  change  of  coachmen  works  no  change  or 
variety  in  the  coachman's  character.  He  is  always  dirty, 
sullen,  and  taciturn.  If  he  be  capable  of  smartness  of  any 
kind,  moral  or  physical,  he  has  a  faculty  of  concealing  it 
which  is  truly  marvellous.  He  never  speaks  to  you  as  you 
sit  beside  him  on  the  box,  and  if  you  speak  to  him,  he  an- 
swers (if  at  all)  in  monosyllables.  He  points  out  nothing 
on  the  road,  and  seldom  looks  at  anything :  being,  to  all 
appearance,  thoroughly  weary  of  it,  and  of  existence  gener- 
ally. As  to  doing  the  honours  of  his  coach,  his  business, 
as  I  have  said,  is  with  the  horses.  The  coach  follows 
because  it  is  attached  to  them  and  goes  on  wheels :  not  be- 
cause you  are  in  it.  Sometimes,  towards  the  end  of  a  long 
stage,  he  suddenly  breaks  out  into  a  discordant  fragment 
of  an  election  song,  but  his  face  never  sings  along  with 
him :  it  is  only  his  voice,  and  not  often  that. 

He  always  chews  and  always  spits,  and  never  encumbers 
himself  with  a  pocket-handkerchief.     The  consequences  to 


188  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

the  box  passenger,  especially  when  the  wind  blows  towards 
him,  are  not  agreeable. 

Whenever  the  coach  stops,  and  you  can  hear  the  voices 
of  the  inside  passengers;  or  whenever  any  bystander  ad- 
dresses them,  or  any  one  among  them;  or  they  address  each 
other;  you  will  hear  one  phrase  repeated  over  and  over  and 
over  again  to  the  most  extraordinary  extent.  It  is  an  or- 
dinary and  unpromising  phrase  enough,  being  neither  more 
nor  less  than  "  Yes,  Sir;  "  but  it  is  adapted  to  every  variety 
of  circumstance,  and  fills  up  every  pause  in  the  conversa- 
tion.    Thus : — 

The  time  is  one  o'clock  at  noon.  The  scene,  a  place 
where  we  are  to  stay  to  dine,  on  this  journey.  The  coach 
drives  up  to  the  door  of  an  inn.  The  day  is  warm,  and 
there  are  several  idlers  lingering  about  the  tavern,  and 
waiting  for  the  public  dinner.  Among  them,  is  a  stout 
gentleman  in  a  brown  hat,  swinging  himself  to  and  fro  in 
a  rocking-chair  on  the  pavement. 

As  the  coach  stops,  a  gentleman  in  a  straw  hat  looks  out 
of  the  window : 

Straw  Hat.  (To  the  stout  gentleman  in  the  rocking- 
chair.)     I  reckon  that's  Judge  Jefferson,  an't  it? 

Brown  Hat.  (Still  swinging;  speaking  very  slowly; 
and  without  any  emotion  whatever.)     Yes,  Sir. 

Straw  Hat.     Warm  weather,  Judge. 

Brown  Hat.     Yes,  Sir. 

Straw  Hat.     There  was  a  snap  of  cold,  last  week. 

Brown  Hat.     Yes,  Sir. 

Straw  Hat.     Yes,  Sir. 

A  pause.     They  look  at  each  other  very  seriously. 

Straw  Hat.  I  calculate  you'll  have  got  through  that 
case  of  the  corporation.  Judge,  by  this  time,  now? 

Brown  Hat.     Yes,  Sir. 

Straw  Hat.     How  did  the  verdict  go,  Sir? 

Brown  Hat.     For  the  defendant.  Sir. 

Straw  Hat.      (Interrogatively.)     Yes,  Sir? 

Brown  Hat.      (Affirmatively.)     Yes,  Sir. 

Both.  (Musingly,  as  each  gazes  down  the  street.)  Yes, 
Sir. 

Another  pause.  They  look  at  each  other  again,  still 
more  seriously  than  before. 

Brown  Hat.  This  coach  is  rather  behind  its  time  to- 
day, I  guess. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  189 

Straw  Hat.     (Doubtingly.)     Yes,  Sir. 

Brown  Hat,  (Looking  at  his  watch.)  Yes,  Sir;  nigh 
upon  two  hours. 

Straw  Hat,  (Raising  his  eyebrows  in  very  great  sur- 
prise.)    Yes,  Sir! 

Brown  Hat.  (Decisively,  as  he  puts  up  his  watch.) 
Yes,  Sir. 

All  the  other  inside  Passengers  (among  themselves). 
Yes,  Sir. 

Coachman  (in  a  very  surly  tone).     No  it  an't. 

Straw  Hat.  (To  the  coachman.)  Well,  I  don't  know, 
Sir,  We  were  a  pretty  tall  time  coming  that  last  fifteen 
mile.     That's  a  fact. 

The  coachman  making  no  reply,  and  plainly  declining  to 
enter  into  any  controversy  on  a  subject  so  far  removed  from 
his  sympathies  and  feelings,  another  passenger  says,  "  Yes, 
Sir;  "  and  the  gentleman  in  the  straw  hat  in  acknowledg- 
ment of  his  courtesy,  says  "Yes,  Sir,"  to  him,  in  return. 
The  straw  hat  then  inquires  of  the  brown  hat,  whether  that 
coach  in  which  he  (the  straw  hat)  then  sits,  is  not  a  new 
one?  To  which  the  brown  hat  again  makes  answer,  "  Yes, 
Sir." 

Straw  Hat.  I  thought  so.  Pretty  loud  smell  of  var- 
nish. Sir? 

Brown  Hat.     Yes,  Sir. 

All  the  other  inside  Passengers.     Yes,  Sir. 

Brown  Hat  (to  the  company  in  general).     Yes,  Sir. 

The  conversational  powers  of  the  company  having  been 
by  this  time  pretty  heavily  taxed,  the  straw  hab  opens  the 
door  and  gets  out;  and  all  the  rest  alight  also.  We  dine 
soon  afterwards  with  the  boarders  in  the  house,  and  have 
nothing  to  drink  but  tea  and  coffee.  As  they  are  both  very 
bad  and  the  water  is  worse,  I  ask  for  brandy;  but  it  is  a 
Temperance  Hotel,  and  spirits  are  not  to  be  had  for  love  or 
money.  This  preposterous  forcing  of  unpleasant  drinks 
down  the  reluctant  throats  of  travellers  is  not  at  all  uncom- 
mon in  America,  but  I  never  discovered  that  the  scruples 
of  such  wincing  landlords  induced  them  to  preserve  any 
unusually  nice  balance  between  the  quality  of  their  fare, 
and  their  scale  of  charges :  on  the  contrary,  I  rather  sus- 
pected them  of  diminishing  the  one  and  exalting  the  other, 
lay  way  of  recompense  for  the  loss  of  their  profit  on  the 
sale  of  spirituous  liquors.     After  all,  perhaps,  the  plainest 


19d  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

course  for  persons  of  such  tender  consciences,  would  be,  a 
total  abstinence  from  tavern-keeping. 

Dinner  over,  we  get  into  another  vehicle  which  is  ready 
at  the  door  (for  the  coach  has  been  changed  in  the  interval), 
and  resume  our  journey;  which  continues  through  the  same 
kind  of  country  until  evening,  when  we  come  to  the  town 
where  we  are  to  stop  for  tea  and  supper;  and  having  deliv- 
ered the  mail  bags  at  the  Post-of&ce,  ride  through  the  usual 
wide  street,  lined  with  the  usual  stores  and  houses  (the 
drapers  always  having  hung  up  at  their  door,  by  way  of 
sign,  a  piece  of  bright  red  cloth),  to  the  hotel  where  this 
meal  is  prepared.  There  being  many  boarders  here,  we  sit 
down,  a  large  party,  and  a  very  melancholy  one  as  usual. 
But  there  is  a  buxom  hostess  at  the  head  of  the  table,  and 
opposite,  a  simple  Welsh  schoolmaster  with  his  wife  and 
child;  who  came  here,  on  a  speculation  of  greater  promise 
than  performance,  to  teach  the  classics :  and  they  are  suffi- 
cient subjects  of  interest  until  the  meal  is  over,  and  another 
coach  is  ready.  In  it  we  go  on  once  more,  lighted  by  a 
bright  moon,  until  midnight;  when  we  stop  to  change  the 
coach  again,  and  remain  for  half  an  hour  or  so  in  a  miser- 
able room,  with  a  blurred  lithograph  of  Washington  over 
the  smoky  fireplace,  and  a  mighty  jug  of  cold  water  on  the 
table :  to  which  refreshment  the  moody  passengers  do  so 
apply  themselves  that  they  would  seem  to  be,  one  and  all, 
keen  patients  of  Doctor  Sangrado.  Among  them  is  a  very 
little  boy,  who  chews  tobacco  like  a  very  big  one;  and  a 
droning  gentleman,  who  talks  arithmetically  and  statisti- 
cally on  all  subjects,  from  poetry  downwards;  and  who 
always  speaks  in  the  same  key,  with  exactly  the  same 
emphasis,  and  with  very  grave  deliberation.  He  came  out- 
side just  now,  and  told  me  how  that  the  uncle  of  a  certain 
young  lady  who  had  been  spirited  away  and  married  by  a 
certain  captain,  lived  in  these  parts;  and  how  this  uncle 
was  so  valiant  and  ferocious  that  he  shouldn't  wonder  if  he 
were  to  follow  the  said  captain  to  England,  "  and  shoot  him 
down  in  the  street,  wherever  he  found  him;  "  in  the  feasibil- 
ity of  which  strong  measure  I,  being  for  the  moment  rather 
prone  to  contradiction,  from  feeling  half  asleep  and  very 
tired,  declined  to  acquiesce :  assuring  him  that  if  the  uncle 
did  resort  to  it,  or  gratified  any  other  little  whim  of  the  like 
nature,  he  would  find  himself  one  morning  prematurely 
throttled  at  the  Old  Bailey :  and  that  he  would  do  well  to 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  191 

make  his  will  before  he  went,  as  he  would  certainly  want 
it  before  he  had  been  in  Britain  very  long. 

On  we  go,  all  night,  and  by-and-by  the  day  begins  to 
break,  and  presently  the  first  cheerful  rays  of  the  warm 
sun  come  slanting  on  us  brightly.  It  sheds  its  light  upon 
a  miserable  waste  of  sodden  grass,  and  dull  trees,  and 
squalid  huts,  whose  aspect  is  forlorn  and  grievous  in  the 
last  degree.  A  very  desert  in  the  wood,  whose  growth  of 
green  is  dank  and  noxious  like  that  upon  the  top  of  stand- 
ing water;  where  poisonous  fungus  grows  in  the  rare  foot- 
print on  the  oozy  ground,  and  sprouts  like  witches'  coral, 
from  the  crevices  in  the  cabin  wall  and  floor;  it  is  a  hideous 
thing  to  lie  upon  the  very  threshold  of  a  city.  But  it  was 
purchased  years  ago,  and  as  the  owner  cannot  be  discov- 
ered, the  State  has  been  unable  to  reclaim  it.  So  there  it 
remains,  in  the  midst  of  cultivation  and  improvement,  like 
ground  accursed,  and  made  obscene  and  rank  by  some  great 
crime. 

We  reached  Columbus  shortly  before  seven  o'clock,  and 
stayed  there,  to  refresh,  that  day  and  night :  having  excel- 
lent apartments  in  a  very  large  unfinished  hotel  called  the 
Neill  House,  which  were  richly  fitted  with  the  polished 
wood  of  the  black  walnut,  and  opened  on  a  handsome  por- 
tico and  stone  verandah,  like  rooms  in  some  Italian  man- 
sion. The  town  is  clean  and  pretty,  and  of  course  is 
"  going  to  be "  much  larger.  It  is  the  seat  of  the  State 
legislature  of  Ohio,  and  lays  claim,  in  consequence,  to 
some  consideration  and  importance. 

There  being  no  stage-coach  next  day,  upon  the  road  we 
wished  to  take,  I  hired  "  an  extra,"  at  a  reasonable  charge, 
to  carry  us  to  Tiffin;  a  small  town  from  whence  there  is  a 
railroad  to  Sandusky.  This  extra  was  an  ordinary  four- 
horse  stage-coach,  such  as  I  have  described,  changing 
horses  and  drivers,  as  the  stage-coach  would,  but  was  ex- 
clusively our  own  for  the  journey.  To  ensure  our  having 
horses  at  the  proper  stations,  and  being  incommoded  by  no 
strangers,  the  proprietors  sent  an  agent  on  the  box,  who 
was  to  accompany  us  the  whole  way  through;  and  thus  at- 
tended, and  bearing  with  us,  besides,  a  hamper  full  of  sa- 
voury cold  mea^s,  and  fruit,  and  wine;  we  started  off  again, 
in  high  spirits,  at  half-past  six  o'clock  next  morning,  very 
much  delighted  to  be  by  ourselves,  and  disposed  to  enjoy 
even  the  roughest  journey. 


192  AMERICAN  NOTES, 

It  was  well  for  us,  that  we  were  in  this  humour,  for  th6 
road  vfe  went  over  that  day,  was  certainly  enough  to  have 
shaken  tempers  that  were  not  resolutely  at  Set  Fair,  down 
to  some  inches  below  Stormy.  At  one  time  we  were  all 
flung  together  in  a  heap  at  the  bottom  of  the  coach,  and  at 
another  we  were  crushing  our  heads  against  the  roof. 
Now,  one  side  was  down  deep  in  the  mire,  and  we  were 
holding  on  to  the  other.  Now,  the  coach  was  lying  on  the 
tails  of  the  two  wheelers;  and  now  it  was  rearing  up  in  the 
air,  in  a  frantic  state,  with  all  four  horses  standing  on 
the  top  of  an  insurmountable  eminence,  looking  coolly  back 
at  it,  as  though  they  would  say  "  Unharness  us.  It  can't  be 
done."  The  drivers  on  these  roads,  who  certainly  get  over 
the  ground  in  a  manner  which  is  quite  miraculous,  so  twist 
and  turn  the  team  about  in  forcing  a  passage,  corkscrew 
fashion,  through  the  bogs  and  swamps,  that  it  was  quite  a 
common  circumstance  on  looking  out  of  the  window,  to  see 
the  coachman  with  the  ends  of  a  pair  of  reins  in  his  hands, 
apparently  driving  nothing,  or  playing  at  horses,  and  the 
leaders  staring  at  one  unexpectedly  from  the  back  of  the 
coach,  as  if  they  had  some  idea  of  getting  up  behind,  A 
great  portion  of  the  way  was  over  what  is  called  a  corduroy 
road,  which  is  made  by  throwing  trunks  of  trees  into  a 
marsh,  and  leaving  them  to  settle  there.  The  very  slightest 
of  the  jolts  with  which  the  ponderous  carriage  fell  from 
log  to  log,  was  enough,  it  seemed,  to  have  dislocated  all  the 
bones  in  the  human  body.  It  would  be  impossible  to  ex- 
perience a  similar  set  of  sensations,  in  any  other  circum- 
stances, unless  perhaps  in  attempting  to  go  up  to  the  top  of 
St.  Paul's  in  an  omnibus.  Never,  never  once,  that  day,  was 
the  coach  in  any  position,  attitude,  or  kind  of  motion  to 
which  we  are  accustomed  in  coaches.  Never  did  it  make 
the  smallest  approach  to  one's  experience  of  the  proceed- 
ings of  any  sort  of  vehicle  that  goes  on  wheels. 

Still,  it  was  a  fine  day,  and  the  temperature  was  deli- 
cious, and  though  we  had  left  Summer  behind  us  in  the 
West,  and  were  fast  leaving  Spring,  we  were  moving  tow- 
ards Niagara,  and  home.  We  alighted  in  a  pleasant  woo(? 
towards  the  middle  of  the  day,  dined  on  a  fallen  tree,  and 
leaving  our  best  fragments  with  a  cottagei",  and  our  worst 
with  the  pigs  (who  swarm  in  this  part  of  the  country  like 
grains  of  sand  on  the  sea-shore,  to  the  great  comfort  of  our 
commissariat  in  Canada),  we  went  forward  again,  gaily 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  Ifl3 

As  night  came  on,  the  track  grew  narrower  and  narrower, 
until  at  last  it  so  lost  itself  among  the  trees,  that  the  driver 
seemed  to  find  his  way  by  instinct.  We  had  the  comfort 
of  knowing,  at  least,  that  there  was  no  danger  of  his  fall- 
ing asleep,  for  every  now  and  then  a  wheel  would  strike 
against  an  unseen  stump  with  such  a  jerk,  that  he  was  fain 
to  hold  on  pretty  tight  and  pretty  quick,  to  keep  himself 
upon  the  box.  Nor  was  there  any  reason  to  dread  the  least 
danger  from  furious  driving,  inasmuch  as  over  that  broken 
ground  the  horses  had  enough  to  do  to  walk;  as  to  shy- 
ing, there  was  no  room  for  that;  and  a  herd  of  wild  ele- 
phants could  not  have  run  away  in  such  a  wood,  with 
such  a  coach  at  their  heels.  So  we  stumbled  along,  quite 
satisfied. 

These  stumps  of  trees  are  a  curious  feature  in  American 
travelling.  The  varying  illusions  they  present  to  the  un- 
accustomed eye  as  it  grows  dark,  are  quite  astonishing  in 
their  number  and  reality.  Now,  there  is  a  Grecian  urn 
erected  in  the  centre  of  a  lonely  field;  now  there  is  a  woman 
weeping  at  a  tomb;  now  a  very  commonplace  old  gentleman 
in  a  white  waistcoat,  with  a  thumb  thrust  into  each  arm- 
hole  of  his  coat;  now  a  student  poring  on  a  book;  now  a 
crouching  negro;  now,  a  horse,  a  dog,  a  cannon,  an  armed 
man;  a  hunchback  throwing  off  his  cloak  and  stepping 
forth  into  the  light.  They  were  often  as  entertaining  to 
me  as  so  many  glasses  in  a  magic  lantern,  and  never  took 
their  shapes  at  my  bidding,  but  seemed  to  force  them- 
selves upon  me,  whether  I  would  or  no;  and  strange  to 
say,  I  sometimes  recognised  in  them  counterparts  of  fig- 
ures once  familiar  to  me  in  pictures  attached  to  childish 
books,  forgotten  long  ago. 

It  soon  became  too  dark,  however,  even  for  this  amuse- 
ment, and  the  trees  were  so  close  together  that  their  dry 
branches  rattled  against  the  coach  on  either  side,  and 
obliged  us  all  to  keep  our  heads  within.  It  lightened  too, 
for  three  whole  hours;  each  flash  being  very  bright,  and 
blue,  and  long;  and  as  the  vivid  streaks  came  darting  in 
among  the  crowded  branches,  and  the  thunder  rolled  gloom- 
ily above  the  tree-tops,  one  could  scarcely  help  thinking 
that  there  were  better  neighbourhoods  at  such  a  time  than 
thick  woods  afforded. 

At  length,  between  ten  and  eleven  o'clock  at  night,  a 
few  feeble  lights  appeared  in  the  distance,  and  Upper  San- 
13 


194  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

dusky,  an  Indian  village,  where  we  were  to  stay  till  morn- 
ing, lay  before  us. 

They  were  gone  to  bed  at  the  log  Inn,  which  was  the 
only  house  of  entertainment  in  the  place,  but  soon  answered 
to  our  knocking,  and  got  some  tea  for  us  in  a  sort  of  kitchen 
or  common  room,  tapestried  with  old  newspapers,  pasted 
against  the  wall.  The  bedchamber  to  which  my  wife  and 
I  were  shown,  was  a  large,  low,  ghostly  room;  with  a  quan- 
tity of  withered  branches  on  the  hearth,  and  two  doors 
without  any  fastening,  opposite'  to  each  other,  both  opening 
on  the  black  night  and  wild  country,  and  so  contrived,  that 
one  of  them  always  blew  the  other  open :  a  novelty  in  do- 
mestic architecture,  which  I  do  not  remember  to  have  seen 
before,  and  which  I  was  somewhat  disconcerted  to  have 
forced  on  my  attention  after  getting  into  bed,  as  I  had  a 
considerable  sum  in  gold  for  our  travelling  expenses  in  my 
dressing-case.  Some  of  the  luggage,  however,  piled  against 
the  panels,  soon  settled  this  difficulty,  and  my  sleep  would 
not  have  been  very  much  affected  that  night,  I  believe, 
though  it  had  failed  to  do  so. 

My  Boston  friend  climbed  up  to  bed,  somewhere  in  the 
roof,  where  another  guest  was  already  snoring  hugely. 
But  being  bitten  beyond  his  power  of  endurance,  he  turned 
out  again,  and  fled  for  shelter  to  the  coach,  which  was  air- 
ing itself  in  front  of  the  house.  This  was  not  a  very  politic 
step,  as  it  turned  out;  for  the  pigs  scenting  him,  and  look- 
ing upon  the  coach  as  a  kind  of  pie  with  some  manner  of 
meat  inside,  grunted  round  it  so  hideously,  that  he  was 
afraid  to  come  out  again,  and  lay  there  shivering,  till  morn- 
ing. Nor  was  it  possible  to  warm  him,  when  he  did  come 
out,  by  means  of  a  glass  of  brandy;  for  in  Indian  villages 
the  Legislature,  with  a  very  good  and  wise  intention,  for-j 
bids  the  sale  of  spirits  by  tavern-keepers.  The  precaution, 
however,  is  quite  inefficacious,  for  the  Indians  never  fail 
to  procure  liquor  of  a  worse  kind,  at  a  dearer  price,  from 
travelling  pedlars. 

It  is  a  settlement  of  the  Wyandot  Indians  who  inhabit 
this  place.  Among  the  company  at  breakfast  was  a  mild 
old  gentleman,  who  had  been  for  many  years  employed  by 
the  United  States  Government  in  conducting  negotiations 
with  the  Indians,  and  who  had  just  concluded  a  treaty  with 
these  people  by  which  they  bound  themselves,  in  considera- 
tion of  a  certain  annual  sum,  to  remove  next  year  to  some 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  195 

land  provided  for  them,  west  of  the  Mississippi,  and  a  lit- 
tle way  beyond  St,  Louis.  He  gave  me  a  moving  account 
of  their  strong  attachment  to  the  familiar  scenes  of  their 
infancy,  and  in  particular  to  the  burial-places  of  their  kin- 
dred; and  of  their  great  reluctance  to  leave  them.  He  had 
witnessed  many  such  removals,  and  always  with  pain, 
though  he  knew  that  they  departed  for  their  own  good. 
The  question  whether  this  tribe  should  go  or  stay,  had  been 
discussed  among  them  a  day  or  two  before,  in  a  hut  erected 
for  the  purpose,  the  logs  of  which  still  lay  upon  the  ground 
before  the  inn.  When  the  speaking  was  done,  the  ayes 
and  noes  were  ranged  on  opposite  sides,  and  every  male 
adult  voted  in  his  turn.  The  moment  the  result  was  known, 
the  minority  (a  large  one)  cheerfully  yielded  to  the  rest, 
and  withdrew  all  kind  of  opposition. 

We  met  some  of  these  poor  Indi'ans  afterwards,  riding  on 
shaggy  ponies.  They  were  so  like  gipsies,  that  if  I  could 
have  seen  any  of  them  in  England,  I  should  have  concluded, 
as  a  matter  of  course,  that  they  belonged  to  that  wandering 
and  restless  people. 

Leaving  this  town  directly  after  breakfast,  we  pushed 
forward  again,  over  a  rather  worse  road  than  yesterday,  if 
possible,  and  arrived  about  noon  at  Tiffin,  where  we  parted 
with  the  extra.  At  two  o'clock,  we  took  the  railroad;  the 
travelling  oU  which  was  very  slow,  its  construction  being 
indifferent,  and  the  ground  wet  and  marshy;  and  arrived 
at  Sandusky  in  time  to  dine  that  evening.  We  put  up  at  a 
comfortable  little  hotel  on  the  brink  of  Lake  Erie,  lay  there 
that  night,  and  had  no  choice  but  to  wait  there  next  day, 
until  a  steamboat  bound  for  Buffalo  appeared.  The  town, 
which  was  sluggish  and  uninteresting  enough,  was  some- 
thing like  the  back  of  an  English  watering-place,  out  of  the 
season. 

Our  host,  who  was  very  attentive  and  anxious  to  make  us 
comfortable,  was  a  handsome  middle-aged  man,  who  had 
^me  to  this  town  from  New  England,  in  which  part  of  the 
country  he  was  "raised,"  When  I  say  that  he  constantly 
walked  in  and  out  of  the  room  with  his  hat  on;  and  stopped 
to  converse  in  the  same  free-and-easy  state;  and  lay  down 
on  our  sofa,  and  pulled  his  newspaper  out  of  his  pocket, 
and  read  it  at  his  ease;  I  merely  mention  these  traits  as 
characteristic  of  the  country :  not  at  all  as  being  matter  of 
complaint,  or  as  having  been  disagreeable  to  me.    I  should 


196  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

undoubtedly  be  offended  by  such  proceedings  at  home,  be- 
cause there  they  are  not  the  custom,  and  where  they  are 
not,  they  would  be  impertinences;  but  in  America,  the  only 
desire  of  a  good-natured  fellow  of  this  kind,  is  to  treat  his 
guests  hospitably  and  well;  and  I  had  no  more  right,  and 
I  can  truly  say  no  more  disposition,  to  measure  his  conduct 
by  our  English  rule  and  standard,  than  I  had  to  quarrel 
with  him  for  not  being  of  the  exact  stature  which  would 
qualify  him  for  admission  into  the  Queen's  Grenadier 
Guards.  As  little  inclination  had  I  to  find  fault  with  a 
funny  old  lady  who  was  an  upper  domestic  in  this  estab- 
lishment, and  who,  when  she  came  to  wait  upon  us  at  any 
meal,  sat  herself  down  comfortably  in  the  most  convenient 
chair,  and  producing  a  large  pin  to  pick  her  teeth  with,  re- 
mained performing  that  ceremony,  and  steadfastly  regard- 
ing us  meanwhile  with  much  gravity  and  composure  (now 
and  then  pressing  us  to  eat  a  little  more),  until  it  was  time 
to  clear  away.  It  was  enough  for  us,  that  whatever  we 
wished  done  was  done  with  great  civility  and  readiness,  and 
a  desire  to  oblige,  not  only  here,  but  everywhere  else;  and 
that  all  our  wants  were,  in  general,  zealously  anticipated. 

We  were  taking  an  early  dinner  at  this  house,  on  the  day 
after  our  arrival,  which  was  Sunday,  when  a  steamboat 
came  in  sight,  and  presently  touched  at  the  wharf.  As  she 
proved  to  be  on  her  way  to  Buffalo,  we  hurried  on  board 
with  all  speed,  and  soon  left  Sandusky  far  behind  us. 

She  was  a  large  vessel  of  five  hundred  tons,  and  hand- 
somely fitted  up,  though  with  high-pressure  engines;  which 
always  conveyed  that  kind  of  feeling  to  me,  which  I  should 
be  likely  to  experience,  I  think,  if  I  had  lodgings  on  the 
first-floor  of  a  powder-mill.  She  was  laden  with  flour, 
some  casks  of  which  commodity  were  stored  upon  the  deck. 
The  captain  coming  up  to  have  a  little  conversation,  and 
to  introduce  a  friend,  seated  himself  astride  of  one  of  these 
barrels,  like  a  Bacchus  of  private  life;  and  pulling  a  great 
clasp-knife  out  of  his  pocket,  began  to  "  whittle  "  it  as  hfi 
talked,  by  paring  thin  slices  off  the  edges.  And  he  whit- 
tled with  such  industry  and  hearty  good  will,  that  but  for 
his  being  called  away  very  soon,  it  must  have  disappeared 
bodily,  and  left  nothing  in  its  place  but  grist  and  shavings. 

After  calling  at  one  or  two  flat  places,  with  low  dams 
stretching  out  into  the  lake,  whereon  were  stumpy  light- 
houses, like  windmills  without  sails,  the  whole  looking  like 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  197 

a  Dutch  vignette,  we  came  at  midnight  to  Cleveland,  where 
we  lay  all  night,  and  until  nine  o'clock  next  morning. 

I  entertained  quite  a  curiosity  in  reference  to  this  place, 
from  having  seen  at  Sandusky  a  specimen  of  its  literature 
in  the  shape  of  a  newspaper,  which  was  very  strong  indeed 
upon  the  subject  of  Lord  Ashburton's  recent  arrival  at 
VVashington,  to  adjust  the  points  in  dispute  between  the 
United  States  Government  and  Great  Britain:  informing 
its  readers  that  as  America  had  "  whipped  "  England  in  her 
infancy,  and  whipped  her  again  in  her  youth,  so  it  was 
clearly  necessary  that  she  must  whip  her  once  again  in  her 
maturity;  and  pledging  its  credit  to  all  True  Americans, 
that  if  Mr.  Webster  did  his  duty  in  the  approaching  nego- 
tiations, and  sent  the  English  Lord  home  again  in  double 
quick  time,  they  should,  within  two  years,  "  sing  Yankee 
Doodle  in  Hyde  Park,  and  Hail  Columbia  in  the  scarlet 
courts  of  Westminster!"  I  found  it  a  pretty  town,  and 
had  the  satisfaction  of  beholding  the  outside  of  the  office 
of  the  journal  from  which  I  have  just  quoted.  I  did  not 
enjoy  the  delight  of  seeing  the  wit  who  indited  the  para- 
graphs in  question,  but  I  have  no  doubt  he  is  a  prodigious 
man  in  his  way,  and  held  in  high  repute  by  a  select  circle. 

There  was  a  gentleman  on  board,  to  whom,  as  I  uninten- 
tionally learned  through  the  thin  partition  which  divided 
our  state-room  from  the  cabin  in  which  he  and  his  wife 
conversed  together,  I  was  unwittingly  the  occasion  of  very 
great  uneasiness.  I  don't  know  why  or  wherefore,  but  I 
appeared  to  run  in  his  mind  perpetually,  and  to  dissatisfy 
him  very  much.  First  of  all  I  heard  him  say :  and  the 
most  ludicrous  part  of  the  business  was,  that  he  said  it  in 
my  very  ear,  and  could  not  have  communicated  more  di- 
rectly with  me,  if  he  had  leaned  upon  my  shoulder,  and 
whispered  me:  "Boz  is  on  board  still,  my  dear."  After  a 
considerable  pause,  he  added  complainingly,  "Boz  keeps 
himself  very  close  :  "  which  was  true  enough,  for  I  was  not 
very  well,  and  was  lying  down,  with  a  book.  I  thought  he 
had  done  with  me  after  this,  but  I  was  deceived;  for  a 
long  interval  having  elapsed,  during  which  I  imagine  him 
to  have  been  turning  restlessly  from  side  to  side,  and  try- 
ing to  go  to  sleep;  he  broke  out  again,  with,  "I  suppose 
that  Boz  will  be  writing  a  book  by-and-by,  and  putting  all 
our  names  in  it !  "  at  which  imaginary  consequence  of  being 
on  board  a  boat  with  Boz,  he  groaned,  and  became  silent. 


198  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

We  called  at  the  town  of  Erie,  at  eight  o'clock  that 
night,  and  lay  there  an  hour.  Between  five  and  six  next 
morning,  we  arrived  at  Buffalo,  where  we  breakfasted;  and 
being  too  near  the  Great  Falls  to  wait  patiently  anywhere 
else,  we  set  off  by  the  train,  the  same  morning  at  nine 
o'clock,  to  Niagara. 

It  was  a  miserable  day;  chilly  and  raw;  a  damp  mist 
falling;  and  the  trees  in  that  northern  region  quite  bare 
and  wintry.  Whenever  the  train  halted,  I  listened  for  the 
roar;  and  was  constantly  straining  my  eyes  in  the  direction 
where  I  knew  the  Falls  must  be,  from  seeing  the  river 
rolling  on  towards  them;  every  moment  expecting  to  be- 
hold the  spray.  Within  a  few  minutes  of  our  stopping,  not 
before,  I  saw  two  great  white  clouds  rising  up  slowly  and 
majestically  from  the  depths  of  the  earth.  That  was  all. 
At  length  we  alighted :  and  then  for  the  first  time,  I  heard 
the  mighty  rush  of  water,  and  felt  the  ground  tremble  un- 
derneath my  feet. 

The  bank  is  very  steep,  and  was  slippery  with  rain,  and 
half -melted  ice.  I  hardly  know  how  I  got  down,  but  I  was 
soon  at  the  bottom,  and  climbing,  with  two  English  officers 
who  were  crossing  and  had  joined  me,  over  some  broken 
rocks,  deafened  by  the  noise,  half -blinded  by  the  spray, 
and  wet  to  the  skin.  We  were  at  the  foot  of  the  American 
Fall.  I  could  see  an  immense  torrent  of  water  tearing 
headlong  down  from  some  great  height,  but  had  no  idea  of 
shape,  or  situation,  or  anything  but  vague  immensity. 

When  we  were  seated  in  the  little  ferry-boat,  and  were 
crossing  the  swoln  river  immediately  before  both  cataracts, 
I  began  to  feel  what  it  was  :■  but  I  was  in  a  manner  stunned, 
and  unable  to  comprehend  the  vastness  of  the  scene.  It 
was  not  until  I  came  on  Table  Rock,  and  looked — Great 
Heaven,  on  what  a  fall  of  bright- green  water ! — that  it  came 
upon  me  in  its  full  might  and  majesty. 

Then,  when  I  felt  how  near  to  my  Creator  I  was  stand- 
ing, the  first  effect,  and  the  enduring  one — instant  and  last- 
ing— of  the  tremendous  spectacle,  was  Peace.  Peace  of 
Mind :  Tranquillity :  Calm  Recollections  of  the  Dead :  Great 
Thoughts  of  Eternal  Rest  and  Happiness:  nothing  of 
Gloom  or  Terror.  Niagara  was  at  once  stamped  upon  my 
heart,  an  Image  of  Beauty :  to  remain  there,  changeless  and 
indelible,  until  its  pulses  cease  to  beat,  for  ever. 

Oh,  how  the  strife  and  trouble  of  our  daily  life  receded 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  199 

from  my  view,  and  lessened  in  the  distance,  during  tlie  ten 
memorable  days  we  passed  on  that  Enchanted  Ground! 
What  voices  spoke  from  out  the  thundering  water;  what 
faces,  faded  from  the  earth,  looked  out  upon  me  from  its 
gleaming  depths;  what  Heavenly  promise  glistened  in 
those  angels'  tears,  the  drops  of  many  hues,  that  showered 
around,  and  twined  themselves  about  the  gorgeous  arches 
which  the  changing  rainbows  made ! 

I  never  stirred  in  all  that  time  from  the  Canadian  side, 
whither  I  had  gone  at  first.  I  never  crossed  the  river 
again;  for  I  knew  there  were  people  on  the  other  shore, 
and  in  such  a  place  it  is  natural  to  shun  strange  company. 
To  wander  to  and  fro  all  day,  and  see  the  cataracts  from 
all  points  of  view;  to  stand  upon  the  edge  of  the  Great 
Horse  Shoe  Fall,  marking  the  hurried  water  gathering 
strength  as  it  approached  the  verge,  yet  seeming,  too,  to 
pause  before  it  shot  into  the  gulf  below;  to  gaze  from  the 
river's  level  up  at  the  torrent  as  it  came  streaming  down; 
to  climb  the  neighbouring  heights  and  watch  it  through  the 
trees,  and  see  the  wreathing  water  in  the  rapids  hurrying 
on  to  take  its  fearful  plunge;  to  linger  in  the  shadow  of 
the  solemn  rocks  three  miles  below ;  watching  the  river  as, 
stirred  by  no  visible  cause,  it  heaved  and  eddied  and  awoke 
the  echoes,  being  troubled  yet,  far  down  beneath  the  sur- 
face, by  its  giant  leap;  to  have  Niagara  before  me,  lighted 
by  the  sun  and  by  the  moon,  red  in  the  day's  decline,  and 
grey  as  evening  slowly  fell  upon  it;  to  look  upon  it  every 
day,  and  wake  up  in  the  night  and  hear  its  ceaseless  voice : 
this  was  enough. 

I  think  in  every  quiet  seasob  now,  still  do  those  waters 
roll  and  leap,  and  roar  and  tumble,  all  day  long;  still  are 
the  rainbows  spanning  them,  a  hundred  feet  below.  Still, 
when  the  sun  is  on  them,  do  they  shine  and  glow  like 
molten  gold.  Still,  when  the  day  is  gloomy,  do  they  fall 
like  snow,  or  seem  to  crumble  away  like  the  front  of  a  great 
chalk  cliff,  or  roll  down  the  rock  like  dense  white  smoke. 
But  always  does  the  mighty  stream  appear  to  die  as  it 
comes  down,  and  always  from  its  unfathomable  grave  arises 
that  tremendous  ghost  of  spray  and  mist  which  is  never 
laid :  which  has  havmted  this  place  with  the  same  dread 
solemnity  since  Darkness  brooded  on  the  deep,  and  that 
first  flood  before  the  Deluge — Light — came  rushing  on 
Creation  at  the  word  of  God.  > 


200  AMERICAN  NOTES. 


CHAPTER    THE    FIFTEENTH. 

IN  CANADA;  TORONTO;  KINGSTON;  MONTREAL;  QUE- 
BEC; ST.  JOHN'S— IN  THE  UNITED  STATES  AGAIN; 
LEBANON;  THE  SHAKER  VILLAGE;  AND  WEST 
POINT. 

I  "WISH  to  abstain  from  instituting  any  comparison,  or 
drawing  any  parallel  whatever,  between  the  social  features 
of  the  United  States  and  those  of  the  British  Possessions 
in  Canada.  For  this  reason,  I  shall  confine  myself  to  a 
very  brief  account  of  our  journey ings  in  the  latter  territory. 

But  before  I  leave  Niagara,  I  must  advert  to  one  disgust- 
ing circumstance  which  can  hardly  have  escaped  the  ob- 
servation of  any  decent  traveller  who  has  visited  the  Falls. 

On  Table  Rock,  there  is  a  cottage  belonging  to  a  Guide, 
where  little  relics  of  the  place  are  sold,  and  where  visitors 
register  their  names  in  a  book  kept  for  the  purpose.  On 
the  wall  of  the  room  in  which  a  great  many  of  these  vol- 
umes are  preserved,  the  following  request  is  posted :  "  Vis- 
itors will  please  not  copy  nor  extract  the  remarks  and  poet- 
ical effusions  from  the  registers  and  albums  kept  here." 

But  for  this  intimation,  I  should  have  let  them  lie  upon 
the  tables  on  which  they  were  strewn  with  careful  negli- 
gence, like  books  in  a  drawing-room  :  being  quite  satisfied 
with  the  stupendous  silliness  of  certain  stanzas  with  an 
anti-climax  at  the  end  of  each,  which  were  framed  and 
hung  up  on  the  wall.  Curious,  however,  after  reading  this 
announcement,  to  see  what  kind  of  morsels  were  so  carefully 
preserved,  I  turned  a  few  leaves,  and  found  them  scrawled 
all  over  with  the  vilest  and  the  filthiest  ribaldry  that  ever 
human  hogs  delighted  in. 

It  is  humiliating  enough  to  know  that  there  are  among 
men,  brutes  so  obscene  and  worthless,  that  they  can  delight 
in  laying  their  miserable  profanations  upon  the  very  steps 
of  Nature's  greatest  altar.  But  that  these  should  be 
hoarded  up  for  the  delight  of  their  fellow-swine,  and  kept 
in  a  public  place  where  any  eyes  may  see  them,  is  a  dis- 
grace to  the  English  language  in  which  they  are  written 
(though  I  hope  few  of  these  entries  have  been  made  by 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  201 

Englishmen),  and  a  reproach  to  the  English  side,  on  which 
they  are  preserved. 

The  quarters  of  our  soldiers  at  Niagara  are  finely  and 
airily  situated.  Some  of  them  are  large  detached  houses 
on  the  plain  above  the  Falls,  which  were  originally  designed 
for  hotels;  and  in  the  evening  time,  when  the  women  and 
children  were  leaning  over  the  balconies  watching  the  men 
as  they  played  at  ball  and  other  games  upon  the  grass  be- 
fore the  door,  they  often  presented  a  little  picture  of  cheer- 
fulness and  animation  which  made  it  quite  a  pleasure  to 
pass  that  way. 

At  any  garrisoned  point  where  the  line  of  demarcation 
between  one  country  and  another  is  so  very  narrow  as  at 
Niagara,  desertion  from  the  ranks  can  scarcely  fail  to  be 
of  frequent  occurrence :  and  it  may  be  reasonably  supposed 
that  when  the  soldiers  entertain  the  wildest  and  maddest 
hopes  of  the  fortune  and  independence  that  await  them  on 
the  other  side,  the  impulse  to  play  traitor,  which  such  a 
place  suggests  to  dishonest  minds,  is  not  weakened.  But 
it  very  rarely  happens  that  the  men  who  do  desert,  are 
happy  or  contented  afterwards;  and  many  instances  have 
been  known  in  which  they  have  confessed  their  grievous 
disappointment,  and  their  earnest  desire  to  return  to  their 
old  service,  if  they  could  but  be  assured  of  pardon,  or  le- 
nient treatment.  Many  of  their  comrades,  notwithstanding, 
do  the  like,  from  time  to  time;  and  instances  of  loss  of  life 
in  the  effort  to  cross  the  river  with  this  object,  are  far  from 
being  uncommon.  Several  men  were  drowned  in  the  at- 
tempt to  swim  across,  not  long  ago;  and  one,  who  had  the 
madness  to  trust  himself  upon  a  table  as  a  raft,  was  swept 
down  to  the  whirlpool,  where  his  mangled  body  eddied 
round  and  round,  some  days. 

I  am  inclined  to  think  that  the  noise  of  the  Falls  is  very 
much  exaggerated;  and  this  will  appear  the  more  probable 
when  the  depth  of  the  great  basin  in  which  the  water  is  re- 
ceived, is  taken  into  account.  At  no  time  during  our  stay 
there,  was  the  wind  at  all  high  or  boisterous,  but  we  never 
heard  them  three  miles  off,  even  at  the  very  quiet  time  of 
sunset,  though  we  often  tried. 

Queenston,  at  which  place  the  steamboats  start  from  To- 
ronto (or  I  should  rather  say  at  which  place  they  call,  for 
their  wharf  is  at  Lewiston  on  the  opposite  shore),  is  situ- 
ated in  a  delicious  valley,  through  which  the  Niagara  river, 


202  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

in  colour  a  very  deep  green,  pursues  its  course.  It  is  ap- 
proached by  a  road  that  takes  its  winding  way  among  the 
heights  by  which  the  town  is  sheltered;  and  seen  from  this 
point  is  extremely  beautiful  and  picturesque.  On  the  most 
conspicuous  of  these  heights  stood  a  monument  erected  by 
the  Provincial  Legislature  in  memory  of  General  Brock, 
who  was  slain  in  a  battle  with  the  American  forces,  after 
having  won  the  victory.  Some  vagabond,  supposed  to  be 
a  fellow  of  the  name  of  Lett,  who  is  now,  or  who  lately 
was,  in  prison  as  a  felon,  blew  up  this  monument  two  years 
ago,  and  it  is  now  a  melancholy  ruin,  with  a  long  fragment 
of  iron  railing  hanging  dejectedly  from  its  top,  and  waving 
to  and  fro  like  a  wild  ivy  branch  or  broken  vine  stem.  It 
is  of  much  higher  importance  than  it  may  seem,  that  this 
statue  should  be  repaired  at  the  public  cost,  as  it  ought  to 
have  been  long  ago.  Firstly,  because  it  is  beneath  the  dig- 
nity of  England  to  allow  a  memorial  raised  in  honour  of 
one  of  her  defenders,  to  remain  in  this  condition,  on  the 
very  spot  where  he  died.  Secondly,  because  the  sight  of 
it  in  its  present  state,  and  the  recollection  of  the  un- 
punished outrage  which  brought  it  to  this  pass,  is  not 
very  likely  to  soothe  down  border  feelings  among  English 
subjects  here,  or  compose  their  border  quarrels  and  dis- 
likes. 

I  was  standing  on  the  wharf  at  this  place,  watching  the 
passengers  embarking  in  a  steamboat  which  preceded  that 
whose  coming  we  awaited,  and  participating  in  the  anxiety 
with  which  a  sergeant's  wife  was  collecting  her  few  goods 
together — keeping  one  distracted  eye  hard  upon  the  porters, 
who  were  hurrying  them  on  board,  and  the  other  on  a  hoop- 
less  washing- tub  for  which,  as  being  the  most  utterly  worth- 
less of  all  her  moveables,  she  seemed  to  entertain  particular 
affection — when  three  or  four  soldiers  with  a  recruit  came 
up,  and  went  on  board. 

The  recruit  was  a  likely  young  fellow  enough,  strongly 
built  and  well  made,  but  by  no  means  sober :  indeed  he  had 
all  the  air  of  a  man  who  had  been  more  or  less  drunk  for 
some  days.  He  carried  a  small  bundle  over  his  shoulder, 
slung  at  the  end  of  a  walking-stick,  and  had  a  short  pipe 
in  his  mouth.  He  was  as  dusty  and  dirty  as  recruits 
usually  are,  and  his  shoes  betokened  that  he  had  travelled 
on  foot  some  distance,  but  he  was  in  a  very  jocose  state, 
and  shook  hands  with  this  soldier,  and  clapped  that  one  on 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  ^03 

the  back,  and  talked  and  laughed  continually,  like  a  roar- 
ing idle  dog  as  he  was. 

The  soldiers  rather  laughed  at  this  blade  than  with  him : 
seeming  to  say,  as  they  stood  straightening  their  canes  in 
their  hands,  and  looking  coolly  at  him  over  their  glazed 
stocks,  "Go  on,  my  boy,  while  you  may!  you'll  know  bet- 
ter by-and-by : "  when  suddenly  the  novice,  who  had  been 
backing  towards  the  gangway  in  his  noisy  merriment,  fell 
overboard  before  their  eyes,  and  splashed  heavily  down 
into  the  river  between  the  vessel  and  the  dock. 

I  never  saw  such  a  good  thing  as  the  change  that  came 
over  these  soldiers  in  an  instant.  Almost  before  the  man 
was  down,  their  professional  manner,  their  stiffness  and 
constraint,  were  gone,  and  they  were  filled  with  the  most 
violent  energy.  In  less  time  than  is  required  to  tell  it, 
they  had  him  out  again,  feet  first,  with  the  tails  of  his  coat 
flapping  over  his  eyes,  everything  about  him  hanging  the 
wrong  way,  and  the  water  streaming  off  at  every  thread  in 
his  threadbare  dress.  But  the  moment  they  set  him  upright 
and  found  that  he  was  none  the  worse,  they  were  soldiers 
again,  looking  over  their  glazed  stocks  more  composedly 
than  ever. 

The  half-sobered  recruit  glanced  round  for  a  moment,  as 
if  his  first  impulse  were  to  express  some  gratitude  for  his 
preservation,  but  seeing  them  with  this  air  of  total  uncon- 
cern, and  having  his  wet  pipe  presented  to  him  with  an 
oath  by  the  soldier  who  had  been  by  far  the  most  anxious 
of  the  party,  he  stuck  it  in  his  mouth,  thrust  his  hands  into 
his  moist  pockets,  and  without  even  shaking  the  water  off 
his  clothes,  walked  on  board  whistling;  not  to  say  as  if 
nothing  had  happened,  but  as  if  he  had  meant  to  do  it,  and 
it  had  been  a  perfect  success. 

Our  steamboat  came  up  directly  this  had  left  the  wharf, 
and  soon  bore  us  to  the  mouth  of  the  Niagara:  where 
the  Stars  and  Stripes  of  America  flutter  on  one  side,  and  the 
Union  Jack  of  England  on  the  other :  and  so  narrow  is  the 
space  between  them  that  the  sentinels  in  either  fort  can 
often  hear  the  watchword  of  the  other  covmtry  given. 
Thence  we  emerged  on  Lake  Ontario,  an  inland  sea;  and 
by  half -past  six  o'clock  were  at  Toronto. 

The  country  round  this  town  being  very  flat,  is  bare  of 
scenic  interest;  but  the  town  itself  is  full  of  life  and  mo- 
tion, bustle,  business,  and  improvement.     The  streets  are 


204  A3HERICAN  NOTES. 

well  paved,  and  lighted  with  gas;  the  houses  are  large  and 
good;  the  shops  excellent.  Many  of  them  have  a  display 
of  goods  in  their  windows,  such  as  may  be  seen  in  thriving 
county  towns  in  England ;  and  there  are  some  which  would 
do  no  discredit  to  the  metropolis  itself.  There  is  a  good 
stone  prison  here;  and  there  are,  besides,  a  handsome 
church,  a  court-house,  public  offices,  many  commodious 
private  residences,  and  a  Government  observatory  for  not- 
ing and  recording  the  magnetic  variations.  In  the  College 
of  Upper  Canada,  which  is  one  of  the  public  establishments 
of  the  city,  a  sound  education  in  every  department  of  polite 
learning  can  be  had,  at  a  very  moderate  expense :  the  an- 
nual charge  for  the  instruction  of  each  pupil,  not  exceeding 
nine  pounds  sterling.  It  has  pretty  good  endowments 
in  the  way  of  land,  and  is  a  valuable  and  useful  institu- 
tion. 

The  first  stone  of  a  new  college  had  been  laid  but  a  few 
days  before,  by  the  Governor  General.  It  will  be  a  hand- 
some, spacious  edifice,  approached  by  a  long  avenue,  which 
is  already  planted  and  made  available  as  a  public  walk. 
The  town  is  well  adapted  for  wholesome  exercise  at  all 
seasons,  for  the  footways  in  the  thoroughfares  which  lie 
beyond  the  principal  street,  are  planked  like  floors,  and 
kept  in  very  good  and  clean  repair. 

It  is  a  matter  of  deep  regret  that  political  differences 
should  have  run  high  in  this  place,  and  led  to  most  dis- 
creditable and  disgraceful  results.  It  is  not  long,  since 
guns  were  discharged  from  a  window  in  this  town  at  the 
successful  candidates  in  an  election,  and  the  coachman  of 
one  of  them  was  actually  shot  in  the  body,  though  not  dan- 
gerously wounded.  But  one  man  was  killed  on  the  same 
occasion;  and  from  the  very  window  whence  he  received 
his  death,  the  very  flag  which  shielded  his  murderer  (not 
only  in  the  commission  of  his  crime,  but  from  its  conse- 
quences), was  displayed  again  on  the  occasion  of  the  public 
ceremony  performed  by  the  Governor  General,  to  which  I 
have  just  adverted.  Of  all  the  colours  in  the  rainbow, 
there  is  but  one  which  could  be  so  employed :  I  need  not 
say  that  flag  was  orange. 

The  time  of  leaving  Toronto  for  Kingston  is  noon.  By 
eight  o'clock  next  niorning,  the  traveller  is  at  the  end  of 
his  journey,  which  is  performed  by  steamboat  upon  Lake 
Ontario,  calling  at  Port  Hope  and  Coburg,   the  latter  a 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  205 

cheerful  thriving  little  town.  Vast  quantities  of  flour  form 
the  chief  item  in  the  freight  of  these  vessels.  We  had  no 
fewer  than  one  thousand  and  eighty  barrels  on  board,  be- 
tween Coburg  and  Kingston. 

The  latter  place,  which  is  now  the  seat  of  government  in 
Canada,  is  a  very  poor  town,  rendered  still  poorer  in  the  ap- 
pearance of  its  market-place  by  the  ravages  of  a  recent  fire. 
Indeed,  it  may  be  said  of  Kingston,  that  one  half  of  it  ap- 
pears to  be  burnt  down,  and  the  other  half  not  to  be  built 
up.  The  Government  House  is  neither  elegant  nor  com- 
modious, yet  it  is  almost  the  only  house  of  any  importance 
in  the  neighbourhood. 

There  is  an  admirable  jail  here,  well  and  wisely  governed, 
and  excellently  regulated,  in  every  respect.  The  men  were 
employed  as  shoemakers,  ropemakers,  blacksmiths,  tailors, 
carpenters,  and  stonecutters;  and  in  building  a  new  prison, 
which  was  pretty  far  advanced  towards  completion.  The 
female  prisoners  were  occupied  in  needlework.  Among 
them  was  a  beautiful  girl  of  twenty,  who  had  been  there 
nearly  three  years.  She  acted  as  bearer  of  secret  despatches 
for  the  self-styled  Patriots  on  Navy  Island,  during  the 
Canadian  Insurrection :  sometimes  dressing  as  a  girl,  and 
carrying  them  in  her  stays;  sometimes  attiring  herself  as  a 
boy,  and  secreting  them  in  the  lining  of  her  hat.  In  the 
latter  character  she  always  rode  as  a  boy  would,  which  was 
nothing  to  her,  for  she  could  govern  any  horse  that  any 
man  could  ride,  and  could  drive  four-in-hand  with  the  best 
whip  in  those  parts.  Setting  forth  on  one  of  her  patriotic 
missions,  she  appropriated  to  herself  the  first  horse  she 
could  lay  her  hands  on;  and  this  offence  had  brought  her 
where  I  saw  her.  She  had  quite  a  lovely  face,  though,  as 
the  reader  may  suppose  from  this  sketch  of  her  history, 
there  was  a  lurking  devil  in  her  bright  eye,  which  looked 
out  pretty  sharply  from  between  her  prison  bars. 

There  is  a  bomb-proof  fort  here  of  great  strength,  which 
occupies  a  bold  position,  and  is  capable,  doubtless,  of  doing 
good  service;  though  the  town  is  much  too  close  upon  the 
frontier  to  be  long  held,  I  should  imagine,  for  its  present 
purpose  in  troubled  times.  There  is  also  a  small  navy- 
yard,  where  a  couple  of  Government  steamboats  were  build- 
ing, and  getting  on  vigorously. 

We  left  Kingston  for  Montreal  on  the  tenth  of  May,  at 
half-past  nine  in  the  morning,  and  proceeded  in  a  steam- 


206  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

boat  down  the  St.  Lawrence  river.  The  beauty  of  this 
noble  stream  at  almost  any  point,  but  especially  in  the 
commencement  of  this  journey  when  it  winds  its  way  among 
the  thousand  Islands,  can  hardly  be  imagined.  The  num- 
ber and  constant  successions  of  these  islands,  all  green  and 
richly  wooded;  their  fluctuating  sizes,  some  so  large  that 
for  half  an  hour  together  one  among  them  will  appear  as 
the  opposite  bank  of  the  river,  and  some  so  small  that  they 
are  mere  dimples  on  its  broad  bosom;  their  infinite  variety 
of  shapes;  and  the  numberless  combinations  of  beautiful 
forms  which  the  trees  growing  on  them  present :  all  form 
a  picture  fraught  with  uncommon  interest  and  pleasure. 

In  the  afternoon  we  shot  down  some  rapids  where  the 
river  boiled  and  bubbled  strangely,  and  where  the  force 
and  headlong  violence  of  the  current  were  tremendous.  At 
seven  o'clock  we  reached  Dickenson's  Landing,  whence 
travellers  proceed  for  two  or  three  hours  by  stage-coach : 
the  navigation  of  the  river  being  rendered  so  dangerous  and 
difiicult  in  the  interval,  by  rapids,  that  steamboats  do  not 
make  the  passage.  The  number  and  length  of  those  port- 
ages^ over  which  the  roads  are  bad,  and  the  travelling  slow, 
render  the  way  between  the  towns  of  Montreal  and  Kings- 
ton somewhat  tedious. 

Our  course  lay  over  a  wide,  uninclosed  tract  of  country 
at  a  little  distance  from  the  river  side,  whence  the  bright 
warning  lights  on  the  dangerous  parts  of  the  St.  Lawrence 
shone  vividly.  The  night  was  dark  and  raw,  and  the  way 
dreary  enough.  It  was  nearly  ten  o'clock  when  we  reached 
the  wharf  where  the  next  steamboat  lay;  and  went  on 
board,  and  to  bed. 

She  lay  there  all  night,  and  started  as  soon  as  it 
was  day.  The  morning  was  ushered  in  by  a  violent  thun- 
derstorm, and  was  very  wet,  but  gradually  improved  and 
brightened  up.  Going  on  deck  after  breakfast,  I  was 
amazed  to  see  floating  down  with  the  stream,  a  most  gigan- 
tic raft,  with  some  thirty  or  forty  wooden  houses  upon  it, 
and  at  least  as  many  flag-masts,  so  that  it  looked  like  a 
nautical  street.  I  saw  many  of  these  rafts  afterwards,  but 
never  one  so  large.  All  the  timber,  or  "lumber,"  as  it  is 
called  in  America,  which  is  brought  down  the  St.  Lawrence, 
is  floated  down  in  this  manner.  When  the  raft  reaches  its 
place  of  destination,  it  is  broken  up;  the  materials  are  sold, 
and  the  boatmen  return  for  more. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  207 

At  eight  we  landed  again,  and  travelled  by  a  stage-coach 
for  four  hours  through  a  pleasant  and  well-cultivated  coun- 
try, perfectly  French  in  every  respect :  in  the  appearance 
of  the  cottages;  the  air,  language,  and  dress  of  the  peas- 
antry; the  signboards  on  the  shops  and  taverns;  and  the 
Virgin's  shrines,  and  crosses,  by  the  wayside.  Nearly  ev- 
ery common  labourer  and  boy,  though  he  had  no  shoes  to 
his  feet,  wore  round  his  waist  a  sash  of  some  bright  colour : 
generally  red :  and  the  women,  who  were  working  in  the 
fields  and  gardens,  and  doing  all  kinds  of  husbandry,  wore, 
one  and  all,  great  flat  straw  hats  with  most  capacious  brims. 
There  were  Catholic  Priests  and  Sisters  of  Charity  in  the 
village  streets;  and  images  of  the  Saviour  at  the  corners 
of  cross-roads,  and  in  other  public  places. 

At  noon  we  went  on  board  another  steamboat,  and 
reached  the  village  of  Lachine,  nine  miles  from  Montreal, 
by  three  o'clock.  There,  we  left  the  river,  and  went  on  by 
land. 

Montreal  is  pleasantly  situated  on  the  margin  of  the  St. 
Lawrence,  and  is  backed  by  sotne  bold  heights,  about  which 
there  are  charming  rides  and  drives.  The  streets  are  gen- 
erally narrow  and  irregular,  as  in  most  French  towns  of 
any  age;  but  in  the  more  modern  parts  of  the  city,  they  are 
wide  and  airy.  They  display  a  great  variety  of  very  good 
shops;  and  both  in  the  town  and  suburbs  there  are  many 
excellent  private  dwellings.  The  granite  quays  are  re- 
markable for  their  beauty,  solidity,  and  extent. 

There  is  a  very  large  Catholic  cathedral  here,  recently 
erected;  with  two  tall  spires,  of  which  one  is  yet  unfin- 
ished. In  the  open  space  in  front  of  this  edifice,  stands 
a  solitary,  grim-looking,  square  brick  tower,  which  has  a 
quaint  and  remarkable  appearance,  and  which  the  wiseacres 
of  the  place  have  consequently  determined  to  pull  down  im- 
mediately. The  Government  House  is  very  superior  to 
that  at  Kingston,  and  the  town  is  full  of  life  and  bustle. 
In  one  of  the  suburbs  is  a  plank  road — not  footpath — five 
or  six  miles  long,  and  a  famous  road  it  is  too.  All  the  rides 
in  the  vicinity  were  made  doubly  interesting  by  the  burst- 
ing out  of  spring,  which  is  here  so  rapid,  that  it  is  but  a 
day's  leap  from  barren  winter,  to  the  blooming  youth  of 
summer. 

The  steamboats  to  Quebec  perform  the  journey  in  the 
night;  that  is  to  say,  they  leave  Montreal  at  six  in  the 


208  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

evening,  and  arrive  in  Quebec  at  six  next  morning.  W© 
made  this  excursion  during  our  stay  in  Montreal  (which  ex- 
ceeded a  fortnight),  and  were  charmed  by  its  interest  and 
beauty. 

The  impression  made  upon  the  visitor  by  this  Gibraltar 
of  America:  its  giddy  heights;  its  citadel  suspended,  as  it 
were,  in  the  air;  its  picturesque  steep  streets  and  frowning 
gateways;  and  the  splendid  views  which  burst  upon  the 
eye  at  every  turn :  is  at  once  unique  and  lasting.  It  is  a 
place  not  to  be  forgotten  or  mixed  up  in  the  mind  with 
other  places,  or  altered  for  a  moment  in  the  crowd  of  scenes 
a  traveller  can  recall.  Apart  from  the  realities  of  this  most 
picturesque  city,  there  are  associations  clustering  about  it 
which  would  make  a  desert  jich  in  interest.  The  danger- 
ous precipice  along  whose  rocky  front  Wolfe  and  his  brave 
companions  climbed  to  glory;  the  Plains  of  Abraham, 
where  he  received  his  mortal  wound;  the  fortress,  so  chiv- 
alrously defended  by  Montcalm;  and  his  soldier's  grave, 
dug  for  him  while  yet  alive,  by  the  bursting  of  a  shell; 
are  not  the  least  among  them,  or  among  the  gallant  inci- 
dents of  history. ,  That  is  a  noble  Monument  too,  and  wor- 
thy of  two  great  nations,  which  perpetuates  the  memory  of 
both  brave  generals,  and  on  which  their  names  are  jointly 
written. 

The  city  is  rich  in  public  institutions  and  in  Catholic 
churches  and  charities,  but  it  is  mainly  in  the  prospect 
from  the  site  of  the  Old  Government  House,  and  from  the 
Citadel,  that  its  surpassing  beauty  lies.  The  exquisite  ex- 
panse of  country,  rich  in  field  and  forest,  mountain-height 
and  water,  which  lies  stretched  out  before  the  view,  with 
miles  of  Canadian  villages,  glancing  in  long  white  streaks, 
like  veins  along  the  landscape;  the  motley  crowd  of  gables, 
roofs,  and  chimney-tops  in  the  old  hilly  town  immediately 
at  hand;  the  beautiful  St.  Lawrence  sparkling  and  flashing 
in  the  sunlight;  and  the  tiny  ships  below  the  rock  from 
which  you  gaze,  whose  distant  rigging  looks  like  spiders' 
webs  against  the  light,  while  casks  and  barrels  on  their 
decks  dwindle  into  toys,  and  busy  mariners  become  so  many 
puppets :  all  this,  framed  by  a  sunken  window  in  the  for- 
tress and  looked  at  from  the  shadowed  room  within,  forms 
one  of  the  brightest  and  the  most  enchanting  pictures  that 
the  eye  can  rest  upon. 

In  the  spring  of  the  year,  vast  numbers  of  emigrants 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  209 

who  have  newly  arrived  from  England  or  from  Ireland, 
pass  between  Quebec  and  Montreal  on  their  way  to  the 
backwoods  and  new  settlements  of  Canada.  If  it  be  an  en- 
tertaining lounge  (as  I  very  often  found  it)  to  take  a  morn- 
ing stroll  upon  the  quay  at  Montreal,  and  see  them  grouped 
in  hundreds  on  the  public  wharfs  about  their  chests  and 
boxes,  it  is  matter  of  deep  interest  to  be  their  fellow-pas- 
senger on  one  of  these  steamboats,  and,  mingling  with  the 
concourse,  see  and  hear  them  unobserved. 

The  vessel  in  which  we  returned  from  Quebec  to  Mon- 
treal was  crowded  with  them,  and  at  night  they  spread  their 
beds  between  decks  (those  who  had  beds,  at  least),  and 
slept  so  close  and  thick  about  our  cabin  door,  that  the  pas- 
sage to  and  fro  was  quite  blocked  up.  They  were  nearly 
all  English;  from  Gloucestershire  the  greater  part;  and  had 
had  a  long  winter-passage  out :  but  it  was  wonderful  to  see 
how  clean  the  children  had  been  kept,  and  how  untiring  in 
their  love  and  self-denial  all  the  poor  parents  were. 

Cant  as  we  may,  and  as  we  shall  to  the  end  of  all  things, 
it  is  very  much  harder  for  the  poor  to  be  virtuous  than  it 
is  for  the  rich;  and  the  good  that  is  in  them  shines  the 
brighter  for  it.  In  many  a  noble  mansion  lives  a  man,  the 
best  of  husbands  and  of  fathers,  whose  private  worth  in 
both  capacities  is  justly  lauded  to  the  skies.  But  bring 
him  here,  upon  this  crowded  deck.  Strip  from  his  fair 
young  wife  her  silken  dress  and  jewels,  unbind  her  braided 
hair,  stamp  early  wrinkles  on  her  brow,  pinch  her  pale 
cheek  with  care  and  much  privation,  array  her  faded  form 
in  coarsely  patched  attire,  let  there  be  nothing  but  his  love 
to  set  her  forth  or  deck  her  out,  and  you  shall  put  it  to  the 
proof  indeed.  So  change  his  station  in  the  world,  that  be 
shall  see  in  those  young  things  who  climb  about  his  knee : 
not  records  of  his  wealth  and  name :  but  little  wrestlers 
with  him  for  his  daily  bread;  so  many  poachers  on  his 
scanty  meal;  so  many  units  to  divide  his  every  sum  of 
comfort,  and  farther  to  reduce  its  small  amount.  In  lieu 
of  the  endearments  of  childhood  in  its  sweetest  aspect,  heap 
upon  him  all  its  pains  and  wants,  its  sicknesses  and  ills,  its 
f retf ulness,  caprice,  and  querulous  endurance :  let  its  prat- 
tle be,  not  of  engaging  infant  fancies,  but  of  cold,  and 
thirst,  and  hunger :  and  if  his  fatherly  affection  outlive  all 
this,  and  he  be  patient,  watchful,  tender;  careful  of  his 
children's  lives,  and  mindful  always  of  their  joys  and  sor- 
14 


210  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

rows;  then  send  him  back  to  Parliament,  and  Pulpit,  and 
to  Quarter  Sessions,  and  when  he  hears  fine  talk  of  the  de- 
pravity of  those  who  live  from  hand  to  mouth,  and  labour 
hard  to  do  it,  let  him  speak  up,  as  one  who  knows,  and  tell 
those  holders  forth  that  they,  by  parallel  with  such  a  class, 
should  be  High  Angels  in  their  daily  lives,  and  lay  but 
humble  siege  to  Heaven  at  last. 

Which  of  us  shall  say  what  he  would  be,  if  such  realir 
ties,  with  small  relief  or  change  all  through  his  days,  were 
his !  Looking  round  upon  these  people :  far  from  home, 
houseless,  indigent,  wandering,  weary  with  travel  and  hard 
living :  and  seeing  how  patiently  they  nursed  and  tended 
their  young  children ;  how  they  consulted  ever  their  wants 
first,  then  half  supplied  their  own;  what  gentle  ministers 
of  hope  and  faith  the  women  were;  how  the  men  profited 
by  their  example;  and  how  very,  very  seldom  even  a  mo- 
ment's petulance  or  harsh  complaint  broke  out  among  them : 
I  felt  a  stronger  love  and  honour  of  my  kind  come  glowing 
on  my  heart,  and  wished  to  God  there  had  been  many 
Atheists  in  the  better  part  of  human  nature  there,  to  read 
with  me  this  simple  lesson  in  the  book  of  Life. 

We  left  Montreal  for  New  York  again,  on  the  thirtieth 
of  May;  crossing  to  La  Prairie,  on  the  opposite  shore  of  the 
St.  Lawrence,  in  a  steamboat;  we  then  took  the  railroad 
to  St.  John's,  which  is  on  the  brink  of  Lake  Champlain. 
Our  last  greeting  in  Canada  was  from  the  English  officers 
in  the  pleasant  barracks  at  that  place  (a  class  of  gentlemen 
who  had  made  every  hour  of  our  visit  memorable  by  their 
hospitality  and  friendship);  and  with  "Eule  Britannia" 
sounding  in  our  ears,  soon  left  it  far  behind. 

But  Canada  has  held,  and  always  will  retain,  a  foremost 
place  in  my  remembrance.  Few  Englishmen  are  prepared 
to  find  it  what  it  is.  Advancing  quietly ;  old  diiferences 
settling  down,  and  being  fast  forgotten ;  public  feeling  and 
private  enterprise  alike  in  a  sound  and  wholesome  state ; 
nothing  of  flush  or  fever  in  its  system,  but  health  and  vig- 
our throbbing  in  its  steady  pulse :  it  is  full  of  hope  and 
promise.  To  me — who  had  been  accustomed  to  think  of  it 
as  something  left  behind  in  the  strides  of  advancing  so- 
ciety, as  something  neglected  and  forgotten,  slumbering 
and  wasting  in  its  sleep — the  demand  for  labour  and  the 
rates  of  wages;  the  busy  quays  of  Montreal;  the  vessels 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  211 

taking  in  their  cargoes,  and  discharging  them;  the  amount 
of  shipping  in  the  different  ports;  the  commerce,  roads, 
and  public  works,  all  made  to  last ;  the  respectability  and 
character  of  the  public  journals;  and  the  amount  of  rational 
comfort  and  happiness  which  honest  industry  may  earn : 
were  very  great  surprises.  The  steamboats  on  the  lakes,  in 
their  conveniences,  cleanliness,  and  safety;  in  the  gentle- 
manly character  and  bearing  of  their  captains;  and  in  the 
politeness  and  perfect  comfort  of  their  social  regulations; 
are  unsurpassed  even  by  the  famous  Scotch  vessels,  de- 
servedly so  much  esteemed  at  home.  The  inns  are  usually 
bad;  because  the  custom  of  boarding  at  hotels  is  not  so 
general  here  as  in  the  States,  and  the  British  officers,  who 
form  a  large  portion  of  the  society  of  every  town,  live 
chiefly  at  the  regimental  messes:  but  in  every  other  re- 
spect, the  traveller  in  Canada  will  find  as  good  provision 
for  his  comfort  as  in  any  place  I  know. 

There  is  one  American  boat — the  vessel  which  carried 
us  on  Lake  Champlain,  from  St.  John's  to  Whitehall — 
which  I  praise  very  highly,  but  no  more  than  it  deserves, 
when  I  say  that  it  is  superior  even  to  that  in  which  we 
went  from  Queenstown  to  Toronto,  or  to  that  in  which  we 
travelled  from  the  latter  place  to  Kingston,  or  I  have  no 
doubt  I  may  add  to  any  other  in  the  world.  This  steam- 
boat, which  is  called  the  Burlington,  is  a  perfectly  exqui- 
site achievement  of  neatness,  elegance,  and  order.  The 
decks  are  drawing-rooms;  the  cabins  are  boudoirs,  choicely 
furnished  and  adorned  with  prints,  pictures,  and  musical 
instruments;  every  nook  and  corner  in  the  vessel  is  a  per- 
fect curiosity  of  graceful  comfort  and  beautiful  contrivance. 
Captain  Sherman,  her  commander,  to  whose  ingenuity  and 
excellent  taste  these  results  are  so'lely  attributable,  has 
bravely  and  worthily  distinguished  himself  on  more  than 
one  trying  occasion :  not  least  among  them,  in  having  the 
moral  courage  to  carry  British  troops,  at  a  time  (during  the 
Canadian  rebellion)  when  no  other  conveyance  was  open 
to  them.  He  and  his  vessel  are  held  in  universal  respect, 
both  by  his  own  countrymen  and  ours;  and  no  man  ever 
enjoyed  the  popular  esteem,  who,  in  his  sphere  of  action, 
won  and  wore  it  better  than  this  gentleman. 

By  means  of  this  floating  palace  we  were  soon  in  the 
United  States  again,  and  called  that  evening  at  Burlington; 
a  pretty  town,  where  we  lay  an  hour  or  so.     We  reached 


212  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

Whitehall,  where  we  were  to  disembark,  at  six  next  morn- 
ing; and  miglit  have  done  so  earlier,  but  that  these  steam- 
boats lie  by  for  some  hours  in  the  night,  in  consequence  of 
the  lake  becoming  very  narrow  at  that  part  of  the  journey, 
and  difficult  of  navigation  in  the  dark.  Its  width  is  so  con- 
tracted at  one  point,  indeed,  that  they  are  obliged  to  Avarp 
round  by  means  of  a  rope. 

After  breakfasting  at  Whitehall,  we  took  the  stage-coach 
for  Albany :  a  large  and  busy  town,  where  we  arrived  be- 
tween five  and  six  o'clock  that  afternoon;  after  a  very  hot 
day's  journey,  for  we  were  now  in  the  height  of  summer 
again.  At  seven  we  started  for  New  York  on  board  a  great 
North  River  steamboat,  which  was  so  crowded  with  passen- 
gers that  the  upper  deck  was  like  the  box  lobby  of  a  thea- 
tre between  the  pieces,  and  the  lower  one  like  Tottenham 
Court  Road  on  a  Saturday  night.  But  we  slept  soundly, 
notwithstanding,  and  soon  after  five  o'clock  next  morning 
reached  New  York. 

Tarrying  here,  only  that  day  and  night,  to  recruit  after 
our  late  fatigues,  we  started  off  once  more  upon  our  last 
journey  in  America.  We  had  yet  five  days  to  spare  before 
embarking  for  England,  and  I  had  a  great  desire  to  see 
"the  Shaker  Village,"  which  is  peopled  by  a  religious  sect 
from  whom  it  takes  its  name. 

To  this  end,  we  went  up  the  North  River  again,  as  far 
as  the  town  of  Hudson,  and  there  hired  an  extra  to  carry 
us  to  Lebanon,  thirty  miles  distant:  and  of  course  another 
and  a  different  Lebanon  from  that  village  where  I  slept  on 
the  night  of  the  Prairie  trip. 

The  country  through  which  the  road  meandered,  was 
rich  and  beautiful;  the  weather  very  fine;  and  for  many 
miles  the  Kaatskill  Mountains,  where  Rip  Van  Winkle  and 
the  ghostly  Dutchmen  played  at  ninepins  one  memorable 
gusty  afternoon,  towered  in  the  blue  distance,  like  stately 
clouds.  At  one  point,  as  we  ascended  a  steep  hill,  athwart 
whose  base  a  railroad,  yet  constructing,  took  its  course,  we 
came  upon  an  Irish  colony.  With  means  at  hand  of  build- 
ing decent  cabins,  it  was  wonderful  to  see  how  clumsy, 
rough,  and  wretched,  its  hovels  were.  The  best  were  poor 
protection  from  the  weather;  the  worst  let  in  the  wind  and 
rain  through  wide  breaches  in  the  roofs  of  sodden  grass, 
and  in  the  walls  of  mud;  some  had  neither  door  nor  win- 
dow; some  had  nearly  fallen  down,  and  were  imperfectly 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  213 

propped  up  by  stakes  and  poles;  all  were  ruinous  and 
filthy.  Hideously  ugly  old  women  and  very  buxom  young 
ones,  pigs,  dogs,  men,  children,  babies,  pots,  kettles,  dung- 
hills, vile  refuse,  rank  straw,  and  standing  water,  all  wal- 
lowing together  in  an  inseparable  heap,  composed  t-he  fur- 
niture of  every  dark  and  dirty  hut. 

Between  nine  and  ten  o'clock  at  night,  we  arrived  at  Leb- 
anon: which  is  renowned  for  its  warm  baths,  and  for  ;i. 
great  hotel,  well  adapted,  I  have  no  doubt,  to  the  gregari- 
ous taste  of  those  seekers  after  health  or  pleasure  who  re- 
pair here,  but  inexpressibly  comfortless  to  me.  We  were 
shown  into  an  immense  apartment,  lighted  by  two  dim  cau- 
dles, called  the  drawing-room :  from  which  there  was  a  de- 
scent by  a  flight  of  steps,  to  another  vast  desert,  called  the 
dining-room:  our  bedchambers  were  among  certain  long 
rows  of  little  whitewashed  cells,  which  opened  from  either 
side  of  a  dreary  passage;  and  were  so  like  rooms  in  a  prison 
that  I  half  expected  to  be  locked  up  when  I  went  to  bed, 
and  listened  mvoluntarily  for  the  turning  of  the  key  on  the 
outside.  There  need  be  baths  somewhere  in  the  neighbour- 
hood, for  the  other  washing  arrangements  were  on  as  lim- 
ited a  scale  as  I  ever  saw,  even  in  America :  indeed,  these 
bedroooms  were  so  very  bare  of  even  such  common  luxuries 
as  chairs,  that  I  should  say  they  were  not  provided  with 
enough  of  anything,  but  that  I  bethink  myself  of  our  hav- 
ing been  most  bountifully  bitten  all  night. 

The  house  is  very  pleasantly  situated,  however,  and  we 
had  a  good  breakfast.  That  done,  we  went  to  visit  our 
place  of  destination,  which  was  some  two  miles  off,  and  the 
way  to  which  was  soon  indicated  by  a  finger-post,  whereon 
was  painted,  "To  the  Shaker  Village." 

As  we  rode  along,  we  passed  a  party  of  Shakers,  who 
were  at  work  upon  the  road;  who  wore  the  broadest  of  all 
broad-brimmed  hats;  and  were  in  all  visible  respects  such 
very  wooden  men,  that  I  felt  about  as  much  sympathy  for 
them,  and  as  much  interest  in  them,  as  if  they  had  been  so 
many  figure-heads  of  ships.  Presently  we  came  to  the  be- 
ginning of  the  village,  and  alighting  at  the  door  of  a  house 
where  the  Shaker  manufactures  are  sold,  and  which  is  the 
head-quarters  of  the  elders,  requested  permission  to  see  the 
Shaker  worship. 

Pending  the  conveyance  of  this  request  to  some  person 
in  authority,  we  walked  into  a  grim  room,  where  several 


214  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

grim  hats  were  hanging  on  grim  pegs,  and  the  time  was 
grimly  told  by  a  grim  clock,  which  uttered  every  tick  with 
a  kind  of  struggle,  as  if  it  broke  the  grim  silence  reluctant- 
ly, and  under  protest.  Ranged  against  the  wall  were  six 
or  eight  stiff  high-backed  chairs,  and  they  partook  so 
strongly  of  the  general  grimness,  that  one  would  much 
rather  have  sat  on  the  floor  than  incurred  the  smallest  obli- 
gation to  any  of  them. 

Presently,  there  stalked  into  this  apartment,  a  grim  old 
Shaker,  with  eyes  as  hard,  and  dull,  and  cold,  as  the  great 
round  metal  buttons  on  his  coat  and  waistcoat :  a  sort  of 
calm  goblin.  Being  informed  of  our  desire,  he  produced  a 
newspaper  wherein  the  body  of  elders,  whereof  he  was  a 
member,  had  advertised  but  a  few  days  before,  that  in  con- 
sequence of  certain  unseemly  interruptions  which  their 
worship  had  received  from  strangers,  their  chapel  was 
closed  to  the  public  for  the  space  of  one  year. 

As  nothing  was  to  be  urged  in  opposition  to  this  reason- 
able arrangement,  we  requested  leave  to  make  some  trifling 
purchases  of  Shaker  goods;  which  was  grimly  conceded. 
We  accordingly  repaired  to  a  store  on  the  same  house  and  on 
the  opposite  side  of  the  passage,  where  the  stock  was  pre- 
sided over  by  something  alive  in  a  russet^  case,  which  the 
elder  said  was  a  woman;  and  which  I  suppose  was  a  wom- 
an, though  I  should  not  have  suspected  it. 

On  the  opposite  side  of  the  road  was  their  place  of  wor- 
ship; a  cool  clean  edifice  of  wood,  with  large  windows  and 
green  blinds :  like  a  spacious  summer-house.  As  there  was 
no  getting  into  this  place,  and  nothing  was  to  be  done  but 
walk  up  and  down,  and  look  at  it  and  the  other  buildings 
in  the  village  (which  were  chiefly  of  wood,  painted  a  dark 
red  like  English  barns,  and  composed  of  many  stories  like 
English  factories),  I  have  nothing  to  communicate  to  the 
reader,  beyond  the  scanty  results  I  gleaned  the  while  our 
purchases  were  making. 

These  people  are  called  Shakers  from  their  peculiar  form 
of  adoration,  which  consists  of  a  dance,  performed  by  the 
men  and  women  of  all  ages,  who  arrange  themselves  for 
that  purpose  in  opposite  parties;  the  men  first  divesting 
themselves  of  their  hats  and  coats,  which  they  gravely 
hang  against  the  wall  before  they  begin;  and  tying  a  rib- 
bon round  their  shirt-sleeves,  as  though  they  were  going  to 
be  bled.    They  accompany  themselves  with  a  droning,  hum- 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  215 

ining  noise,  and  dance  until  they  are  quite  exhausted,  al- 
ternately advancing  and  retiring  in  a  preposterous  sort  of 
trot.  The  effect  is  said  to  be  unspeakably  absurd :  and  if 
I  may  judge  from  a  print  of  this  ceremony  which  I  have 
in  my  possession;  and  which  I  am  informed  by  those  who 
have  visited  the  chapel,  is  perfectly  accurate;  it  must  be 
infinitely  grotesque. 

They  are  governed  by  a  woman,  and  her  rule  is  under- 
stood to  be  absolute,  though  she  has  the  assistance  of  a 
council  of  elders.  She  lives,  it  is  said,  in  strict  seclusion, 
in  certain  rooms  above  the  chapel,  and  is  never  shown  to 
profane  eyes.  If  she  at  all  resemble  the  lady  who  presided 
over  the  store,  it  is  a  great  charity  to  keep  her  as  close  as 
possible,  and  I  cannot  too  strongly  express  my  perfect  con- 
currence in  this  benevolent  proceeding. 

All  the  possessions  and  revenues  of  the  settlement  are 
thrown  into  a  common  stock,  which  is  managed  by  the  el- 
ders. As  they  have  made  converts  among  people  who  were 
well  to  do  in  the  world,  and  are  frugal  and  thrifty,  it  is 
understood  that  this  fund  prospers :  the  more  especially  as 
they  have  made  large  purchases  of  land.  Nor  is  this  at 
Lebanon  the  only  Shaker  settlement:  there  are,  I  think, 
at  least,  three  others. 

They  are  good  farmers,  and  all  their  produce  is  eagerly 
purchased  and  highly  esteemed.  "  Shaker  seeds,"  "  Shaker 
herbs,"  and  "  Shaker  distilled  waters,"  are  commonly  an- 
nounced for  sale  in  the  shops  of  towns  and  cities.  They 
are  good  breeders  of  cattle,  and  are  kind  and  merciful  to 
the  brute  creation.  Consequently,  Shaker  beasts  seldom 
fail  to  find  a  ready  market. 

They  eat  and  drink  together,  after  the  Spartan  model,  at 
a  great  public  table.  There  is  no  union  of  .the  sexes,  and 
every  Shaker,  male  and  female,  is  devoted  to  a  life  of  celi- 
bacy. Eumour  has  been  busy  upon  this  theme,  but  here 
again  I  must  refer  to  the  lady  of  the  store,  and  say,  that  if 
many  of  the  sister  Shakers  resemble  her,  I  treat  all  such 
slander  as  bearing  on  its  face  the  strongest  marks  of  wild 
improbability.  But  that  they  take  as  proselytes,  persons 
so  young  that  they  cannot  know  their  own  minds,  and  can- 
not possess  much  strength  of  resolution  in  this  or  any  other 
respect,  I  can  assert  from  my  own  observation  of  the  ex- 
treme juvenility  of  certain  youthful  Shakers  whom  I  saw 
at  work  among  the  party  on  the  road. 


216  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

They  are  said  to  be  good  drivers  of  bargains,  but  to  be 
honest  and  just  in  their  transactions,  and  even  in  horse- 
dealing  to  resist  those  thievish  tendencies  which  would 
seem,  for  some  undiscovered  reason,  to  be  almost  insepa- 
rable from  that  branch  of  traffic.  In  all  matters  they  hold 
their  own  course  quietly,  live  in  their  gloomy  silent  com- 
monwealth, and  show  little  desire  to  interfere  with  other 
people. 

This  is  well  enough,  but  nevertheless  I  cannot,  I  con- 
fess, incline  towards  the  Shakers;  view  them  with  much 
favour,  or  extend  towards  them  any  very  lenient  construc- 
tion. I  so  abhor,  and  from  my  soul  detest  that  bad  spirit, 
no  matter  by  what  class  or  sect  it  may  be  entertained, 
which  would  strip  life  of  its  healthful  graces,  rob  youth  of 
its  innocent  pleasures,  pluck  from  maturity  and  age  their 
pleasant  ornaments,  and  make  existence  but  a  narrow  path 
towards  the  grave:  that  odious  spirit  which,  if  it  could 
have  had  full  scope  and  sway  upon  the  earth,  must  have 
blasted  and  made  barren  the  imaginations  of  the  greatest 
men,  and  left  them,  in  their  power  of  raising  up  endviriug 
images  before  their  fellow-creatures  yet  unboru,  no  better 
than  the  beasts :  that,  in  these  very  broad-brimmed  hats 
and  very  sombre  coats — in  stiff-necked  solemn-visaged 
piety,  in  short,  no  matter  what  its  garb,  whether  it  have 
cropped  hair  as  in  a  Shaker  village,  or  long  nails  as  in  a 
Hindoo  temple — I  recognize  the  worst  among  the  enemies 
of  Heaven  and  Earth,  who  turn  the  water  at  the  marriage 
feasts  of  this  poor  world,  not  into  wine  but  gall.  And  if 
there  must  be  people  vowed  to  crush  the  harmless  fancies 
and  the  love  of  innocent  delights  and  gaieties,  which 
are  a  part  of  human  nature :  as  much  a  part  of  it  as  any 
other  love  or  hope  that  is  our  common  portion :  let  them, 
for  me,  stand  openly  revealed  among  the  ribald  and 
licentious;  the  very  idiots  know  that  they  are  not  on  the 
Immortal  road,  and  will  despise  them,  and  avoid  them 
i-eadily. 

Leaving  the  Shaker  village  Avith  a  hearty  dislike  of  the 
old  Shakers,  and  a  hearty  pity  for  the  young  ones:  tem- 
pered by  the  strong  probability  of  their  running  away  as 
they  grow  older  and  wiser,  which  they  not  uncommonly 
do:  we  returned  to  Lebanon,  and  so  to  Hudson,  by  the  way 
we  had  come  upon  the  previous  day.  There,  we  took  the 
steamboat  down  the  North  River  towards  New  York,  but 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  217 

stopped,  some  four  hours'  journey  short  of  it,  at  West 
Point,  where  we  remained  that  night,  and  all  next  day, 
and  next  night  too. 

In  this  beautiful  place :  the  fairest  among  the  fair  and 
lovely  Highlands  of  the  North  River:  shut  in  by  deep 
green  heights  and  ruined  forts,  and  looking  down  upon  the 
distant  town  of  Newburgh,  along  a  glittering  path  of  sun- 
lit water,  with  here  and  there  a  skiff,  whose  white  sail  of- 
ten bends  on  some  new  tack  as  sudden  flaws  of  wind  come 
down  upon  her  from  the  gullies  in  the  hills :  hemmed  in, 
besides,  all  round  with  memories  of  Washington,  and  events 
of  the  revolutionary  war :  is  the  Military  School  of  America. 

It  could  not  stand  on  more  appropriate  ground,  and  any 
ground  more  beautiful  can  hardly  be.  The  course  of  edu- 
cation is  severe,  but  well  devised,  and  manly.  Through 
June,  July,  and  August,  the  young  men  encamp  upon  the 
spacious  plain  whereon  the  college  stands;  and  all  the  year 
their  military  exercises  are  performed  there,  daily.  The 
term  of  study  at  this  institution,  which  the  State  requires 
from  all  cadets,  is  four  years;  but,  whether  it  be  from  the 
rigid  nature  of  the  discipline,  or  the  national  impatience  of 
restraint,  or  both  causes  combined,  not  more  than  half  the 
number  who  begin  their  studies  here,  ever  remain  to  finish 
them. 

The  number  of  cadets  being  about  equal  to  that  of  the 
members  of  Congress,  one  is  sent  here  from  every  Congres- 
sional district:  its  member  influencing  the  selection. 
Commissions  in  the  service  are  distributed  on  the  same 
principle.  The  dwellings  of  the  various  Professors  are 
beautifully  situated;  and  there  is  a  most  excellent  hotel 
for  strangers,  though  it  has  the  two  drawbacks  of  being  a 
total  abstinence  house  (wines  and  spirits  being  forbidden  to 
the  students),  and  of  serving  the  public  meals  at  rather  un- 
comfortable hours:  to  wit,  breakfast  at  seven,  dinner  at 
one,  and  supper  at  sunset. 

The  beauty  and  freshness  of  this  calm  retreat,  in  the 
very  dawn  and  greenness  of  summer — it  was  then  the  be- 
ginning of  June — were  exquisite  indeed.  Leaving  it  upon 
the  sixth,  and  returning  to  New  York,  to  embark  for  Eng- 
land on  the  succeeding  day,  I  was  glad  to  think  that  among 
the  last  memorable  beauties  which  had  glided  past  us,  and 
softened  in  the  bright  perspective,  were  those  whose  pic- 
tures, traced  by  no  common  hand,  are  fresh  in  most  men's 


218  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

minds :  not  easily  to  grow  old,  or  fade  beneath  the  dust 
of  Time :  the  Kaatskill  Mountains,  Sleepy  Hollow,  and  the 
Tappaan  Zee. 


CHAPTER    THE   SIXTEENTH. 

THE  PASSAGE  HOME. 

I  NEVER  had  so  much  interest  before,  and  very  likely  I 
shall  never  have  so  much  interest  again,  in  the  state  of 
the  wind,  as  on  the  long  looked-for  morning  of  Tuesday 
the  Seventh  of  June.  Some  nautical  authority  had  told  me 
a  day  or  two  previous,  "  anything  with  west  in  it,  will  do;" 
so  when  I  darted  out  of  bed  at  daylight,  and  throwing  up 
the  window,  was  saluted  by  a  lively  breeze  from  the  north- 
west which  had  sprung  np  in  the  night,  it  came  upon  me 
so  freshly,  rustling  with  so  many  happy  associations,  that 
I  conceived  upon  the  spot  a  special  regard  for  all  airs  blow- 
ing from  that  quarter  of  the  compass,  which  I  shall  cher- 
ish, I  dare  say,  until  my  own  wind  has  breathed  its  last 
frail  puff,  and  withdraAvn  itself  for  ever  from  the  mortal 
calendar. 

The  pilot  had  not  been  slow  to  take  advantage  of  this 
favourable  weather,  and  the  ship  which  yesterday  had  been 
in  such  a  crowded  dock  that  she  might  have  retired  from 
trade  for  good  and  all,  for  any  chance  she  seemed  to  have 
of  going  to  sea,  was  now  full  sixteen  miles  away.  A  gal- 
lant sight  she  was,  when  we,  fast  gaining  on  her  in  a  steam- 
boat, saw  her  in  the  distance  riding  at  anchor:  her  tall 
masts  pointing  up  in  graceful  lines  against  the  sky,  and 
every  rope  and  spar  expressed  in  delicate  and  thread-like 
outline :  gallant,  too,  when  we,  being  all  aboard,  the  anchor 
came  up  to  the  sturdy  chorus  "  Cheerily  men,  oh  cheerily !  " 
and  she  followed  proudly  in  the  towing  steamboat's  wake : 
but  bravest  and  most  gallant  of  all,  when  the  tow-rope  be- 
ing cast  adrift,  the  canvas  fluttered  from  her  masts,  and 
spreading  her  white  wings  she  soared  away  upon  her  free 
and  solitary  course. 

In  the  after  cabin  we  were  only  fifteen  passengers  in  all, 
and  the  greater  part  were  from  Canada,  where  some  of  us 
had  known  each  other.     The  night  was  rough  and  squally. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  219 

so  were  the  next  two  days,  but  they  flew  by  quickly,  and 
we  were  soon  as  cheerful  and  as  snug  a  party,  with  an  hon- 
est, manly-hearted  captain  at  our  head,  as  ever  came  to  the 
resolution  of  being  mutually  agreeable,  on  land  or  water. 

We  breakfasted  at  eight,  lunched  at  twelve,  dined  at 
three,  and  took  our  tea  at  half -past  seven.  We  had  abun- 
dance of  amusements,  and  dinner  was  not  the  least  among 
them:  firstly,  for  its  own  sake;  secondly,  because  of  its 
extraordinary  length :  its  duration,  inclusive  of  all  the  long 
pauses  between  the  courses,  being  seldom  less  than  two 
hours  and  a  half;  which  was  a  subject  of  never-failing  en- 
tertainment. By  way  of  beguiling  the  tediousness  of 
these  banquets,  a  select  association  was  formed  at  the  lower 
end  of  the  table,  below  the  mast,  to  whose  distinguished 
president  modesty  forbids  me  to  make  any  further  allusion, 
which,  being  a  very  hilarious  and  jovial  institution,  was 
(prejudice  apart)  in  high  favour  with  the  rest  of  the  com- 
munity, and  particularly  with  a  black  steward,  who  lived 
for  three  weeks  in  a  broad  grin  at  the  marvellous  humour 
of  these  incorporated  worthies. 

Then  we  had  chess  for  those  who  played  it,  whist,  crib- 
bage,  books,  backgammon,  and  shovelboard.  In  all  weath- 
ers, fair  or  foul,  calm  or  windy,  we  were  every  one  on  deck, 
walking  up  and  down  in  pairs,  lying  in  the  boats,  leaning 
over  the  side,  or  chatting  in  a  lazy  group  together.  We 
had  no  lack  of  music,  for  one  played  the  accordion,  another 
the  violin,  and  another  (who  usually  began  at  six  o'clock 
A.M.)  the  key- bugle:  the  combined  effect  of  which  instru- 
ments, when  they  all  played  different  tunes,  in  different 
parts  of  the  ship,  at  the  same  time,  and  within  hearing 
of  each  other,  as  they  sometimes  did  (everybody  being  in- 
tensely satisfied  with  his  own  performance),  was  sublimely 
hideous. 

When  all  these  means  of  entertainment  failed,  a  sail 
would  heave  in  sight;  looming,  perhaps,  the  very  spirit  of 
a  ship,  in  the  misty  distance,  or  passing  us  so  close  that 
through  our  glasses  we  could  see  the  people  on  her  decks, 
,and  easily  make  out  her  name,  and  whither  she  was  bound. 
For  hours  together  we  could  watch  the  dolphins  and  por- 
poises as  they  rolled  and  leaped  and  dived  around  the  ves- 
sel; or  those  small  creatures  ever  on  the  wing,  the  Mother 
Carey's  chickens,  which  had  borne  us  company  from  New 
York  bay,  and  for  a  whole  fortnight  fluttered  about  the 


220  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

vessel's  stern.  For  some  days  we  had  a  dead  calm,  or 
very  light  winds,  during  which  the  crew  amused  themselves 
with  fishing,  and  hooked  an  unlucky  dolphin,  who  expired, 
in  all  his  rainbow  colours,  on  the  deck :  an  event  of  such 
importance  in  our  barren  calendar,  that  afterwards  we  dated 
from  the  dolphin,  and  made  the  day  on  which  he  died,  an 
era. 

Besides  all  this,  when  we  were  five  or  six  days  out,  there 
began  to  be  much  talk  of  icebergs,  of  which  wandering 
islands  an  unusual  number  had  been  seen  by  the  vessels 
that  had  come  into  New  York  a  day  or  two  before  we  left 
that  port,  and  of  whose  dangerous  neighbourhood  we  were 
warned  by  the  sudden  coldness  of  the  weather,  and  the 
sinking  of  the  mercury  in  the  barometer.  While  these 
tokens  lasted,  a  double  look-out  was  kept,  and  many  dismal 
tales  were  whispered,  after  dark,  of  ships  that  had  struck 
upon  the  ice  and  gone  down  in  the  night;  but  the  wind 
obliging  us  to  hold  a  southward  course,  we  saw  none  of 
them,  and  the  weather  soon  grew  bright  and  warm  again. 

The  observation  every  day  at  noon,  and  the  subsequent 
working  of  the  vessel's  course,  was,  as  may  be  supposed, 
a  feature  in  our  lives  of  paramount  importance;  nor  were 
there  wanting  (as  there  never  are)  sagacious  doubters  of 
the  captain's  calculations,  who,  so  soon  as  his  back  was 
turned,  would,  in  the  absence  of  compasses,  measure  the 
chart  with  bits  of  string,  and  ends  of  pocket-handkerchiefs, 
and  points  of  snuffers,  and  clearly  prove  him  to  be  wrong 
by  an  odd  thousand  miles  or  so.  It  was  very  edifying  to 
see  these  unbelievers  shake  their  heads  and  frown,  and 
hear  them  hold  forth  strongly  upon  navigation :  not  that 
they  knew  anything  about  it,  but  that  they  always  mis- 
trusted the  captain  in  calm  weather,  or  when  the  wind  was 
adverse.  Indeed,  the  mercury  itself  is  not  so  variable  as 
this  class  of  passengers,  whom  you  will  see,  when  the  ship 
is  going  nobly  through  the  water,  quite  pale  with  admira- 
tion, swearing  that  the  captain  beats  all  captains  ever 
known>  and  even  hinting  at  subscriptions  for  a  piece  of 
plate :  and  who,  next  morning,  when  the  breeze  has  lulled, 
and  all  the  sails  hang  useless  in  the  idle  air,  shake  their 
despondent  heads  again,  and  say,  with  screwed-up  lips, 
they  hope  that  captain  is  a  sailor,  but  they  shrewdly  doubt 
him;  that  they  do. 

It  even  became  an  occupation  in  the  calm,  to  wonder  when 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  221 

the  wind  would  spring  up  in  the  favourable  quarter,  where, 
it  was  clearly  shown  by  all  the  rules  and  precedents,  it 
ought  to  have  sprung  up  long  ago.  The  first  mate,  who 
whistled  for  it  zealously,  was  much  respected  for  his  perse- 
verance, and  was  regarded  even  by  the  unbelievers  as  a 
first-rate  sailor.  Many  gloomy  looks  would  be  cast  upward 
through  the  cabin  skylights  at  the  flapping  sails  while  din- 
ner was  in  progress;  and  some,  growing  bold  in  ruefulness, 
predicted  that  we  should  land  about  the  middle  of  July. 
There  are  always  on  board  ship,  a  Sanguine  One,  and  a 
Despondent  One..  The  latter  character  carried  it  hollow  at 
this  period  of  the  voyage,  and  triumphed  over  the  Sanguine 
One  at  every  meal,  by  inquiring  where  he  supposed  the  Great 
Western  (which  left  New  York  a  week  after  us)  was  now : 
and  where  he  supposed  the  '  Cuuard '  steam-packet  was 
now :  and  what  he  thought  of  sailing  vessels,  as  compared 
with  steamships  now :  and  so  beset  his  life  with  pestilent 
attacks  of  that  kind,  that  he  too  was  obliged  to  affect 
despondency,  for  very  peace  and  quietude. 

These  were  additions  to  the  list  of  entertaining  incidents, 
but  there  was  still  another  source  of  interest.  We  carried 
in  the  steerage  nearly  a  hundred  passengers :  a  little  world 
of  poverty :  and  as  we  came  to  know  individuals  among 
them  by  sight,  from  looking  down  upon  the  deck  where 
they  took  the  air  in  the  daytime,  and  cooked  their  food, 
and  very  often  ate  it  too,  we  became  curious  to  know  their 
histories,  and  with  what  expectations  they  had  gone  out  to 
America,  and  on  what  errands  they  were  going  home,  and 
what  their  circumstances  were.  The  information  we  got  on 
these  heads  from  the  carpenter,  who  had  charge  of  these 
people,  was  often  of  the  strangest  kind.  Some  of  them  had 
been  in  America  but  three  days,  some  but  three  months, 
and  some  had  gone  out  in  the  last  voyage  of  that  very  ship 
in  which  they  were  now  returning  home.  Others  had  sold 
their  clothes  to  raise  the  passage-money,  and  had  hardly 
rags  to  cover  them;  others  had  no  food,  and  lived  upon  the 
charity  of  the  rest;  and  one  man,  it  was  discovered  nearly 
at  the  end  of  the  voyage,  not  before — for  he  kept  his  secret 
close,  and  did  not  court  compassion — had  had  no  suste- 
nance whatever  but  the  bones  and  scraps  of  fat  he  took  from 
the  plates  used  in  the  after-cabin  dinner,  when  they  were 
put  out  to  be  washed. 

The  whole  system  of  shipping  and  conveying  these  unfor- 


222  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

tuiiate  persons  is  one  that  stands  in  need  of  thorough  re- 
vision. If  any  class  deserve  to  be. protected  and  assisted 
by  the  Government,  it  is  that  class  who  are  banished  from 
their  native  land  in  search  of  the  bare  means  of  subsistence. 
All  that  could  be  done  for  these  poor  people  by  the  great 
compassion  and  humanity  of  the  captain  and  officers  was 
done,  but  they  require  much  more.  The  law  is  bound,  at 
least  upon  the  English  side,  to  see  that  too  many  of  them 
are  not  put  on  board  one  ship :  and  that  their  accommoda- 
tions are  decent:  not  demoralising  and  profligate.  It  is 
bound,  too,  in  common  humanity,  to  declare  that  no  man 
shall  be  taken  on  board  without  his  stock  of  provisions  be- 
ing previously  inspected  by  some  proper  officer,  and  pro- 
nounced moderately  sufficient  for  his  support  upon  the 
voyage.  It  is  bound  to  provide,  or  to  require  that  there 
be  provided,  a  medical  attendant;  whereas  in  these  ships 
there  are  none,  though  sickness  of  adults,  and  deaths  of 
children,  on  the  passage,  are  matters  of  the  very  common- 
est occurrence.  Above  all  it  is  the  duty  of  auy  Govern- 
ment, be  it  monarchy  or  republic,  to  interpose  and  put  an 
end  to  that  system  by  which  a  firm  of  traders  in  emigrants 
purchase  of  the  owners  the  whole  'tween-decks  of  a  ship, 
and  send  on  board  as  many  wretched  people  as  they  can  lay 
hold  of,  on  any  terms  they  can  get,  without  the  smallest 
reference  to  the  conveniences  of  the  steerage,  the  number 
of  berths,  the  slightest  separation  of  the  sexes,  or  anything 
but  their  own  immediate  profit.  Nor  is  even  this  the  worst 
of  the  vicious  system:  for,  certain  crimping  agents  of 
these  houses,  who  have  a  percentage  on  all  the  passengers 
they  inveigle,  are  constantly  travelling  about  those  dis- 
tricts where  poverty  and  discontent  are  rife,  and  tempt- 
ing the  credulous  into  more  misery,  by  holding  out  mon- 
strous inducements  to  emigration  which  never  can  be 
realised. 

The  history  of  every  family  we  had  on  board  was  pretty 
much  the  same.  After  hoarding  up,  and  borrowing,  and 
begging,  and  selling  everything  to  pay  the  passage,  they 
had  gone  out  to  New  York,  expecting  to  find  its  streets 
paved  with  gold;  and  had  found  them  paved  with  very 
hard  and  very  real  stones.  Enterprise  was  dull;  labourers 
were  not  wanted;  jobs  of  work  were  to  be  got,  but  the  pay- 
ment was  not.  They  were  coming  back,  even  poorer  than 
they  went.     One  of  them  was  carrying  an  open  letter  from 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  223 

a  young  English  artisan,  who  had  been  in  New  York  a  fort- 
night, to  a  friend  near  Manchester,  whom  he  strongly 
urged  to  follow  him.  One  of  the  officers  brought  it  to  me 
as  a  curiosity.  "  This  is  the  country,  Jem,"  said  the  writer. 
"I  like  America.  There  is  no  despotism  here;  that's  the 
great  thing.  Employment  of  all  sorts  is  going  a-begging, 
and  wages  are  capital.  You  have  only  to  choose  a  trade, 
Jem,  and  be  it.  I  haven't  made  choice  of  one  yet,  but  I 
shall  soon.  At  present  1  haven't  quite  made  up  mind 
whether  to  be  a  carpenter — or  a  tailor." 

There  was  yet  another  kind  of  passenger,  and  but  one 
more,  who,  in  the  calm  and  the  light  winds,  was  a  constant 
theme  of  conversation  and  observation  among  us.  This  was 
an  English  sailor,  a  smart,  thorough-built,  English  man-of- 
war' s-nian  from  his  hat  to  his  shoes,  who  was  serving  in 
the  American  Navy,  and  having  got  leave  of  absence  was 
on  his  way  home  to  see  his  friends.  When  he  presented 
himself  to  take  and  pay  for  his  passage,  it  had  been  sug- 
gested to  him  that  being  an  able  seaman  he  might  as  well 
work  it  and  save  the  money,  but  this  piece  of  advice  he 
very  indignantly  rejected:  saying.  He'd  be  damned  but  for 
once  he'd  go  aboard  ship,  as  a  gentleman.  Accordingly, 
they  took  his  money,  but  he  no  sooner  came  aboard,  than 
he  stowed  his  kit  in  the  forecastle,  arranged  to  mess  with 
the  crew,  and  the  very  first  time  the  hands  were  turned- 
up,  went  aloft  like  a  cat,  before  anybody.  And  all  through 
the  passage  there  he  was,  first  at  the  braces,  outermost  on 
the  yards,  perpetually  lending  a  hand  everywhere,  but  al- 
ways with  a  sober  dignity  in  his  manner,  and  a  sober  grin 
on  his  face,  which  plainly  said,  "  I  do  it  as  a  gentleman. 
For  my  own  pleasure,  mind  you !  " 

At  length,  and  at  last,  the  promised  wind  came  up  in 
right  good  earnest,  and  away  we  went  before  it,  with  every 
stitch  of  canvas  set,  slashing  through  the  water  nobly. 
There  was  a  grandeur  in  the  motion  of  the  splendid  ship, 
as  overshadowed  by  her  mass  of  sails,  she  rode  at  a  furious 
pace  upon  the  waves,  which  filled  one  with  an  indescribable 
sense  of  pride  and  exultation.  As  she  plunged  into  a  foam- 
ing valley,  how  I  loved  to  see  the  green  waves,  bordered 
deep  with  white,  come  rushing  on  astern,  to  buoy  her  up- 
ward at  their  pleasure,  and  curl  about  her  as  she  stooped 
again,  but  always  own  her  for  their  haughty  mistress  still ! 
On,  on  we  flew,  with  changing  lights  upon  the  water,  being 


224  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

now  in  the  blessed  region  of  fleecy  skies;  a  bright  sun 
lighting  us  by  day,  and  a  bright  moon  by  night;  the  vane 
pointing  directly  homeward,  alike  the  truthful  index  to  the 
favouring  wind  and  to  our  cheerful  hearts;  until  at  sunrise, 
one  fair  Monday  morning — the  twenty-seventh  of  June,  I 
shall  not  easily  forget  the  day — there  lay  before  us,  old 
Cape  Clear,  God  bless  it,  showing,  in  the  mist  of  early 
morning,  like  a  cloud:  the  brightest  and  most  welcome 
cloud,  to  us,  that  ever  hid  the  face  of  Heaven's  fallen  sis- 
ter—Home. 

Dim  speck  as  it  was  in  the  wide  prospect,  it  made  the 
sunrise  a  more  cheerful  sight,  and  gave  to  it  that  sort  of 
human  interest  which  it  seems  to  want  at  sea.  There,  as 
elsewhere,  the  return  of  day  is  inseparable  from  some  sense 
of  renewed  hope  and  gladness;  but  the  light  shining  on  the 
dreary  waste  of  water,  and  showing  it  in  all  its  vast  extent 
of  loneliness,  presents  a  solemn  spectacle,  which  even 
night,  veiling  it  in  darkness  and  uncertainty,  does  not  sur- 
pass. The  rising  of  the  moon  is  more  in  keeping  with  the 
solitaiy  ocean;  and  has  an  air  of  melancholy  grandeur, 
which  in  its  soft  and  gentle  influence,  seems  to  comfort 
while  it  saddens.  I  recollect  when  I  was  a  very  young 
child  having  a  fancy  that  the  reflection  of  the  moon  in  wa- 
ter was  a  path  to  Heaven,  trodden  by  the  spirits  of  good 
people  on  their  way  to  God;  and  this  old  feeling  often 
came  over  me  again,  when  I  watched  it  on  a  tranquil  night 
at  sea. 

The  wind  was  very  light  on  this  same  Monday  morning, 
but  it  was  still  in  the  right  quarter,  and  so,  by  slow  de- 
grees, we  left  Cape  Clear  behind,  and  sailed  along  within 
sight  of  the  coast  of  Ireland.  And  how  merry  we  all  were, 
and  how  loyal  to  the  George  Washington,  and  how  full  of 
mutual  congratulations,  and  how  venturesome  in  predicting 
the  exact  hour  at  which  we  should  arrive  at  Liverpool,  may 
be  easily  imagined  and  readily  understood.  Also,  how 
heartily  we  drank  the  captain's  health  that  day  at  dinner; 
and  how  restless  we  became  about  packing  up :  and  how 
two  or  three  of  the  most  sanguine  spirits  rejected  the  idea 
of  going  to  bed  at  all  that  night  as  something  it  was  not 
worth  while  to  do,  so  near  the  shore,  but  went  nevertheless, 
and  slept  soundl}^;  and  how  to  be  so  near  our  journey's 
end,  was  like  a  pleasant  dream,  from  which  one  feared  to 
wake. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  225 

The  friendly  breeze  freshened  again  next  day,  and  on  we 
went  once  more  before  it,  gallantly:  descrying  now  and 
then  an  English  ship  going  homeward  under  shortened  sail, 
while  we  with  every  inch  of  canvas  crowded  on,  dashed 
gaily  past,  and  left  her  far  behind.  Towards  evening,  the 
weather  turned  hazy,  with  a  drizzling  rain;  and  soon  be- 
came so  thick,  that  we  sailed,  as  it  were,  in  a  cloud.  Still 
we  swept  onward  like  a  phantom  ship,  and  many  an  eager 
eye  glanced  up  to  where  the  look-out  on  the  mast  kept 
watch  for  Holyhead. 

At  length  his  long-expected  cry  was  heard,  and  at  the 
same  moment  there  shone  out  from  the  haze  and  mist 
ahead,  a  gleaming  light,  which  presently  was  gone,  and 
soon  returned,  and  soon  was  gone  again.  Whenever  it 
came  back,  the  eyes  of  all  on  board  brightened  and  spar- 
kled like  itself :  and  there  we  all  stood,  watching  this  re- 
volving light  upon  the  rock  at  Holyhead,  and  praising  it 
for  its  brightness  and  its  friendly  warning,  and  lauding 
it,  in  short,  above  all  other  signal  lights  that  ever  were 
displayed,  until  it  once  more  glimmered  faintly  in  the 
distance,  far  behind  us. 

Then  it  was  time  to  fire  a  gun,  for  a  pilot;  and  almost 
before  its  smoke  had  cleared  away,  a  little  boat  with  a  light 
at  her  masthead  came  bearing  down  upon  us,  through  the 
darkness,  swiftly.  And  presently,  our  sails  being  backed, 
she  ran  alongside;  and  the  hoarse  pilot,  wrapped  and  muf- 
fled in  pea-coats  and  shawls  to  the  very  bridge  of  his 
weather-ploughed-up  nose,  stood  bodily  among  us  on  the 
deck.  And  I  think  if  that  pilot  had  wanted  to  borrow  fifty 
pounds  for  an  indefinite  period  on  no  security,  we  should 
have  engaged  to  lend  it  him,  among  us,  before  his  boat 
had  dropped  astern,  or  (which  is  the  same  thing)  before 
every  scrap  of  news  in  the  paper  he  brought  with  him  had 
become  the  common  property  of  all  on  board. 

We  turned  in  pretty  late  that  night,  and  turned  out 
pretty  soon  next  morning.  By  six  o'clock  we  clustered 
on  the  deck,  prepared  to  go  ashore;  and  looked  upon  the 
spires,  and  roofs,  and  smoke,  of  Liverpool.  By  eight  we 
all  sat  down  in  one  of  its  Hotels,  to  eat  and  drink  together 
for  the  last  time.  And  by  nine  we  had  shaken  hands  all 
round,  and  broken  up  our  social  company  for  ever. 

The  country,  by  the  railroad,  seemed,  as  we  rattled 
through  it,  like  a  luxuriant  garden.  The  beauty  of  the 
16 


226  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

fields  (so  small  they  looked!),  the  hedgerows,  and  the 
trees;  the  pretty  cottages,  the  beds  of  flowers,  the  old 
churchyards,  the  antique  houses,  and  every  well-known  ob- 
ject :  the  exquisite  delights  of  that  one  journey,  crowding 
in  the  short  compass  of  a  summer's  day  the  joy  of  many 
years,  and  winding  up  with  Home  and  all  that  makes  it 
dear :  no  tongue  can  tell,  or  pen  of  mine  describe. 


CHAPTER  THE   SEVENTEENTH. 

SLAVERY. 

The  upholders  of  slavery  in  America — of  the  atrocities 
of  which  system,  I  shall  not  write  one  word  for  which  I 
have  not  ample  proof  and  warrant — may  be  divided  into 
three  great  classes. 

The  first  are  those  more  moderate  and  rational  owners  of 
human  cattle,  who  have  come  into  the  possession  of  them 
as  so  many  coins  in  their  trading  capital,  but  who  admit 
the  frightful  nature  of  the  Institution  in  the  abstract,  and 
perceive  the  dangers  to  society  with  which  it  is  fraught : 
dangers  which  however  distant  they  may  be,  or  howsoever 
tardy  in  their  coming  on,  are  as  certain  to  fall  upon  its 
guilty  head,  as  is  the  Day  of  Judgment. 

The  second  consists  of  all  those  owners,  breeders,  users, 
buyers  and  sellers  of  slaves,  who  will,  imtil  the  bloody 
chapter  has  a  bloody  end,  own,  breed,  use,  buy,  and  sell 
them  at  all  hazards ;  who  doggedly  deny  the  horrors  of  the 
system,  in  the  teeth  of  such  a  mass  of  evidence  as  never 
was  brought  to  bear  on  any  other  subject,  and  to  which  the 
experience  of  every  day  contributes  its  immense  amount; 
who  would  at  this  or  any  other  moment,  gladly  involve 
America  in  a  war,  civil  or  foreign,  provided  that  it  had  for 
its  sole  end  and  object  the  assertion  of  their  right  to  per- 
petuate slavery,  and  to  whip  and  work  and  torture  slaves, 
unquestioned  by  any  human  authority,  and  unassailed  by 
any  human  power;  who,  when  they  speak  of  Freedom, 
mean  the  Freedom  to  oppress  their  kind,  and  to  be  savage, 
merciless,  and  cruel;  and  of  whom  every  man  on  his  own 
ground,  in  republican  America,  is  a  more  exacting,  and  a 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  227 

sterner,  and  a  less  responsible  despot  than  the  Caliph  Ha- 
roun  A.lraschid  in  his  angry  robe  of  scarlet. 

The  third,  and  not  the  least  numerous  or  influential,  is 
composed  of  all  that  delicate  gentility  which  cannot  bear 
a  superior,  and  cannot  brook  an  equal;  of  that  class  whose 
Republicanism  means,  "I  will  not  tolerate  a  man  above 
me:  and  of  those  below,  none  must  approach  too  near;  " 
whose  pride,  in  a  land  where  voluntary  servitude  is  shunned 
as  a  disgrace,  must  be  ministered  to  by  slaves;  and  whose  in- 
alienable rights  can«only  have  their  growth  in  negro  wrongs. 

It  has  been  sometimes  urged  that,  in  the  unavailing  ef- 
forts which  have  been  made  to  advance  the  cause  of  Human 
Freedom  in  the  republic  of  America  (strange  cause  for  his- 
tory to  treat  of !),  suificient  regard  has  not  been  had  to  the 
existence  of  the  first  class  of  persons;  and  it  has  been  con- 
tended that  they  are  hardly  used,  in  being  confounded  with 
tlie  second.  This  is,  no  doubt,  the  case;  noble  instances 
of  pecuniary  and  personal  sacrifice  have  already  had  their 
growth  among  them;  and  it  is  much  to  be  regretted  that 
the  gulf  between  them  and  the  advocates  of  emancipation 
should  have  been  widened  and  deepened  by  any  means: 
the  rather,  as  there  are,  beyond  dispute,  among  these  slave- 
owners, many  kind  masters  who  are  tender  in  the  exercise 
of  their  unnatural  power.  Still,  it  is  to  be  feared  that  this 
injustice  is  inseparable  from  the  state  of  things  with  which 
humanity  and  truth  are  called  upon  to  deal.  Slavery  is  not 
a  whit  the  more  endurable  because  some  hearts  are  to  be 
found  which  can  partially  resist  its  hardening  influencesj 
nor  can  the  indignant  tide  of  honest  wrath  stand  still, 
because  in  its  onward  course  it  overwhelms  a  few  who  are 
comparatively  innocent,  among  a  host  of  guilty. 

The  ground  most  commonly  taken  by  these  better  men 
among  the  advocates  of  slavery,  is  this :  "  It  is  a  bad  sys- 
tem; and  for  myself  I  would  willingly  get  rid  of  it,  if  I 
could;  most  willingly.  But  it  is  not  so  bad,  as  you  in  Eng- 
land take  it  to  be.  You  are  deceived  by  the  representations 
of  the  emancipationists.  The  greater  part  of  my  slaves  are 
much  attached  to  me.  You  will  say  that  I  do  not  allow 
them  to  be  severely  treated;  but  I  will  put  it  to  you  whether 
you  believe  that  it  can  be  a  general  practice  to  treat  them  in- 
humanly, when  it  would  impair  their  value,  and  would  be 
obviously  against  the  interests  of  their  masters." 

Is  it  tibe  interest  of  any  man  to  steal,  to  game,  to  waste 


228  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

his  health  and  mental  faculties  by  drunkenness,  to  lie,  for- 
swear himself,  indulge  hatred,  seek  desperate  revenge,  or 
do  murder?  No.  All  these  are  roads  to  ruin.  And  why, 
then,  do  men  tread  them?  Because  such  inclinations  are 
among  the  vicious  qualities  of  mankind.  Blot  out,  ye 
friends  of  slavery,  from  the  catalogue  of  human  passions, 
brutal  lust,  cruelty,  and  the  abuse  of  irresponsible  power 
(of  all  earthly  temptations  the  most  difficult  to  be  resisted), 
and  when  ye  have  done  so,  and  not  before,  we  will  inquire 
whether  it  be  the  interest  of  a  master^ to  lash  and  maim 
the  slaves,  over  whose  lives  and  limbs  he  has  an  absolute 
control. 

But  again :  this  class,  together  with  that  last  one  I  have 
named,  the  miserable  aristocracy  spawned  of  a  false  repub- 
lic, lift  up  their  voices  and  exclaim  "  Public  opinion  is  all- 
sufficient  to  prevent  such  cruelty  as  you  denounce."  Pub- 
lic opinion!  Why,  public  opinion  in  the  slave  States  is 
slavery,  is  it  not?  Public  opinion,  in  the  slave  States,  has 
delivered  the  slaves  over,  to  the  gentle  mercies  of  their 
masters.  Public  opinion  has  made  the  laws,  and  denied 
them  legislative  protection  Public  opinion  has  knotted 
the  lash,  heated  the  branding-iron,  loaded  the  rifle,  and 
shielded  the  murderer.  Public  opinion  threatens  the  abo- 
litionist with  death,  if  he  venture  to  the  South;  and  drags 
him  with  a  rope  about  his  middle,  in  broad  unblushing 
noon,  through  the  first  city  in  the  East.  Public  opinion 
has,  within  a  few  years,  burned  a  slave  alive  at  a  slow  fire 
in  the  city  of  St  Louis;  and  public  opinion  has  to  this  day 
maintained  upon  the  bench  that  estimable  Judge  who 
charged  the  Jury,  impanelled  there  to  try  his  murderers, 
that  their  most  horrid  deed  was  an  act  of  public  opinion, 
and  being  so,  must  not  be  punished  by  the  laws  the  public 
sentiment  had  made  Public  opinion  hailed  this  doctrine 
with  a  howl  of  wild  applause,  and  set  the  prisoners  free,  to 
walk  the  city,  men  of  mark,  and  influence;  and  station,  as 
they  had  been  before. 

Public  opinion !  what  class  of  men  have  an  immense  pre- 
ponderance over  the  rest  of  the  community,  in  their  power 
of  representing  public  opinion  in  the  Legislature?  the  slave 
owners.  They  send  from  their  twelve  States  one  hundred 
members,  while  the  fourteen  free  States,  with  a  free  pop- 
ulation nearly  double,  return  but  a  hundred  and  forty- two. 
Before  whom  do  the  Presidential  candidates  bow  down  the 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  229 

most  humbly,  on  whom  do  they  fawn  the  most  fondly,  and 
for  whose  tastes  do  they  cater  the  most  assiduously  in  their 
servile  protestations?     The  slave  owners  always. 

Public  opinion !  hear  the  public  opinion  of  the  free  South, 
as  expressed  by  its  own  members  in  the  House  of  Repre- 
sentatives at  Washington.  "I  have  a  great  respect  for  tlie 
chair,"  quoth  North  Carolina,  "I  have  a  great  respect  for 
the  chair  as  an  officer  of  the  House,  and  a  great  respect  for 
him  personally;  nothing  but  that  respect  prevents  me  from 
rushing  to  the  table  and  tearing  that  petition  which  has 
just  been  presented  for  the  abolition  of  slavery  in  the  Dis- 
trict of  Columbia,  to  pieces." — "I  warn  the  abolitionists," 
says  South  Carolina,  "ignorant,  infuriated  barbarians  as 
they  are,  that  if  chance  shall  throw  any  of  them  into  our 
hands,  he  may  expect  a  felon's  death." — "Let  an  aboli- 
tionist come  within  the  borders  of  South  Carolina,"  cries  a 
third;  mild  Carolina's  colleague;  "and  if  we  can  catch 
him,  we  will  try  him,  and  notwithstanding  the  interference 
of  all  the  governments  on  earth,  including  the  Federal  Gov- 
ernment, we  will  HANG  him." 

Public  opinion  has  made  this  law. — It  has  declared  that 
in  Washington,  in  that  city  which  takes  its  name  from  the 
father  of  American  liberty,  any  justice  of  the  peace  may 
bind  with  fetters  any  negro  passing  down  the  street  and 
thrust  him  into  jail :  no  offence  on  the  black  man's  part  is 
necessary.  The  justice  says,  "  I  choose  to  think  this  man 
a  runaway ;  "  and  locks  him  up  Public  opinion  impowers 
the  man  of  law  when  this  is  done,  to  advertise  the  negro  in 
the  newspapers,  warning  his  owner  to  come  and  claim  him, 
or  he  will  be  sold  to  pay  the  jail  fees.  But  supposing  he 
is  a  free  black,  and  has  no  owner,  it  may  naturally  be  pre- 
sumed that  he  is  set  at  liberty.  No :  he  is  sold  to  recom- 
pense his  JAILER  This  has  been  done  again,  and  again, 
and  again.  He  has  no  means  of  proving  his  freedom;  has 
no  adviser,  messenger,  or  assistance  of  any  sort  or  kind; 
no  investigation  into  his  case  is  made,  or  inquiry  instituted. 
He,  a  free  man,  who  may  have  served  for  years,  and 
bought  his  liberty,  is  thrown  into  jail  on  no  process,  for  no 
crime,  and  on  no  pretence  of  crime :  and  is  sold  to  pay  the 
jail  fees  This  seems  incredible,  even  of  America,  but  it 
is  the  law. 

Public  opinion  is  deferred  to,  in  such  cases  as  the  follow- 
ing; which  is  headed  in  the  newspapers: — 


230  AMERICAN  NOTES. 


** Interesting  Law-Case. 

"An  interesting  case  is  now  on  trial  in  the  Supreme 
Court,  arising  out  of  the  following  facts.  A  gentleman  re- 
siding in  Maryland  had  allowed  an  aged  pair  of  his  slaves, 
substantial  though  not  legal  freedom  for  several  years. 
While  thus  living,  a  daughter  was  born  to  them,  who  grew 
up  in  the  same  liberty,  until  she  married  a  free  negro,  and 
went  with  him  to  reside  in  Pennsylvania.  They  had  sev- 
eral children,  and  lived  unmolested  until  the  original  owner 
died,  when  his  heir  attempted  to  regain  them;  but  the 
magistrate  before  whom  they  were  brought,  decided  that 
he  had  no  jurisdiction  in  the  case.  The  owner  seized  the 
woman  and  her  children  in  the  night,  and  carried  them  to 
Maryland." 

"Cd,sh  for  negroes,"  "cash  for  negroes,"  "cash  for  ne- 
groes," is  the  heading  of  advertisements  in  great  capitals 
down  the  long  columns  of  the  crowded  journals.  Wood- 
cuts of  a  runaway  negro  with  manacled  hands,  crouching 
beneath  a  bluff  pursuer  in  top  boots^  who,  having  caught 
him,  grasps  him  by  the  throat,  agreeably  diversify  the 
pleasant  text.  The  leading  article  protests  against  "  that 
abominable  and  hellish  doctrine  of  abolition,  which  is  re- 
pugnant alike  to  every  law  of  God  and  nature."  The  deli- 
cate mama,  who  smiles  her  acquiescence  in  this  sprightly 
writing  as  she  reads  the  paper  in  her  cool  piazza,  quiets 
her  youngest  child  who  clings  about  her  skirts,  by  promis- 
ing the  boy  "a  whip  to  beat  the  little  niggers  with." — But 
the  negroes,  little  and  big,  are  protected  by  public  opinion. 

Let  us  try  this  public  opinion  by  another  test,  which  is 
important  in  three  points  of  view:  first,  as  showing  how 
desperately  timid  of  the  public  opinion  slave  owners  are, 
in  their  delicate  descriptions  of  fugitive  slaves  in  widely 
circulated  newspapers;  secondly,  as  showing  how  perfectly 
contented  the  slaves  are,  and  how  very  seldom  they  run 
away;  thirdly,  as  exhibiting  their  entire  freedom  from  scar, 
or  blemish,  or  any  mark  of  cruel  infliction,  as  their  pictures 
are  drawn,  not  by  lying  abolitionists,  but  by  their  own 
truthful  masters. 

The  following  are  a  few  specimens  of  the  advertisements 
in  the  public  papers.    It  is  only  four  years  since  the  oldest 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  231 

among  them  appeared;  and  others  of  the  same  nature  con- 
tinue to  be  published  every  day,  in  shoals. 

"Ran  away,  Negress  Caroline.  Had  on  a  collar  with 
one  prong  turned  down." 

"  Ran  away,  a  black  woman,  Betsy.  Had  an  iron  bar  on 
her  right  leg." 

"Ran  away,  the  negro  Manuel.  Much  marked  with 
irons." 

"  Ran  away,  the  negress  Fanny.  Had  on  an  iron  band 
about  her  neck." 

"  Ran  away,  a  negro  boy  about  twelve  years  old.  Had 
round  his  neck  a  chain  dog-collar  with  *  De  Lampert '  en- 
graved on  it." 

"  Ran  away,  the  negro  Hown.  Has  a  ring  of  iron  on  his 
left  foot.  Also,  Grise,  his  wife,  having  a  ring  and  chain  on 
the  left  leg." 

"  Ran  away,  a  negro  boy  named  James.  Said  boy  was 
ironed  when  he  left  me." 

"Committed  to  jail,  a  man  who  calls  his  name  John. 
He  has  a  clog  of  iron  on  his  right  foot  which  will  weigh 
four  or  five  pounds." 

"Detained  at  the  police  jail,  the  negro  wench,  Myra. 
Has  several  marks  of  lashing,  and  has  irons  on  her  feet." 

"Ran  away,  a  negro  woman  and  two  children:  a  few 
days  before  she  went  off,  I  burnt  her  with  a  hot  iron,  on 
the  left  side  of  her  face.     I  tried  to  make  the  letter  M." 

"  Ran  away,  a  negro  man  named  Henry;  his  left  eye  out, 
some  scars  from  a  dirk  on  and  under  his  left  arm,  and 
much  scarred  with  the  whip." 

"  One  hundred  dollars  reward,  for  a  negro  fellow,  Pom- 
pey,  40  years  old.     He  is  branded  on  the  left  jaw." 

"  Committed  to  jail,  a  negro  man.  Has  no  toes  on  the 
left  foot." 

"  Ran  away,  a  negro  woman  named  Rachel.  Has  lost 
all  her  toes  except  the  large  one." 

"Ran  away,  Sam.  He  was  shot  a  short  time  since 
through  the  hand,  and  has  several  shots  in  his  left  arm  and 
side." 

"  Ran  away,  my  negro  man  Dennis.  Said  negro  has  been 
shot  in  the  left  arm  between  the  shoulder  and  elbow,  whiqh 
has  paralysed  the  left  hand." 

"Ran  away,  my  negro  man  named  Simon.  He  has  been 
shot  badly,  in  his  back  and  right  arm." 


232  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

"  Ran  away,  a  negro  named  Arthur.  Has  a  considerable 
scar  across  his  breast  and  each  arm,  made  by  a  knife;  loves 
to  talk  much  of  the  goodness  of  God." 

"  Twenty-five  dollars  reward  for  my  man  Isaac.  He  has 
a  scar  on  his  forehead,  caused  by  a  blow;  and  one  on  his 
back,  made  by  a  shot  from  a  pistol," 

"  Ran  away,  a  negro  girl  called  Mary.  Has  a  small  scar 
over  her  eye,  a  good  many  teeth  missing,  the  letter  A  is 
branded  on  her  cheek  and  forehead." 

"  Ran  away,  negro  Ben.  Has  a  scar  on  his  right  hand ; 
his  thumb  and  forefinger  being  injured  by  being  shot  last 
fall.  A  part  of  the  bone  came  out.  He  has  also  one  or 
two  large  scars  on  his  back  and  hips." 

"Detained  at  the  jail,  a  mulatto,  named  Tom.  Has  a 
scar  on  the  right  cheek,  and  appears  to  have  been  burned 
with  powder  on  the  face." 

"  Ran  away,  a  negro  man  named  Ned.  Three  of  his  fin- 
gers are  drawn  into  the  palm  of  his  hand  by  a  cut.  Has  a 
scar  on  the  back  of  his  neck,  nearly  half  round,  done  by  a 
knife." 

"  Was  committed  to  jail,  a  negro  man.  Says  his  name  is 
Josiah.  His  back  very  much  scarred  by  the  whip;  and 
branded  on  the  thigh  and  hips  in  three  or  four  places,  thus 
(J  M).     The  rim  of  his  right  ear  has  been  bit  or  cut  off." 

"Fifty  dollars  reward,  for  my  fellow  Edward.  He  has 
a  scar  on  the  corner  of  his  mouth,  two  cuts  on  and  under 
his  arm,  and  the  letter  E  on  his  arm." 

"  Ran  away,  negro  boy  Ellie.  Has  a  scar  on  one  of  his 
arms  from  the  bite  of  a  dog." 

"  Ran  away,  from  the  plantation  of  James  Surgette,  the 
following  negroes:  Randal,  has  one  ear  cropped;  Bob,  has 
lost  one  eye;  Kentucky  Tom,  has  one  jaw  broken." 

"  Ran  away,  Anthony.  One  of  his  ears  cut  off,  and  his 
left  hand  cut  with  an  axe." 

"  Fifty  dollars  reward  for  the  negro  Jim  Blake.  Has  a 
piece  cut  out  of  each  ear,  and  the  middle  finger  of  the  left 
hand  cut  off  to  the  second  joint." 

"Ran  away,  a  negro  woman  named  Maria.  Has  a  scar 
on  one  side  of  her  cheek,  by  a  cut.  Some  scars  on  her 
back." 

"  Ran  away,  the  Mulatto  wench  Mary.  Has  a  cut  on 
the  left  arm,  a  scar  on  the  left  shoulder,  and  two  upper 
teeth  missing." 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  233 

I  should  say,  perhaps,  in  explanation  of  this  latter  piece 
of  description,  that  among  the  other  blessings  which  public 
opinion  secures  to  the  negroes,  is  the  common  practice  of 
violently  punching  out  their  teeth.  To  make  them  wear 
iron  collars  by  day  and  night,  and  to  worry  them  with  dogs, 
are  practices  almost  too  ordinary  to  deserve  mention. 

"Ean  away,  my  man  Fountain.  Has  holes  in  his  ears, 
a  scar  on  the  right  side  of  his  forehead,  has  been  shot  in 
the  hind  parts  of  his  legs,  and  is  marked  on  the  back  with 
the  whip." 

"Two  hundred  and  fifty  dollars  reward  for  my  negro 
man  Jim.  He  is  much  marked  with  shot  in  his  right  thigh. 
The  shot  entered  on  the  outside,  halfway  between  the  hip 
and  knee  joints." 

"Brought  to  jail,  John.     Left  ear  cropt." 

"Taken  up,  a  negro  man.  Is  very  much  scarred  about 
the  face  and  body,  and  has  the  left  ear  bit  off." 

"  Ran  away,  a  black  girl,  named  Mary.  Has  a  scar  on 
her  cheek,  and  the  end  of  one  of  her  toes  cut  off." 

"  Ran  away,  my  Mulatto  woman,  Judy.  She  has  had 
her  right  arm  broke." 

"Ran  away,  my  negro  man,  Levi.  His  left  hand  has 
been  burnt,  and  I  think  the  end  of  his  forefinger  is  off." 

"Ran  away,  a  negro  man,  named  Washingtok.  Has 
lost  a  part  of  his  middle  finger,  and  the  end  of  his  little 
finger," 

"  Twenty-five  dollars  reward  for  my  man  John.  The  tip 
of  his  nose  is  bit  off." 

"  Twenty-five  dollars  reward  for  the  negro  slave,  Sally. 
Walks  as  though  crippled  in  the  back." 

"  Ran  away,  Joe  Dennis.  Has  a  small  notch  in  one  of 
his  ears." 

"  Ran  away,  negro  boy.  Jack.  Has  a  small  crop  out  of 
his  left  ear." 

"Ran  away,  a  negro  man,  named  Ivory.  Has  a  small 
piece  cut  out  of  the  top  of  each  ear." 

While  upon  the  subject  of  ears,  I  may  observe  that  a  dis- 
tinguished abolitionist  in  New  York  once  received  a  negro's 
ear,  which  had  beeu  cut  off  close  to  the  head,  in  a  general 
post  letter.  It  was  forwarded  by  the  free  and  independent 
gentleman  "who  had  caused  it  to  be  amputated,  with  a 
polite  request  that  he  would  place  the  specimen  in  his 
"collection." 


234  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

I  could  enlarge  this  catalogue  with  broken  arms,  and 
broken  legs,  and  gashed  flesh,  and  missing  teeth,  and  lacer- 
ated backs,  and  bites  of  dogs,  and  brands  of  red-hot  irons 
innumerable :  but  as  my  readers  will  be  sufficiently  sick- 
ened and  repelled  already,  I  will  turn  to  another  branch  of 
the  subject. 

These  advertisements,  of  which  a  similar  collection  might 
be  made  for  every  year,  and  month,  and  week,  and  day; 
and  which  are  coolly  read  in  families  as  things  of  course, 
and  as  a  part  of  the  current  news  and  small- talk;  will 
serve  to  show  how  very  much  the  slaves  profit  by  public 
opinion,  and  how  tender  it  is  in  their  behalf.  But  it  may 
be  worth  while  to  inquire  how  the  slave  owners,  and  the 
class  of  society  to  which  great  numbers  of  them  belong, 
defer  to  public  opinion  in  their  conduct,  not  to  their  slaves 
but  to  each  other;  how  they  are  accustomed  to  restrain 
their  passions;  what  their  bearing  is  among  themselves; 
whether  they  are  fierce  or  gentle;  whether  their  social  cus- 
toms be  brutal,  sanguinary,  and  violent,  or  bear  the  impress 
of  civilisation  and  refinement. 

That  we  may  have  no  partial  evidence  from  abolitionists 
in  this  inquiry,  either,  I  will  once  more  turn  to  their  own 
newspapers,  and  I  will  confine  myself,  this  time,  to  a  se- 
lection from  paragraphs  which  appeared  from  day  to  day, 
during  my  visit  to  America,  and  which  refer  to  occurrences 
happening  while  I  was  there.  The  italics  in  these  extracts, 
as  in  the  foregoing,  are  my  own. 

These  cases  did  not  all  occur,  it  will  be  seen,  in  terri- 
tory actually  belonging  to  legalised  Slave  States,  though 
most,  and  those  the  very  worst  among  them,  did,  as  their 
counterparts  constantly  do;  but  the  position  of  the  scenes 
of  action  in  reference  to  places  immediately  at  hand;  where 
slavery  is  the  law;  and  the  strong  resemblance  between 
that  class  of  outrages  and  the  rest;  lead  to  the  just  pre- 
sumption that  the  character  of  the  parties  concerned  was 
formed  in  slave  districts,  and  brutalised  by  slave  customs. 

^^  Horrible  Tragedy. 

"  By  a  slip  from  The  Southport  Telegraph,  Wisconsin, 
we  learn  that  the  Hon.  Charles  C.  P.  Arndtj  Member  of 
the  Council  for  Brown  county,  was  shot  dead  on  the  floor  of 
the  Council  chamber,  by  James  E..  Vinyard,  Member  from 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  236 

Grant  county.  The  affair  grew  out  of  a  nomination  for 
Sheriff  of  Grant  county.  Mr.  E.  S.  Baker  was  nominated 
and  supported  by  Mr.  Arndt.  This  nomination  was  opposed 
by  Vinyard,  who  wanted  the  appointment  to  vest  in  his 
own  brother.  In  the  course  of  debate,  the  deceased  made 
some  statements  which  Vinyard  pronounced  false,  and  made 
use  of  violent  and  insulting  language,  dealing  largely  in 
personalities,  to  which  Mr.  A.  made  no  reply.  After  the 
adjournment,  Mr.  A.  stepped  up  to  Vinyard,  and  requested 
him  to  retract,  which  he  refused  to  do,  repeating  the  offen- 
sive words.  Mr.  Arndt  then  made  a  blow  at  Vinyard,  who 
stepped  back  a  pace,  drew  a  pistol,  and  shot  him  dead. 

"  The  issue  appears  to  have  been  provoked  on  the  part  of 
Vinyard,  who  was  determined  at  all  hazards  to  defeat  the 
appointment  of  Baker,  and  who,  himself  defeated,  turned 
his  ire  and  revenge  upon  the  unfortunate  Arndt." 

"  The  Wisconsin  Tragedy. 

"  Public  indignation  runs  high  in  the  territory  of  Wis- 
consin, in  relation  to  the  murder  of  C.  C.  P.  Arndt,  in 
the  Legislative  Hall  of  the  Territory.  Meetings  have  been 
held  in  different  counties  of  Wisconsin,  denouncing  the  prac- 
tice of  secretly  bearing  arms  in  the  Legislative  chambers  of 
the  country.  We  have  seen  the  account  of  the  expulsion 
of  James  R.  Vinyard,  the  perpetrator  of  the  bloody  deed, 
and  are  amazed  to  hear,  that,  after  this  expulsion  by  those 
who  saw  Vinyard  kill  Mr.  Arndt  in  the  presence  of  his  aged 
father,  who  was  on  a  visit  to  see  his  son,  little  dreaming 
that  he  was  to  witness  his  murder.  Judge  Dunn  has  dis- 
charged Vinyard  on  bail.  The  Miners'  Free  Press  speaks 
in  terms  of  merited  rebuke  at  the  outrage  upon  the  feel- 
ings of  the  people  of  Wisconsin.  Vinyard  was  within 
arm's  length  of  Mr.  Arndt,  when  he  took  such  deadly  aim 
at  him,  that  he  never  spoke.  Vinyard  might  at  pleasure, 
being  so  near,  have  only  wounded  him,  but  he  chose  to 
kill  him." 

"  Murder. 

"  By  a  letter  in  a  St.  Louis  paper  of  the  14th,  we  notice 
a  terrible  outrage  at  Burlington,  Iowa.  A  Mr.  Bridgman 
having  had  a  difficulty  with  a  citizen  of  the  place,  Mr. 
E.OSS;  a  brother-in-law  of  the  latter  provided  himself  witli 


236  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

one  of  Colt's  revolving  pistols,  met  Mr.  B.  in  the  street, 
and  discharged  the  contents  of  five  of  the  barrels  at  him : 
each  shot  taking  effect.  Mr.  B. ,  though  horribly  wounded, 
and  dying,  returned  the  fire,  and  killed  Ross  on  the  spot." 

"  Terrible  Death  of  Robert  Potter. 

"From  the  *  Caddo  Gazette,'  of  the  12th  inst.,  we  learn 
the  frightful  death  of  Colonel  Robert  Potter.  .  .  .  He  was 
beset  in  his  house  by  an  enemy,  named  Rose.  He  sprang 
from  his  couch,  seized  his  gun,  and,  in  his  night-clothes, 
rushed  from  the  house.  For  about  two  hundred  yards  his 
speed  seemed  to  defy  his  pursuers;  but,  getting  entangled 
in  a  thicket,  he  was  captured.  Rose  told  him  that  he  in- 
tended to  act  a  generous  part,  and  give  him  a  chance  for  his 
life.  He  then  told  Potter  he  might  run,  and  he  should  not 
be  interrupted  till  he  reached  a  certain  distance.  Potter 
started  at  the  word  of  command,  and  before  a  gun  was  fired 
he  had  reached  the  lake.  His  first  impulse  was  to  jump  in 
the  water  and  dive  for  it,  which  he  did.  Rose  was  close 
behind  him,  and  formed  his  men  on  the  bank  ready  to 
shoot  him  as  he  rose.  In  a  few  seconds  he  came  up  to 
breathe;  and  scarce  had  his  head  reached  the  surface  of  the 
water  when  it  was  completely  riddled  with  the  shot  of  their 
guns,  and  he  sunk,  to  rise  no  more !  " 

"  Murder  in  Arkansas. 

"  We  understand  that  a  severe  rencontre  came  off  a  few 
days  since  in  the  Seneca  Nation,  between  Mr.  Loose,  the 
sub-agent  of  the  mixed  band  of  the  Senecas,  Quapaw,  and 
Shawnees,  and  Mr.  James  Gillespie,  of  the  mercantile  firm 
of  Thomas  G.  Allison  and  Co.,  of  Maysville,  Benton 
Comity,  Ark,  in  which  the  latter  was  slain  with  a  bowie- 
knife.  Some  difficulty  had  for  some  time  existed  between 
the  parties.  It  is  said  that  Major  Gillespie  brought  on  the 
attack  with  a  cane.  A  severe  conflict  ensued,  during  which 
two  pistols  were  fired  by  Gillespie  and  one  by  Loose. 
Loose  then  stabbed  Gillespie  with  one  of  those  never  fail- 
ing weapons,  a  bowie-knife.  The  death  of  Major  G.  is 
much  regretted,  as  he  was  a  liberal-minded  and  energetic 
man.  Since  the  above  was  in  type,  we  have  learned  that 
Major  Allison  has  stated  to  some  of  our  citizens  in  town 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  237 

that  Mr.  Loose  gave  the  first  blow.  We  forbear  to  give 
any  particulars,  as  the  matter  will  be  the  svhject  of  jvdicial 
investigation. " 

"  Foul  Deed. 

"  The  steamer  Thames,  just  from  Missouri  river  brought 
us  a  handbill,  offering  a  reward  of  500  dollars  for  the  per- 
son who  assassinated  Lilburn  VV.  Baggs,  state  Governor  of 
this  State,  at  Independence,  on  the  night  of  the  6th  inst. 
Governor  Baggs,  it  is  stated  in  a  written  memorandum,  was 
not  dead,  but  mortally  wounded. 

"  Since  the  above  was  written  we  received  a  note  from 
the  clerk  of  the  Thames,  giving  the  following  particulars. 
Gov.  Baggs  was  shot  by  some  villain  on  Friday,  6th  inst., 
in  the  evening,  while  sitting  in  a  room  in  his  own  house  in 
Independence.  His  son,  a  boy,  hearing  a  report,  ran  into 
the  room,  and  found  the  Governor  sitting  in  his  cliair,  with 
his  jaw  fallen  down,  and  his  head  leaning  back;  on  discov- 
ering the  injury  done  his  father,  he  gave  the  alarm.  Foot 
tracks  were  found  in  the  garden  below  the  window,  and  a 
pistol  picked  up  supposed  to  have  been  overloaded,  and 
thrown  from  the  hand  of  the  scoundrel  who  fired  it.  Three 
buck  shots  of  a  heavy  load,  took  effect;  one  going  through 
his  mouth,  one  into  the  brain,  and  another  probably  in  or 
near  the  brain :  all  going  into  the  back  part  of  the  neck 
and  head.  The  Governor  was  still  alive  on  the  morning  of 
the  7th;  but  no  hopes  for  his  recovery  by  his  friends,  and 
but  slight  hopes  from  his  physicians. 

"  A  man  was  suspected,  and  the  Sheriff  most  probably 
has  possession  of  him  by  this  time. 

"The  pistol  was  one  of  a  pair  stolen  some  days  previous 
from  a  baker  in  Independence,  and  the  legal  authorities 
have  the  description  of  the  other." 

"  Rencontre. 

"  An  unfortunate  affair  took  place  on  Friday  evening  in 
Chatres  Street,  in  which  one  of  our  most  respectable  citi- 
zens received  a  dangerous  wound,  from  a  poignard  in  the 
abdomen.  From  the  Bee  (New  Orleans)  of  yesterday,  we 
learn  the  following  particulars.  It  appears  that  an  article 
was  published  in  the  French  side  of  the  paper  on  Monday 
last,  containing  some  strictures  on  the  Artillery  Battalion 


238  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

for  firing  their  guns  on  Sunday  morning,  in  answer  to  those 
from  the  Ontario  and  Woodbury,  and  thereby  much  alarm 
was  caused  to  the  families  of  those  persons  who  were  out 
all  night  preserving  the  peace  of  the  city.  Major  C.  Gaily, 
Commander  of  the  battalion  resenting  this,  called  at  the 
office  and  demanded  the  Author's  name;  that  of  M.  P. 
Arpin  was  given  to  him,  who  was  absent  at  the  time. 
Some  angry  words  then  passed  with  one  of  the  proprietors, 
and  a  challenge  followed;  the  friends  of  both  parties  tried 
to  arrange  the  affair,  but  failed  to  do  so.  On  Friday  even- 
ing, about  seven  o'clock,  Major  Gaily  met  Mr.  P.  Arpin  in 
Chatres  Street,  and  accosted  him.      '  Are  you  Mr.  Arpin?  ' 

"'Yes,  Sir.' 

"  *  Then  I  have  to  tell  you  that  you  are  a '  (applying 

an  appropriate  epithet). 

"  '  I  shall  remind  you  of  your  words,  Sir.' 

"  '  But  I  have  said  I  would  break  my  cane  on  your  shoul- 
ders. ' 

"  '  I  know  it,  but  I  have  not  yet  received  the  blow. ' 

"  At  these  words.  Major  Gaily  having  a  cane  in  his  hands, 
struck  Mr.  Arpin  across  the  face,  and  the  latter  drew  a 
poignard  from  his  pocket  and  stabbed  Major  Gaily  in  the 
abdomen. 

"  Fears  are  entertained  that  the  wound  will  be  mortal. 
We  understand  that  Mr.  Arpin  has  given  security  for  his 
appearance  at  the  Criminal  Court  to  answer  the  charge,^' 

"Affray  in  Mississippi. 

"On  the  27th  ult.,  in  an  affray  near  Carthage,  Leake 
county,  Mississippi,  between  James  Cottingham  and  John 
Wilburn,  the  latter  was  shot  by  the  former,  and  so  hor- 
ribly wounded,  that  there  was  no  hope  of  his  recovery.  On 
the  2nd  instant,  there  was  an  affray  at  Carthage  between 
A.  C.  Sharkey  and  George  Goff,  in  which  the  latter  was 
shot,  and  thought  mortally  wouuded.  Sharkey  delivered 
himself  up  to  the  authorities,  but  changed  his  mind  and 
escaped  /  " 

"  Personal  Encounter. 

"  An  encounter  took  place  in  Sparta,  a  few  days  since, 
between  the  barkeeper  of  an  hotel,  and  a  man  named  Bury. 
It  appears  that  Bury  had  become  somewhat  noisy,  and  that 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  239 

the  barkeeper,  determined  to  preserve  order,  had  threatened 
to  shoot  Bury,  whereupon  Bury  drew  a  pistol  and  shot  the 
barkeeper  down.  He  was  not  dead  at  the  last  accounts, 
but  slight  hopes  were  entertained  of  his  recovery." 

"Ihiel. 

"The  clerk  of  the  steamboat  Tribune  informs  us  that  an- 
other duel  was  fought  on  Tuesday  last,  by  Mr.  Robbins, 
a  bank  officer  in  Vicksburg,  and  Mr.  Fall,  the  editor  of  the 
Vicksburg  Sentinel,  According  to  the  arrangement,  the 
parties  had  six  pistols  each,  which,  after  the  word  *  Fire ! ' 
they  were  to  discharge  as  fast  as  they  pleased.  Fall  fired 
two  pistols  without  effect.  Mr.  Bobbins'  first  shot  took 
effect  in  Fall's  thigh,  who  fell,  and  was  unable  to  continue 
the  combat." 

"  Affray  in  Clarke  County. 

"An  unfortunate  affray  occurred  in  Clarke  county  (Mo.) 
near  Waterloo,  on  Tuesday  the  19th  ult.,  which  originated 
in  settling  the  partnership  concerns  of  Messrs.  M'Kane  and 
M'Allister,  who  had  been  engaged  in  the  business  of  dis- 
tilling, and  resulted  in  the  death  of  the  latter,  who  was 
shot  down  by  Mr.  M'Kane,  because  of  his  attempting  to 
take  possession  of  seven  barrels  of  whiskey,  the  property  of 
M'Kane,  which  had  been  knocked  off  to  M'Allister  at  a 
sheriff's  sale  at  one  dollar  per  barrel.  M'Kane  imme- 
diately fled,  and  at  the  latest  dates  had  not  been  taken. 

"  This  unfortunate  affray  caused  considerable  excitement 
in  the  neighbourhood,  as  both  the  parties  were  men  with 
large  families  depending  upon  them  and  stood  well  in  the 
community." 

I  will  quote  but  one  more  paragraph,  which,  by  reason 
of  its  monstrous  absurdity,  may  be  a  relief  to  these  atro- 
cious deeds. 

"Affair  of  Honor. 

"  We  have  just  heard  the  particulars  of  a  meeting  which 
took  place  on  Six  Mile  Island,  on  Tuesday,  between  two 
young  bloods  of  our  city :  Samuel  Thurston,  aged  fifteen, 
and  William  Hine,  aged  thirteen  years.  They  were  at- 
tended by  young  gentlemen  of  the  same  age.     The  weapons 


240  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

used  on  the  occasion,  were  a  couple  of  Dickson's  best  rifles; 
the  distance,  thirty  yards.  They  took  one  fire,  without 
any  damage  being  sustained  by  either  party,  except  the 
ball  of  Thurston's  gun  passing  through  the  crown  of  Hine's 
hat.  Through  the  intercession  of  the  Board  of  Honor,  the 
challenge  was  withdrawn,  and  the  difference  amicably 
adjusted." 

If  the  reader  will  picture  to  himself  the  kind  of  Board 
of  Honour  which  amicably  adjusted  the  difference  between 
these  two  little  boys,  who  in  any  other  part  of  the  world 
would  have  been  amicably  adjusted  on  two  porters'  backs 
and  soundly  flogged  with  birchen  rods,  he  will  be  pos- 
sessed, no  doubt,  with  as  strong  a  sense  of  its  ludicrous 
character,  as  that  which  sets  me  laughing  whenever  its 
image  rises  up  before  me. 

Now,  I  appeal  to  every  human  mind,  imbued  with  the 
commonest  of  common  sense,  and  the  commonest  of  com- 
mon humanity;  to  all  dispassionate,  reasoning  creatures,  of 
any  shade  of  opinion;  and  ask,  with  these  revolting  evi- 
dences of  the  state  of  society  which  exists  in  and  about  the 
slave  districts  of  America  before  them,  can  they  have  a 
doubt  of  the  real  condition  of  the  slave,  or  can  they  for  a 
moment  make  a  compromise  between  the  institution  or  any 
of  its  flagrant  fearful  features,  and  their  own  just  con- 
sciences? Will  they  say  of  any  tale  of  cruelty  and  horror, 
however  aggravated  in  degree,  that  it  is  improbable,  when 
they  can  turn  to  the  public  prints,  and,  running,  read  such 
signs  as  these,  laid  before  them  by  the  men  who  rule  the 
slaves :  in  their  own  acts  and  under  their  own  hands? 

Do  we  not  know  that  the  worst  deformity  and  ugliness 
of  slavery  are  at  once  the  cause  and  the  effect  of  the  reck- 
less license  taken  by  these  freeborn  outlaws?  Do  we  not 
know  that  the  man  who  has  been  born  and  bred  among  its 
wrongs;  who  has  seen  in  his  childhood  husbands  obliged 
at  the  word  of  command  to  flog  their  wives;  women,  inde- 
cently compelled  to  hold  up  their  own  garments  that  men 
might  lay  the  heavier  stripes  upon  their  legs,  driven  and 
harried  by  brutal  overseers  in  their  time  of  travail,  and  be- 
coming mothers  on  the  field  of  toil,  under  the  very  lash  it- 
self; who  has  read  in  youth,  and  seen  his  virgin  sisters 
read,  descriptions  of  runaway  men  and  women,  and  their 
disfigured  persons,  which  could  not  be  published  elsewhere, 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  241 

of  so  much  stock  upon  a  farm,  or  at  a  show  of  beasts; — do 
we  not  know  that  that  man,  whenever  his  wrath  is  kindled 
up,  will  be  a  brutal  savage?  Do  we  not  know  that  as  he  is 
a  coward  in  his  domestic  life,  stalking  among  his  shrinking 
men  and  women  slaves  armed  with  his  heavy  whip,  so  he 
will  be  a  coward  out  of  doors,  and  carrying  cowards'  weap- 
ons hidden  in  his  breast  will  shoot  men  down  and  stab  them 
when  he  quarrels?  And  if  our  reason  did  not  teach  us  this 
and  much  beyond;  if  we  were  such  idiots  as  to  close  our 
eyes  to  that  fine  mode  of  training  which  rears  up  such  men; 
should  we  not  know  that  they  who  among  their  equals  stab 
and  pistol  in  the  legislative  halls,  and  in  the  counting- 
house,  and  on  the  market-place,  and  in  all  the  elsewhere 
peaceful  pursuits  of  life,  must  be  to  their  dependants,  even 
though  they  were  free  servants,  so  many  merciless  and  un- 
relenting tyrants? 

What!  shall  we  declaim  against  the  ignorant  peasantry 
of  Ireland,  and  mince  the  matter  when  these  American 
taskmasters  are  in  question?  Shall  we  cry  shame  on  the 
brutality  of  those  who  hamstring  cattle:  and  spare  the 
lights  of  Freedom  upon  earth  who  notch  the  ears  of  men 
and  women,  cut  pleasant  posies  in  the  shrinking  flesh,  learn 
to  write  with  pens  of  red-hot  iron  on  the  human  face,  rack 
their  poetic  fancies  for  liveries  of  mutilation  which  their 
slaves  shall  wear  for  life  and  carry  to  the  grave,  break  Jiving 
limbs  as  did  the  soldiery  who  mocked  and  slew  the  Sav- 
iour of  the  world,  and  set  defenceless  creatures  up  for  tar- 
gets !  Shall  we  whimper  over  legends  of  the  tortures  prac- 
tised on  each  other  by  the  Pagan  Indians,  and  smile  upon 
the  cruelties  of  Christian  men !  Shall  we,  so  long  as  these 
things  last,  exult  above  the  scattered  remnants  of  that 
stately  race,  and  triumph  in  the  white  enjoyment  of  their 
broad  possessions?  Rather,  for  me,  restore  the  forest  and 
the  Indian  village;  in  lieu  of  stars  and  stripes,  let  some 
poor  feather  flutter  in  the  breeze;  replace  the  streets  and 
squares  by  wigwams;  and  though  the  death-song  of  a  hun- 
dred haughty  warriors  fill  the  air,  it  will  be  music  to  the 
shriek  of  one  unhappy  slave. 

On  one  theme,  which  is  commonly  before  our  eyes,  and 
in  respect  of  which  our  national  character  is  changing  fast, 
let  the  plain  Truth  be  spoken,  and  let  us  not,  like  dastards, 
beat  about  the  bush  by  hinting  at  the  Spaniard  and  the 
fierce  Italian.  When  knives  are  drawn  by  Englishmen  in 
16 


242  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

conflict  let  it  be  said  and  known :  "  "We  owe  this  change  to 
Republican  Slavery.  These  are  the  weapons  of  Freedom. 
With  sharp  points  and  edges  such  as  these,  Liberty  in 
America  doth  hew  and  hack  her  slaves;  or,  failing  that 
pursuit,  her  sons  devote  them  to  a  better  use,  and  turn  them 
on  each  other." 


CHAPTER    THE    EIGHTEENTH. 

CONCLUDING  REMARKS. 

There  are  many  passages  in  this  book,  where  I  have 
been  at  some  pains  to  resist  the  temptation  of  troubling  my 
readers  with  my  own  deductions  and  conclusions :  prefer- 
ring that  they  should  judge  for  themselves,  from  such 
premises  as  I  have  laid  before  them.  My  only  object  in 
the  outset,  was,  to  carry  them  with  me  faithfully  whereso- 
ever I  went,  and  that  task  I  have  discharged. 

But  I  may  be  pardoned,  if  on  such  a  theme  as  the 
general  character  of  the  American  people,  and  the  general 
character  of  their  social  system,  as  presented  to  a  stranger's 
eyes,  I  desire  to  express  my  own  opinions  in  a  few  words, 
before  I  bring  this  volume  to  a  close. 

They  are,  by  nature,  frank,  brave,  cordial,  hospitable, 
and  affectionate.  Cultivation  and  refinement  seem  but 
to  enhance  their  warmth  of  heart  and  ardent  enthusiasm; 
and  it  is  the  possession  of  these  latter  qualities  in  a  most 
remarkable  degree,  which  renders  an  educated  American 
one  of  the  most  endearing  and  most  generous  of  friends. 
I  never  was  so  won  upon,  as  by  this  class;  never  yielded 
up  my  full  confidence  and  esteem  so  readily  and  pleasur- 
ably,  as  to  them;  never  can  make  again,  in  half-a-year,  so 
many  friends  for  whom  I  seem  to  entertain  the  regard  of 
half  a  life. 

These  qualities  are  natural,  I  implicitly  believe,  to  the 
whole  people.  That  they  are,  however,  sadly  sapped  and 
blighted  in  their  growth  among  the  mass;  and  that  there 
are  influences  at  work  which  endanger  them  still  more,  and 
give  but  little  present  promise  of  their  healthy  restoration ; 
is  a  tTuth  that  ought  to  be  told. 

It  is  an  essential  part  of  every  national  character  to  pique 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  243 

itself  mightily  upon  its  faults,  and  to  deduce  tokens  of  its 
virtue  or  its  wisdom  from  their  very  exaggeration.  One 
great  blemish  in  the  popular  mind  of  America,  and  the 
prolific  parent  of  an  innumerable  brood  of  evils,  is  Universal 
Distrust.  Yet,  the  American  citizen  plumes  himself  upon 
this  spirit,  even  when  he  is  sufficiently  dispassionate  to 
perceive  the  ruin  it  works;  and  will  often  adduce  it,  in 
spite  of  his  own  reason,  as  an  instance  of  the  great  sagacity 
and  acuteness  of  the  people,  and  their  superior  shrewdness 
and  independence. 

"You  carry,"  says  the  stranger,  "this  jealousy  and  dis- 
trust into  every  transaction  of  public  life.  By  repelling 
worthy  men  from  your  legislative  assemblies,  it  has  bred 
up  a  class  of  candidates  for  the  suifrage,  who,  in  their  ev- 
ery act,  disgrace  your  Institutions  and  your  people's  choice. 
It  has  rendered  you  so  fickle,  and  so  given  to  change,  that 
your  inconstancy  has  passed  into  a  proverb,  for  you  no 
sooner  set  up  an  idol  firmly,  than  you  are  sure  to  pull  it 
down  and  dash  it  into  fragments;  and  this,  because  directly 
you  reward  a  benefactor,  or  a  public  servant,  you  distrust 
him,  merely  because  he  is  rewarded;  and  immediately  ap- 
ply yourselves  to  find  out,  either  that  you  have  been  too 
bountiful  in  your  acknowledgments,  or  he  remiss  in  his  de- 
serts. Any  man  who  attains  a  high  place  among  you,  from 
the  President  downwards,  may  date  his  downfall  from  that 
moment;  for  any  printed  lie  that  any  notorious  villain  pens, 
although  it  militate  directly  against  the  character  and  con- 
duct of  a  life,  appeals  at  once  to  your  distrust,  and  is  be- 
lieved. You  will  strain  at  a  gnat  in  the  way  of  trustful- 
ness and  confidence,  however  fairly  won  and  well  deserved; 
but  you  will  swallow  a  whole  caravan  of  camels,  if  they  be 
laden  with  unworthy  doubts  and  mean  suspicions.  Is  this 
well,  think  you,  or  likely  to  elevate  the  character  of  the 
governors  or  the  governed,  among  you?  " 

The  answer  is  invariably  the  same :  "There's  freedom  of 
opinion  here,  you  know.  Every  man  thinks  for  himself, 
and  we  are  not  to  be  easily  overreached.  That's  how  our 
people  come  to  be  suspicious." 

Another  prominent  feature  is  the  love  of  "  smart "  deal- 
ing, which  gilds  over  many  a  swindle  and  gross  breach  of 
trust;  many  a  defalcation,  public  and  private;  and  enables 
many  a  knave  to  hold  his  head  up  with  the  best,  who  well 
deserves  a  halter — though  it  has  not  been  without  its  re- 


244  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

tributive  operation,  for  this  smartness  has  done  more  in  a 
few  years  to  impair  the  public  credit,  and  to  cripple  the 
public  resources,  than  dull  honesty,  however  rash,  could 
have  effected  in  a  century.  The  merits  of  a  broken  specu- 
lation, or  a  bankruptcy,  or  of  a  successful  scoundrel,  are 
not  gauged  by  its  or  his  observance  of  the  golden  rule, 
"Do  as  you  would  be  done  by,"  but  are  considered  with 
reference  to  their  smartness.  I  recollect,  on  both  occasions 
of  our  passing  that  ill-fated  Cairo  on  the  Mississippi,  re- 
marking on  the  bad  effects  such  gross  deceits  must  have 
when  they  exploded,  in  generating  a  want  of  confidence 
abroad,  and  discouraging  foreign  investment:  but  I  was 
given  to  understand  that  this  was  a  very  smart  scheme  by 
which  a  deal  of  money  had  been  made :  and  that  its  smart- 
est feature  was,  that  they  forgot  these  things  abroad,  in  a 
very  short  time,  and  speculated  again,  as  freely  as  ever. 
The  following  dialogue  I  have  held  a  hundred  times : — "  Is 
it  not  a  very  disgraceful  circumstance  that  such  a  man  as 
So  and  So  should  be  acquiring  a  large  property  by  the  most 
infamous  and  odious  means,  and  notwithstanding  all  the 
crimes  of  which  he  has  been  guilty,  should  be  tolerated  and 
abetted  by  your  Citizens?  He  is  a  public  nuisance,  is  he 
not?"  "Yes,  Sir."  "A  convicted  liar?"  "Yes,  Sir." 
"  He  has  been  kicked,  and  cuffed,  and  caned?  "  "  Yes, 
Sir."  "And  he  is  utterly  dishonourable,  debased,  and 
profligate?"  "Yes,  Sir."  "In  the  name  of  wonder,  then, 
what  is  his  merit?"     "Well,  Sir,  he  is  a  smart  man." 

In  like  manner,  all  kinds  of  deficient  and  impolitic  usages 
are  referred  to  the  national  love  of  trade;  though,  oddly 
enough,  it  would  be  a  weighty  charge  against  a  foreigner 
that  he  regarded  the  Americans  as  a  trading  people.  The 
love  of  trade  is  assigned  as  a  reason  for  that  comfortless 
custom,  so  very  prevalent  in  country  towns,  of  married 
persons  living  in  hotels,  having  no  fireside  of  their  own, 
and  seldom  meeting  from  early  morning  until  late  at  night, 
but  at  the  hasty  public  meals.  The  love  of  trade  is  a 
reason  why  the  literature  of  America  is  to  remain  for  ever 
unprotected  :  "For  we  are  a  trading  people,  and  don't  care 
for  poetry,"  though  we  do^  by  the  way,  profess  to  be  very 
proud  of  our  poets;  while  healthful  amusements,  cheerfiil 
means  of  recreation,  and  wholesome  fancies,  must  fade 
before  the  stern  utilitarian  joys  of  trade. 

These  three  characteristics  are  strongly  presented  at  ev- 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  245 

ery  turn,  full  in  the  stranger's  view.  But  the  foul  growth 
of  America  has  a  more  entangled  root  than  this;  and  it 
strikes  its  fibres,  deep  in  its  licentious  Press. 

Schools  may  be  erected,  East,  West,  North,  and  South; 
pupils  be  taught,  and  masters  reared,  by  scores  upon  scores  of 
thousands;  colleges  may  thrive,  churches  may  be  crammed, 
temperance  may  be  diffused,  and  advancing  knowledge  in 
all  other  forms  walk  through  the  land  with  giant  strides; 
but  while  the  newspaper  press  of  America  is  in,  or  near,  its 
present  abject  state,  high  moral  improvement  in  that  coun- 
try is  hopeless.  Year  by  year,  it  must  and  will  go  back; 
year  by  year,  the  tone  of  public  feeling  must  sink  lower 
down ;  year  by  year,  the  Congress  and  the  Senate  must  be- 
come of  less  account  before  all  decent  men;  and  year  by 
year,  the  memory  of  the  Great  Fathers  of  the  Eevolution 
must  be  outraged  more  and  more,  in  the  bad  life  of  their 
degenerate  child. 

Among  the  herd  of  journals  which  are  published  in  the 
States,  there  are  some,  the  reader  scarcely  need  be  told,  of 
character  and  credit.  From  personal  intercourse  with  ac- 
complished gentlemen,  connected  with  publications  of  this 
class,  I  have  derived  both  pleasure  and  profit.  But  the 
name  of  these  is  Few,  and  of  the  others  Legion;  and  the 
influence  of  the  good,  is  powerless  to  counteract  the  mortal 
poison  of  the  bad. 

Among  the  gentry  of  America;  among  the  well-informed 
and  moderate;  in  the  learned  professions;  at  the  Bar,  and 
on  the  Bench;  there  is,  as  there  can  be,  but  one  opinion,  in 
reference  to  the  vicious  character  of  these  infamous  jour- 
nals. It  is  sometimes  contended — I  will  not  say  strangely, 
for  it  is  natural  to  seek  excuses  for  such  a  disgrace — that 
their  influence  is  not  so  great  as  a  visitor  would  suppose. 
I  must  be  pardoned  for  saying  that  there  is  no  warrant  for 
this  plea,  and  that  every  fact  and  circumstance  tends  di- 
rectly to  the  opposite  conclusion. 

When  any  man,  of  any  grade  of  desert  in  intellect  or 
character,  can  climb  to  any  public  distinction,  no  matter 
what,  in  America,  without  first  grovelling  down  upon  the 
earth,  and  bending  the  knee  before  this  monster  of  deprav- 
ity; when  any  private  excellence  is  safe  from  its  attacks; 
when  any  social  confidence  is  left  unbroken  by  it,  or  any  tie 
of  social  decency  and  honour  is  held  in  the  least  regard; 
when  any  man  in  that  Free  Country  has  freedom  of  opin- 


246  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

ion,  and  presumes  to  think  for  himself,  and  speak  for  him- 
self, without  humble  reference  to  a  censorship  which,  for 
its  rampant  ignorance  and  base  dishonesty,  he  utterly 
loathes  and  despises  in  his  heart;  when  those  who  most 
acutely  feel  its  infamy  and  the  reproach  it  casts  upon  the 
nation,  and  who  most  denounce  it  to  each  other,  dare  to  set 
their  heels  upon,  and  crush  it  openly,  in  the  sight  of  all 
men;  then,  I  will  believe  that  its  influence  is  lessening,  and 
men  are  returning  to  their  manly  senses.  But  while  that 
Press  has  its  evil  eye  in  every  house,  and  its  black  hand  in 
every  appointment  in  the  state,  from  a  president  to  a  post- 
man; while,  with  ribald  slander  for  its  only  stock  in  trade, 
it  is  the  standard  literature  of  an  enormous  class,  who  must 
find  their  reading  in  a  newspaper,  or  they  will  not  read  at 
all;  so  long  must  its  odium  be  upon  the  country's  head, 
and  so  long  must  the  evil  it  works,  be  plainly  visible  in  the 
Republic. 

To  those  who  are  accustomed  to  the  leading  English 
journals,  or  to  the  respectable  journals  of  the  Continent  of 
Europe;  to  those  who  are  accustomed  to  anything  else  in 
print  and  paper;  it  would  be  impossible,  without  an  amount 
of  extract  for  which  I  have  neither  space  nor  inclination, 
to  convey  an  adequate  idea  of  this  frightful  engine  in 
America.  But  if  any  man  desire  confirmation  of  my  state- 
ment on  this  head,  let  him  repair  to  any  place  in  this 
city  of  London,  where  scattered  numbers  of  these  publica- 
tions are  to  be  found;  and  there,  let  him  form  his  own 
opinion.* 

It  would  be  well,  there  can  be  no  doubt,  for  the  Ameri- 
can people  as  a  whole,  if  they  loved  the  Real  less,  and  the 
Ideal  somewhat  more.  It  would  be  well,  if  there-  were 
greater  encouragement  to  lightness  of  heart  and  gaiety,  and 
a  wider  cultivation  of  what  is  beautiful,  without  being  em- 
inently and  directly  useful.  But  here,  I  think  the  general 
remonstrance,  "we  are  a  new  country,"  which  is  so  often 
advanced  as  an  excuse  for  defects  which  are  quite  unjusti- 
fiable, as  being,  of  right,  only  the  slow  growth  of  an  old 

•  Or,  let  him  refer  to  an  able,  and  perfectly  truthful  article,  in 
The  Foreign  Quarterly  Beview,  published  in  the  present  month  of 
October;  to  which  my  attention  has  been  attracted,  since  these 
sheets  have  been  passing  tlirough  the  press.  He  will  find  some 
specimens  there,  by  no  means  remarkable  to  any  man  who  has  been 
in  America,  but  sufficiently  striking  to  one  who  has  not. 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  247 

one,  may  be  very  reasonably  urged :  and  I  yet  hope  to  hear 
of  there  being  some  other  national  amusement  in  the  United 
States,  besides  newspaper  politics. 

They  certainly  are  not  a  humorous  people,  and  their 
temperament  always  impressed  me  as  being  of  a  dull  and 
gloomy  character.  In  shrewdness  of  remark,  and  a  certain 
cast-iron  quaintness,  the  Yankees,  or  people  of  New  Eng- 
land, unquestionably  take  the  lead;  as  they  do  in  most 
other  evidences  of  intelligence.  But  in  travelling  about, 
out  of  the  large  cities — as  I  have  remarked  in  former  parts 
of  this  volume — I  was  quite  oppressed  by  the  prevailing 
seriousness  and  melancholy  air  of  business :  which  was  so 
general  and  vmvarying,  that  at  every  new  town  I  came  to, 
I  seemed  to  meet  the  very  same  people  whom  I  had  left 
behind  me,  at  the  last.  Such  defects  as  are  perceptible 
in  the  national  manners,  seem,  to  me,  to  be  referable,  in  a 
great  degree,  to  this  cause :  which  has  generated  a  dull, 
sullen  persistence  in  coarse  usages,  and  rejected  the  graces 
of  life  as  undeserving  of  attention.  There  is  no  doubt  that 
Washington,  who  was  always  most  scrupulous  and  exact 
on  points  of  ceremony,  perceived  the  tendency  towards  this 
mistake,  even  in  his  time,  and  did  his  utmost  to  correct  it. 

I  cannot  hold  with  other  writers  on  these  subjects  that 
the  prevalence  of  various  forms  of  dissent  in  America,  is  in 
any  way  attributable  to  the  non-existence  there  of  an  estab- 
lished church :  indeed,  I  think  the  temper  of  the  people,  if 
it  admitted  of  such  an  Institution  being  founded  amongst 
them,  would  lead  them  to  desert  it,  as  a  matter  of  course, 
merely  because  it  was  established.  But,  supposing  it  to 
exist,  I  doubt  its  probable  efficacy  in  summoning  the  wan- 
dering sheep  to  one  great  fold,  simply  because  of  the  im- 
mense amount  of  dissent  which  prevails  at  home;  and  be- 
cause I  do  not  find  in  America  any  one  form  of  religion 
with  which  we  in  Europe,  or  even  in  England,  are  unac- 
quainted. Dissenters  resort  thither  in  great  numbers,  as 
other  people  do,  simply  because  it  is  a  land  of  resort;  and 
great  settlements  of  them  are  founded,  because  ground  can 
be  purchased,  and  towns  and  villages  reared,  where  there 
were  none  of  the  human  creation  before.  But  even  the 
Shakers  emigrated  from  England;  our  country  is  not  un- 
known to  Mr.  Joseph  Smith,  the  apostle  of  Mormonism,  or 
to  his  benighted  disciples;  I  have  beheld  religious  scenes 
myself  in  some  of  our  populous  towns  which  can  hardly  be 


248  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

surpassed  by  an  American  camp-meeting;  and  I  am  not 
aware  that  any  instance  of  superstitious  imposture  on  the 
one  hand,  and  superstitious  credulity  on  the  other,  has  had 
its  origin  in  the  United  States,  which  we  cannot  more  than 
parallel  by  the  precedents  of  Mrs.  Southcote,  Mary  Tofts 
the  rabbit-breeder,  or  even  Mr.  Thom  of  Canterbury;  which 
latter  case  arose,  some  time  after  the  dark  ages  had  passed 
away. 

The  Republican  Institutions  of  America  undoubtedly  lead 
the  people  to  assert  their  self-respect  and  their  equality; 
but  a  traveller  is  bound  to  bear  those  Institutions  in  his 
mind,  and  not  hastily  to  resent  the  near  approach  of  a  class 
of  strangers,  who,  at  home,  would  keep  aloof.  This  char- 
acteristic, when  it  was  tinctured  with  no  foolish  pride,  and 
stopped  short  of  no  honest  service,  never  offended  me;  and 
I  very  seldom,  if  ever,  experienced  its  rude  or  unbecoming 
display.  Once  or  twice  it  was  comically  developed,  as  in 
the  following  case;  but  this  was  an -amusing  incident,  and 
not  the  rule  or  near  it. 

I  wanted  a  pair  of  boots  at  a  certain  town,  for  I  had 
none  to  travel  in,  but  those  with  the  memorable  cork  soles, 
which  were  much  too  hot  for  the  fiery  decks  of  a  steamboat. 
I  therefore  sent  a  message  to  an  artist  in  boots,  importing, 
with  my  compliments,  that  I  should  be  happy  to  see  him, 
if  he  would  do  me  the  polite  favour  to  call.  He  very  kindly 
returned  for  answer,  that  he  would  "  look  round "  at  six 
o'clock  that  evening. 

I  was  lying  on  the  sofa,  with  a  book  and  a  wine-glass,  at 
about  that  time,  when  the  door  opened,  and  a  gentleman  in 
a  stiff  cravat,  within  a  year  or  two  on  either  side  of  thirty, 
entered,  in  his  hat  and  gloves ;  walked  up  to  the  looking- 
glass  ;  arranged  his  hair ;  took  off  his  gloves ;  slowly  pro- 
duced a  measure  from  the  uttermost  depths  of  his.  coat 
pocket ;  and  requested  me,  in  a  languid  tone,  to  "  unfix  " 
my  straps.  I  complied,  but  looked  with  some  curiosity  at 
his  hat,  which  was  still  upon  his  head.  It  might  have  been 
that,  or  it  might  have  been  the  heat — but  he  took  it  off. 
Then,  he  sat  himself  down  on  a  chair  opposite  to  me ;  rested 
an  arm  on  each  knee ;  and,  leaning  forward  very  much,  took 
from  the  ground,  by  a  great  effort,  the  specimen  of  metro- 
politan workmanship  which  I  had  just  pulled  off — whis- 
tling, pleasantly,  as  he  did  so.  He  turned  it  over  and  over ; 
surveyed  it  with  a  contempt  no  language  can  express;  and 


AMERICAN  NOTES.  24» 

inquired  if  I  wished  him  to  fix  me  a  boot  like  that  ?  I 
courteously  replied,  that  provided  the  boots  were  large 
enough,  I  would  leave  the  rest  to  him;  that  if  convenient 
and  practicable,  I  should  not  object  to  their  bearing  some 
resemblance  to  the  model  then  before  him;  but  that  I  would 
be  entirely  guided  by,  and  would  beg  to  leave  the  whole 
subject  to,  his  judgment  and  discretion.  "  You  an't  par- 
tickler,  about  this  scoop  in  the  heel,  I  suppose  then?  "  says 
he:  "we  don't  f oiler  that,  here."  I  repeated  my  last  ob- 
servation. He  looked  at  himself  in  the  glass  again;  went 
closer  to  it  to  dash  a  grain  or  two  of  dust  out  of  the  corner 
of  his  eye;  and  settled  his  cravat.  All  this  time,  my  leg 
and  foot  were  in  the  air.  "  Nearly  ready.  Sir?  "  I  inquired. 
"  Well,  pretty  nigh,"  he  said;  "keep  steady."  I  kept  as 
steady  as  I  could,  both  in  foot  and  face;  and  having  by 
this  time  got  the  dust  out,  and  found  his  pencil-case,  he 
measured  me,  and  made  the  necessary  notes.  When  he  had 
finished,  he  fell  into  his  old  attitude,  and  taking  up  the 
boot  again,  mused  for  some  4ime.  "And  this,"  he  said,  at 
last,  "  is  an  English  boot,  is  it !  This  is  a  London  boot, 
eh?"  "That,  Sir,"  I  replied,  "is  a  London  boot."  He 
mused  over  it  again,  after  the  manner  of  Hamlet  with 
Yorick's 'skull;  nodded  his  head,  as  who  should  say,  "I 
pity  the  Institutions  that  led  to  the  production  of  this 
boot!";  rose;  put  up  his  pencil,  notes,  and  paper — glan- 
cing at  himself  in  the  glass,  all  the  time — put  on  his  hat, 
drew  on  his  gloves  very  slowly,  and  finally  walked  out. 
When  he  had  been  gone  about  a  minute,  the  door  reopened, 
and  his  hat  and  his  head  reappeared.  He  looked  round  the 
room,  and  at  the  boot  again,  which  was  still  lying  on  the 
floor;  appeared  thoughtful  for  a  minute;  and  then  said, 
"Well,  good  arternoon."  "Good  afternoon,  Sir,"  said  I; 
and  that  was  the  end  of  the  interview. 

There  is  but  one  other  head  on  which  I  wish  to  offer  a 
remark;  and  that  has  reference  to  the  public  health.  In 
so  vast  a  country,  where  there  are  thousands  of  millions 
of  acres  of  land  yet  unsettled  and  uncleared,  and  on  every 
rood  of  which,  vegetable  decomposition  is  annually  taking 
place;  where  there  are  so  many  great  rivers,  and  such  op- 
posite varieties  of  climate;  there  cannot  fail  to  be  a  great 
amount  of  sickness  at  certain  seasons.  But  I  may  venture 
to  say,  after  conversing  with  many  members  of  the  medical 
Drof  ession  in  America,  that  I  am  not  singular  in  the  opinion 


260  AMERICAN  NOTES. 

that  much  of  the  disease  which  does  prevail,  might  be 
avoided,  if  a  few  common  precautions  were  observed. 
Greater  means  of  personal  cleanliness,  are  indispensable  to 
this  end;  the  custom  of  hastily  swallowing  large  quantities 
of  animal  food,  three  times  a-day,  and  rushing  back  to 
sedentary  pursuits  after  each  meal,  must  be  changed;  the 
gentler  sex  nust  go  more  wisely  clad,  and  take  more  health- 
ful exercise;  and  in  the  latter  clause,  the  males  must  be 
included  also.  Above  all,  in  public  institutions,  and 
throughout  the  whole  of  every  town  and  city,  the  system 
of  ventilation,  and  drainage,  and  removal  of  impurities 
requires  to  be  thoroughly  revised.  There  is  no  local 
Legislature  in  America  which  may  not  study  Mr.  Chad- 
wick's  excellent  Report  upon  the  Sanitary  Condition  of  our 
Labouring  Classes,  with  immense  advantage. 

I  HAVE  now  arrived  at  the  close  of  this  book.  I  have 
little  reason  to  believe,  from  certain  warnings  I  have  had, 
since  I  returned  to  England,  that  it  will  be  tenderly  or  fa- 
vourably received  by  the  American  people;  and  as  I  have 
written  the  Truth  in  relation  to  the  mass  of  those  who  form 
their  judgments  and  express  their  opinions,  it  will  be  seen 
that  I  have  no  desire  to  court,  by  any  adventitious  means, 
the  popular  applause. 

It  is  enough  for  me,  to  know,  that  what  I  have  set  down 
in  these  pages,  cannot  cost  me  a  single  friend  on  the  other 
side  of  the  Atlantic,  who  is,  in  anything,  deserving  of  the 
name.  For  the  rest,  I  put  my  trust,  implicitly,  in  the  spirit 
in  which  they  have  been  conceived  and  penned;  and  I  can 
bide  my  time. 

I  have  made  no  reference  to  my  reception,  nor  have  I 
suffered  it  to  influence  me  in  what  I  have  written;  for,  in 
either  case,  I  should  have  offered  but  a  sorry  acknowledg- 
ment, compared  Avith  that  I  bear  within  my  breast,  towards 
those  partial  readers  of  my  former  books,  across  the  Water, 
who  met  me  with  an  open  hand,  and  not  with  one  that 
closed  upon  an  iron  muzzle. 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY 


CONTENTS. 


PAGK 

The  Reader's  Passport 1 

Going  through  France, 3 

Lyons,  The  Rhone,  and  the  Goblin  of  Avignon,         .        .        .11 

Avignon  to  Genoa, 19 

Genoa  and  its  Neighbourhood, 24 

To  Parma,  Modena,  and  Bologna,       ......     55 

Through  Bologna  and  Ferrara 64 

An  Italian  Dream, 60 

By  Verona,  Mantua,  and  Milan,  across  the  Pass  of  the  Simplon 

into  Switzerland, 78 

To  Rome  by  Pisa  and  Siena,        .......     93 

Rome, 106 

A  Rapid  Diorama — 

To  Naples 161 

Naples, 154 

Pompeii— Herculaneum, 168 

Paestum, 160 

Vesuvius 161 

Return  to  Naples,         ........  166 

Monte  Cassino, 170 

Florence, .  178 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 


THE  READER'S  PASSPORT. 

If  the  readers  of  this  volume  will  be  so  kind  as  to  take 
their  credentials  for  the  diiferent  places  which  are  the  sub- 
ject of  its  author's  reminiscences,  from  the  Author  himself, 
perhaps  they  may  visit  them,  in  fancy,  the  more  agreeably, 
and  with  a  better  understanding  of  what  they  are  to  expect. 

Many  books  have  been  written  upon  Italy,  affording 
many  means  of  studying  the  history  of  that  interesting 
country,  and  the  innumerable  associations  entwined  about 
it.  I  make  but  little  reference  to  that  stock  of  informa- 
tion ;  not  at  all  regarding  it  as  a  necessary  consequence  of 
my  having  had  recourse  to  the  storehouse  for  my  own  bene- 
fit, that  I  should  reproduce  its  easily  accessible  contents 
before  the  eyes  of  my  readers. 

Neither  will  there  be  found,  in  these  pages,  any  grave 
examination  into  the  government  or  misgovernment  of  any 
portion  of  the  country.  No  visitor  of  that  beautiful  land 
can  fail  to  have  a  strong  conviction  on  the  subject ;  but  as 
I  chose  when  residing  there,  a  Foreigner,  to  abstain  from 
the  discussion  of  any  such  questions  with  any  order  of 
Italians,  so  I  would  rather  not  enter  on  the  inquiry  now. 
During  my  twelve  months'  occupation  of  a  house  at  Genoa, 
I  never  found  that  authorities  constitutionally  jealous  were 
distrustful  of  me ;  and  I  should  be  sorry  to  give  them  occa- 
sion to  regret  their  free  courtesy,  either  to  myself  or  any 
of  my  countrymen. 

There  is,  probably,  not  a  famous  Picture  or  Statue  in 

all  Italy,   but  could  be  easily  buried  under  a  mountain  of 

printed  paper  devoted  to  dissertations  on  it.     I  do  not, 

therefore,  though  an  earnest  admirer  of  Painting  and  Sculp- 

1 


8  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

ture,  expatiate  at  any  length  on  famous  Pictures  and 
Statues. 

This  Book  is  a  series  of  faint  reflections — mere  shadows 
in  the  water — of  places  to  which  the  imaginations  of  most 
people  are  attracted  in  a  greater  or  less  degree,  on  which 
mine  had  dwelt  for  years,  and  which  have  some  interest  for 
all.  The  greater  part  of  the  descriptions  were  written  on  the 
spot,  and  sent  home,  from  time  to  time,  in  private  letters. 
I  do  not  mention  the  circumstance  as  an  excuse  for  any  de- 
fects they  may  present,  for  it  would  be  none;  but  as  a 
guarantee  to  the  Reader  that  they  were  at  least  penned  in 
the  fulness  of  the  subject,  and  with  the  liveliest  impres- 
sions of  novelty  and  freshness. 

If  they  have  ever  a  fanciful  and  idle  air,  perhaps  the 
reader  will  suppose  them  written  in  the  shade  of  a  Sunny 
Day,  in  the  midst  of  the  objects  of  which  they  treat,  and 
will  li  ie  them  none  the  worse  for  having  such  influences  of 
the  country  upon  them. 

I  hope  I  am  not  likely  to  be  misunderstood  by  Professors 
of  the  Eoman  Catholic  faith,  on  account  of  anything  con- 
tained in  these  pages.  I  have  done  my  best,  in  one  of  my 
former  productions,  to  do  justice  to  them ;  and  I  trust,  in 
this,  they  will  do  justice  to  me.  When  I  mention  any  ex- 
hibition that  impressed  me  as  absurd  or  disagreeable,  I  do 
not  seek  to  connect  it,  or  recognise  it  as  necessarily  con- 
nected with,  any  essentials  of  their  creed.  When  I  treat  of 
the  ceremonies  of  the  Holy  Week,  I  merely  treat  of  their 
effect,  and  do  not  challenge  the  good  and  learned  Dr. 
Wiseman's  interpretation  of  their  meaning.  When  I  hint 
a  dislike  of  nunneries  for  young  girls  who  abjure  the  world 
before  they  have  ever  proved  or  known  it ;  or  doubt  the 
ex  officio  sanctity  of  all  Priests  and  Friars ;  I  do  no  more 
than  many  conscientious  Catholics  both  abroad  and  at  home. 

I  have  likened  these  Pictures  to  shadows  in  the  water, 
and  would  fain  hope  that  I  have,  nowhere,  stirred  the 
wafer  so  roughly,  as  to  mar  the  shadows.  I  could  never 
desire  to  be  on  better  terms  with  all  my  friends  than  now, 
when  distant  mountains  rise,  once  more,  in  my  path.  For 
T  need  not  hesitate  to  avow,  that,  bent  on  correcting  a  brief 
mistake  I  made,  not  long  ago,  in  disturbing  the  old  rela- 
tions between  myself  and  my  readers,  and  departing  for  a 
moment  from  my  old  pursuits,  I  am  aljout  to  resume  them, 
joyfully,  in  Switzerland ;  where  during  another  year  of  ab- 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  3 

sence,  I  can  at  once  work  out  the  themes  I  have  now  in  my 
mind,  without  interruption :  and,  while  I  keep  my  English 
audience  within  speaking  distance,  extend  my  knowledge 
of  a  noble  country,  inexpressibly  attractive  to  me. 

This  book  is  made  as  accessible  as  possible,  because  it 
would  be  a  great  pleasure  to  me  if  I  could  hope,  through 
its  means,  to  compare  impressions  with  some  among  the 
multitudes  who  will  hereafter  visit  the  scenes  described, 
with  interest  and  delight. 

And  I  have  only  now,  in  passport  wise,  to  sketch  my 
reader's  portrait,  which  I  hope  may  be  thus  supposititiously 
traced  for  either  sex : — 


Complexion 
Eyes      . 
Nose 
Mouth  . 
Visage 


Fair. 

Very  cheerful. 

Not  supercilious. 

Smiling. 

Beaming. 


General  Expression         .     Extremely  agreeable. 


GOING  THROUGH  FRANCE. 

On  a  fine  Sunday  morning  in  the  Midsummer  time  and 
weather  of  eighteen  hundred  and  forty-four,  it  was,  my 
good  friend,  when — don't  be  alarmed;  not  when  two  trav- 
ellers might  have  been  observed  slowly  making  their  way 
over  that  picturesque  and  broken  ground  by  which  the  first 
chapter  of  a  Middle  Aged  novel  is  usually  attained — but 
when  an  English  travelling-carriage  of  considerable  propor- 
tions, fresh  from  the  shady  halls  of  the  Pantechnicon  near 
Belgrave  Square,  London,  was  observed  (by  a  very  small 
French  soldier ;  for  I  saw  him  look  at  it)  to  issue  from  the 
gate  of  the  Hotel  Meurice  in  the  Rue  Rivoli  at  Paris. 

I  am  no  more  bound  to  explain  why  the  English  family 
travelling  by  this  carriage,  inside  and  out,  should  be  start- 
ing for  Italy  on  a  Sunday  morning,  of  all  good  days  in  the 
week,  than  I  am  to  assign  a  reason  for  all  the  little  men  in 
France  being  soldiers,  and  all  the  big  men  postilions :  which 
is  the  invariable  rule.  But,  they  had  some  sort  of  reason 
for  what  they  did,  I  have  no  doubt ;  and  their  reason  for 
being  there  at  all,  was,  as  you  know,  that  they  were  going 


4  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

to  live  in  fair  Genoa  for  a  year ;  and  that  the  head  of  the 
family  purposed,  in  that  space  of  time,  to  stroll  about, 
wherever  his  restless  humour  carried  him. 

And  it  would  have  been  small  comfort  to  me  to  have  ex- 
plained to  the  population  of  Paris  generally,  that  I  was 
that  Head  and  Chief ;  and  not  the  radiant  embodiment  of 
good  humour  who  sat  beside  me  in  the  person  of  a  French 
Courier — best  of  servants  and  most  beaming  of  men! 
Truth  to  say,  he  looked  a  great  deal  more  patriarchal  than 
I,  who,  in  the  shadow  of  his  portly  presence,  dwindled 
down  to  no  account  at  all. 

There  was,  of  course,  very  little  in  the  aspect  of  Paris — 
as  we  rattled  near  the  dismal  Morgue  and  over  the  Pont 
Neuf — to  reproach  us  for  our  Sunday  travelling.  The 
wine-shops  (every  second  house)  were  driving  a  roaring 
trade;  awnings  were  spreading,  and  chairs  and  tables 
arranging,  outside  the  cafes,  preparatory  to  the  eating  of 
ices,  and  drinking  of  cool  liquids,  later  in  the  day ;  shoe- 
blacks were  busy  on  the  bridges ;  shops  were  open ;  carts 
and  waggons  clattered  to  and  fro;  the  narrow,  up-hill, 
funnel-like  streets  across  the  River,  were  so  many  dense 
perspectives  of  crowd  and  bustle,  parti-coloured  night-caps, 
tobacco-pipes,  blouses,  large  boots,  and  shaggy  heads  of 
hair;  nothing  at  that  hovir  denoted  a  day  of  rest,  unless  it 
were  the  appearance,  here  and  there,  of  a  family  pleasure 
party,  crammed  into  a  bulky  old  lumbering  cab ;  or  of  some 
contemplative  holiday-maker  in  the  freest  and  easiest  dis- 
habille, leaning  out  of  a  low  garret  window,  watching  the 
drying  of  his  newly  polished  shoes  on  the  little  parapet 
outside  (if  a  gentleman),  or  the  airing  of  her  stockings  in 
the  sun  (if  a  lady),  with  calm  anticipation. 

Once  clear  of  the  never-to-be-f orgotten-or-forgiven  pave- 
ment which  surrounds  Paris,  the  first  three  days  of  travel- 
ling towards  Marseilles  are  quiet  and  monotonous  enough. 
To  Sens.  To  Avallon.  To  Chalons.  A  sketch  of  one 
day's  proceedings  is  a  sketch  of  all  three;  and  here  it  is. 

We  have  four  horses,  and  one  postilion,  who  has  a  very 
long  whip,  and  drives  his  team,  something  like  the  Courier 
of  Saint  Petersburg  in  the  circle  at  Astley's  or  Frauconi's: 
only  he  sits  his  own  horse  instead  of  standing  on  him. 
The  immense  jack-boots  worn  by  these  postilions,  are  some- 
times a  century  or  two  old ;  and  are  so  ludicrously  dispro- 
portionate to  the  wearer's  foot,  that  the  spur,  which  is  put 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  6 

where  his  own  heel  comes,  is  generally  halfway  up  the  leg 
of  the  boots.  The  man  often  comes  out  of  the  stable-yard, 
with  his  whip  in  his  hand  and  his  shoes  on,  and  brings  out, 
in  both  hands,  one  boot  at  a  time,  which  he  plants  on  the 
ground  by  the  side  of  his  horse,  with  great  gravity,  until 
everything  is  ready.  When  it  is — and  oh  Heaven !  the 
noise  they  make  about  it! — he  gets  into  the  boots,  shoes 
and  all,  or  is  hoisted  into  them  by  a  couple  of  friends ; 
adjusts  the  rope  harness,  embossed  by  the  labours  of  in- 
numerable pigeons  in  the  stables ;  makes  all  the  horses  kick 
and  plunge;  cracks  his  whip  like  a  madman;  shouts  "En 
route — Hi!  "  and  away  we  go.  He  is  sure  to  have  a  con- 
test with  his  horse  before  we  have  gone  very  far ;  and  then 
he  calls  him  a  Thief,  and  a  Brigand,  and  a  Pig,  and  what 
not ;  and  beats  him  about  the  head  as  if  he  were  made  of 
wood. 

There  is  little  more  than  one  variety  in  the  appearance 
of  the  country,  for  the  first  two  days.  From  a  dreary 
plain,  to  an  interminable  avenue,  and  from  an  interminable 
avenue  to  a  dreary  plain  again.  Plenty  of  vines  there  are, 
in  the  open  fields,  but  of  a  short  low  kind,  and  not  trained 
in  festoons,  but  about  straight  sticks.  Beggars  innumer- 
able there  are,  everywhere ;  but  an  extraordinarily  scanty 
population,  and  fewer  children  than  I  ever  encountered. 
I  don't  believe  we  saw  a  hundred  children  between  Paris 
and  Chalons.  Queer  old  towns,  draw-bridged  and  walled : 
with  odd  little  towers  at  the  angles,  like  grotesque  faces, 
as  if  the  wall  had  put  a  mask  on,  and  were  staring  down 
into  the  moat ;  other  strange  little  towers,  in  gardens  and 
fields,  and  down  lanes,  and  in  farm-yards :  all  alone,  and 
always  round,  with  a  peaked  roof,  and  never  used  for  any 
purpose  at  all ;  ruinous  buildings  of  all  sorts :  sometimes 
an  hotel  de  ville,  sometimes  a  guard-house,  sometimes  a 
dwelling-house,  sometimes  a  chateau  with  a  rank  garden, 
prolific  in  dandelion,  and  watched  over  by  extinguisher- 
topped  turrets,  and  blink-eyed  little  casements;  are  the 
standard  objects,  repeated  over  and  over  again.  Some- 
times we  pass  a  village  inn,  with  a  crumbling  wall  belong- 
ing to  it,  and  a  perfect  town  of  out-houses :  and  painted 
over  the  gateway,  "  Stabling  for  Sixty  Horses ; "  as  indeed 
tliere  might  be  stabling  for  sixty  score,  were  there  any 
horses  to  be  stabled  there,  or  anybody  resting  there,  or 
anything  stirring  about  the  place  but  a  dangling  bush,  in- 


8  HCTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

dicative  of  the  wine  inside :  which  flutters  idly  in  the  wind, 
in  lazy  keeping  with  everything  else,  and  certainly  is  never 
in  a  green  old  age,  though  always  so  old  as  to  be  dropping 
to  pieces.  And  all  day  long,  strange  little  narrow  wag- 
gons, in  strings  of  six  or  eight,  bringing  cheese  from  Swit- 
zerland, and  frequently  in  charge,  the  whole  line,  of  one 
man  or  even  boy — and  he  very  often  asleep  in  the  foremost 
cart — come  jingling  past :  the  horses  drowsily  ringing  the 
bells  upon  their  harness,  and  looking  as  if  they  thought 
(no  doubt  they  do)  their  great  blue  woolly  furniture,  of 
immense  weight  and  thickness,  with  a  pair  of  grotesque 
horns  growing  out  of  the  collar,  very  much  too  warm  for 
the  Midsummer  weather. 

Then,  there  is  the  Diligence,  twice  or  thrice  a-day ;  with 
the  dusty  outsides  in  blue  frocks,  like  butchers ;  and  the 
insides  in  white  nightcaps :  and  its  cabriolet  head  on  the 
roof,  nodding  and  shaking,  like  an  idiot's  head;  and  its 
Young-France  passengers  staring  out  of  window,  with 
beards  down  to  their  waists,  and  blue  spectacles  awfully 
shading  their  warlike  eyes,  and  very  big  sticks  clenched  in 
their  National  grasp.  Also  the  Malle  Poste,  with  only  a 
couple  of  passengers,  tearing  along  at  a  real  good  dare- 
devil pace,  and  out  of  sight  in  no  time  Steady  old  Cures 
come  jolting  past,  now  and  then,  in  such  ramshackle,  rusty, 
musty,  clattering  coaches  as  no  Englishman  would  believe 
in;  and  bony  women  dawdle  about  in  solitary  places  hold- 
ing cows  by  ropes  while  they  feed,  or  digging  and  hoeing 
or  doing  field-work  of  a  more  laborious  kind,  or  represent- 
ing real  shepherdesses  with  their  flocks — to  obtain  an  ade- 
quate idea  of  which  pursuit  and  its  followers,  in  any  coun- 
try, it  is  only  necessary  to  take  any  pastoral  poem,  or 
picture,  and  imagine  to  yourself  whatever  is  most  exquisite- 
ly and  widely  unlike  the  descriptions  therein  contained. 

You  have  been  travelling  along,  stupidly  enough,  as  you 
generally  do  in  the  last  stage  of  the  day ;  and  the  ninety- 
six  bells  upon  the  horses — twenty-four  apiece — have  been 
ringing  sleepily  in  your  ears  for  half  an  hour  or  so ;  and  it 
has  become  a  very  jog-trot,  monotonous,  tiresome  sort  of 
business;  and  you  have  been  thinking  deeply  about  the 
dinner  you  will  have  at  the  next  stage ;  when,  down  at  the 
end  of  the  long  avenue  of  trees  through  which  you  are  trav- 
elling, the  first  indication  of  a  town  appears,  in  the  shape 
of  some  straggling  cottages:    and  the  carriage  begins  to 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  7 

rattle  and  roll  over  a  horribly  uneven  pavement.  As  if 
the  equipage  were  a  great  firework,  and  the  mere  sight  of 
a  smoking  cottage  chimney  had  lighted  it,  instantly  it  be- 
gins to  crack  and  splutter,  as  if  the  very  devil  were  in  it. 
Crack,  crack,  crack,  crack.  Crack-crack-crack.  Crick- 
crack.  Crick-crack.  Helo!  Hola!  Vite!  Voleur!  Brig- 
and! Hi  hi  hi!  En  r-r-r-r-r-route !  Whip,  wheels,  driver, 
stones,  beggars,  children ;  crack,  crack,  crack ;  helo !  hola  1 
charite  pour  1' amour  de  Dieu!  crick-crack-crick-crack; 
crick,  crick,  crick;  bump,  jolt,  crack,  bump,  crick-crack; 
round  the  corner,  up  the  narrow  street,  down  the  paved 
hill  on  the  other  side ;  in  the  gutter ;  bump,  bump ;  jolt, 
jog,  crick,  crick,  crick;  crack,  crack,  crack;  into  the  shop- 
windows  on  the  left-hand  side  of  the  street,  preliminary 
to  a  sweeping  turn  into  the  wooden  archway  on  the  right ; 
rumble,  rumble,  rumble;  clatter,  clatter  clatter;  crick, 
crick,  crick ;  and  here  we  are  in  the  yard  of  the  Hotel  de 
I'Ecu  d'Or;  used  up,  gone  out,  smoking,  spent,  exhausted; 
but  sometimes  making  a  false  start  unexpectedly,  with 
nothing  coming  of  it — like  a  firework  to  the  last ! 

The  landlady  of  the  Hotel  de  I'Ecu  d'Or  is  here ;  and  the 
landlord  of  the  Hotel  de  I'Ecu  d'Or  is  here ;  and  the  femme 
de  chambre  of  the  Hotel  de  I'Ecu  d'Or  is  here ;  and  a  gen- 
tleman in  a  glazed  cap,  with  a  red  beard  like  a  bosom 
friend,  who  is  staying  at  the  Hotel  de  I'Ecu  d'Or,  is  here; 
and  Monsieur  le  Cure  is  walking  up  and  down  in  a  corner 
of  the  yard  by  himself,  with  a  shovel  hat  upon  his  head, 
and  a  black  gown  on  his  back,  and  a  book  in  one  hand,  and 
an  umbrella  in  the  other;  and  everybody,  except  Monsieur 
le  Cure,  is  open-mouthed  and  open-eyed,  for  the  opening 
of  the  carriage-door.  The  landlord  of  the  Hotel  de  I'Ecu 
d'Or,  dotes  to  that  extent  upon  the  Courier,  that  he  can 
hardly  wait  for  his  coming  down  from  the  box,  but  em- 
braces his  very  legs  and  boot-heels  as  he  descends.  "  My 
Courier!  My  brave  Courier!  My  friend!  My  brother!" 
The  landlady  loves  him,  the  femme  de  chambre  blesses 
him,  the  garqon  worships  him.  The  Courier  asks  if  his 
letter  has  been  received?  It  has,  it  has.  Are  the  rooms 
prepared?  They  are,  they  are.  The  best  rooms  for  my 
noble  Courier.  The  rooms  of  state  for  my  gallant  Courier ; 
the  whole  house  is  at  the  service  of  my  best  of  friends ! 
He  keeps  his  hand  upon  the  carriage-door,  and  asks  some 
other  question  to  enhance  the  expectation.     He  carries  a 


$  PICTURES  FEOM  ITALY. 

green  leathern  purse  outside  his  coat,  suspended  by  a  belt. 
The  idlers  look  at  it ;  one  touches  it.  It  is  full  of  five- 
franc  pieces.  Murmurs  of  admiration  are  heard  among  the 
boys.  The  landlord  falls  upon  the  Courier's  neck,  and 
folds  him  to  his  breast.  He  is  so  much  fatter  than  he  was, 
he  says !     He  looks  so  rosy  and  so  well ! 

The  door  is  opened.  Breathless  expectation.  The  lady 
of  the  family  gets  out.  Ah  sweet  lady !  Beautiful  lady ! 
The  sister  of  the  lady  of  the  family  gets  out.  Great 
Heaven,  Ma'amselle  is  charming!  First  little  boy  gets 
out.  Ah,  what  a  beautiful  little  boy !  First  little  girl  gets 
out.  Oh,  but  this  is  an  enchanting  child !  Second  little 
girl  gets  out.  The  landlady,  yielding  to  the  finest  impulse 
of  our  common  nature,  catches  her  up  in  her  arms !  Sec- 
ond little  boy  gets  out.  Oh,  the  sweet  boy !  Oh,  the  ten- 
der little  family !  The  baby  is  handed  out.  Angelic  baby ! 
The  baby  has  topped  everything.  All  the  rapture  is  ex- 
pended on  the  baby !  Then  the  two  nurses  tumble  out ; 
and  the  enthusiasm  swelling  into  madness,  the  whole  family 
are  swept  up  stairs  as  on  a  cloud ;  while  the  idlers  press 
about  the  carriage,  and  look  into  it,  and  walk  round  it,  and 
touch  it.  For  it  is  something  to  touch  a  cai*riage  that  has 
held  so  many  people.     It  is  a  legacy  to  leave  one's  children. 

The  rooms  are  on  the  first  floor,  except  the  nursery  for 
the  night,  which  is  a  great  rambling  chamber,  with  four 
or  five  beds  in  it :  through  a  dark  passage,  up  two  steps, 
down  four,  past  a  pump,  across  a  balcony,  and  next  door 
to  the  stable.  The  other  sleeping  apartments  are  large  and 
lofty ;  each  with  two  small  bedsteads,  tastefully  hung,  like 
the  windows,  with  red  and  white  drapery.  The  sitting- 
room  is  famous.  Dinner  is  already  laid  in  it  for  three ; 
and  the  napkins  are  folded  in  cocked-hat  fashion.  The 
floors  are  of  red  tile.  There  are  no  carpets,  and  not  much 
furniture  to  speak  of;  but  there  is  abundance  of  looking- 
glass,  and  there  are  large  vases  under  glass  shades,  filled 
with  artificial  flowers;  and  there  are  plenty  of  clocks. 
The  whole  party  are  in  motion.  The  brave  Courier,  in 
particular,  is  everywhere :  looking  after  the  beds,  having 
wine  poured  down  his  throat  by  his  dear  brother  the  land- 
lord, and  picking  up  green  cucumbers — always  cucumbers; 
Heaven  knows  where  he  gets  them — with  which  he  walks 
about,  one  in  each  hand,  like  truncheons. 

Dinner  is  announced.     There  is  very  thin  soup ;   there 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  9 

are  very  large  loaves — one  apiece ;  a  fish ;  four  dishes  after- 
wards; some  poultry  afterwards;  a  dessert  afterwards; 
and  no  lack  of  wine.  There  is  not  much  in  the  dishes ;  but 
they  are  very  good,  and  always  ready  instantly.  When  it 
is  nearly  dark,  the  brave  Courier,  having  eaten  the  two  cu- 
cumbers, sliced  up  in  the  contents  of  a  pretty  large  decan- 
ter of  oil,  and  another  of  vinegar,  emerges  from  his  retreat 
below,  and  proposes  a  visit  to  the  Cathedral,  whose  mas- 
sive tower  frowns  down  upon  the  courtyard  of  the  inn. 
Off  we  go ;  and  very  solemn  and  grand  it  is,  in  the  dim 
light:  so  dim  at  last,  that  the  polite,  old,  lanthorn -jawed 
Sacristan  has  a  feeble  little  bit  of  candle  in  his  hand,  to 
grope  among  the  tombs  with — and  looks  among  the  grim 
columns,  very  like  a  ghost  who  is  searching  for  his  own. 

Underneath  the  balcony,  when  we  return,  the  inferior 
servants  of  the  inn  are  supping  in  the  open  air,  at  a  great 
table;  the  dish,  a  stew  of  meat  and  vegetables,  smoking 
hot,  and  served  in  the  iron  cauldron  it  was  boiled  in. 
They  have  a  pitcher  of  thin  wine,  and  are  very  merry; 
merrier  than  the  gentleman  with  the  red  beard,  who  is  play- 
ing billiards  in  the  light  room  on  the  left  of  the  yard, 
where  shadows,  with  cues  in  their  hands,  and  cigars  in 
their  mouths,  cross  and  recross  the  window,  constantly. 
Still  the  thin  Cure  walks  up  and  down  alone,  with  his  book 
and  umbrella.  And  there  he  walks,  and  there  the  billiard- 
balls  rattle,  long  after  we  are  fast  asleep. 

We  are  astir  at  six  next  morning.  It  is  a  delightful 
day,  shaming  yesterday's  mud  upon  the  carriage,  if  any- 
thing could  shame  a  carriage,  in  a  land  where  carriages  are 
never  cleaned.  Everybody  is  brisk ;  and  as  we  finish  break- 
fast, the  horses  come  jingling  into  the  yard  from  the  Post- 
house.  Everything  taken  out  of  the  carriage  is  put  back 
again.  The  brave  Courier  announces  that  all  is  ready, 
after  walking  into  every  room,  and  looking  all  round  it,  to 
be  certain  that  nothing  is  left  behind.  Everybody  gets  in. 
Everybody  connected  with  the  Hotel  de  I'Ecu  d'Or  is  again 
enchanted.  The  brave  Courier  runs  into  the  house  for  a 
parcel  containing  cold  fowl,  sliced  ham,  bread,  and  biscuits, 
for  lunch ;  hands  it  into  the  coach ;  and  runs  back  again. 

What  has  he  got  in  his  hand  now?  More  cucumbers? 
No.     A  long  strip  of  paper.     It's  the  bill. 

The  brave  Courier  has  two  belts  on,  this  morning:  one 
supporting  the  purse :  another,  a  mighty  good  sort  of  leath- 


10  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

ern  bottle,  filled  to  the  throat  with  the  best  light  Bordeaux 
wine  in  the  house.  He  never  pays  the  bill  till  this  bottle 
is  full.     Then  he  disputes  it. 

He  disputes  it  now,  violently.  He  is  still  the  landlord's 
brother,  but  by  another  father  or  mother.  He  is  not  so 
nearly  related  to  him  as  he  was  last  night.  The  landlord 
scratches  his  head.  The  brave  Courier  points  to  certain 
figures  in  the  bill,  and  intimates  that  if  they  remain  there, 
the  Hotel  de  I'Ecu  d'Or  is  thenceforth  and  for  ever  an 
Hotel  de  I'Ecu  de  Cuivre.  The  landlord  goes  into  a  little 
counting-house.  The  brave  Courier  follows,  forces  the  bill 
and  a  pen  into  his  hand,  and  talks  more  rapidly  than  ever. 
The  landlord  takes  the  pen.  The  Courier  smiles.  The 
landlord  makes  an  alteration.  The  Courier  cuts  a  joke. 
The  landlord  is  affectionate,  but  not  weakly  so.  He  bears 
it  like  a  man.  He  shakes  hands  with  his  brave  brother, 
but  he  don't  hug  him.  Still,  he  loves  his  brother;  for  he 
knows  that  he  will  be  returning  that  way,  one  of  these  tine 
days,  with  another  family,  and  he  foresees  that  his  heart 
will  yearn  towards  him  again.  The  brave  Courier  traverses 
all  round  the  carriage  once,  looks  at  the  drag,  inspects 
the  wheels,  jumps  up,  gives  the  word,  and  away  we  go! 

It  is  market  morning.  The  market  is  held  in  the  little 
square  outside  in  front  of  the  cathedral.  It  is  crowded 
with  men  and  women,  in  blue,  in  red,  in  green,  in  white ; 
with  canvassed  stalls;  and  fluttering  merchandise.  The 
country  people  are  grouped  about,  with  their  clean  baskets 
before  them.  Here,  the  lace-sellers;  there,  the  butter  and 
egg-sellers ;  there,  tlie  fruit-sellers ;  there,  the  shoe-makers. 
The  whole  place  looks  as  if  it  were  the  stage  of  some  great 
theatre,  and  the  curtain  had  just  run  up,  for  a  pi(!turesque 
ballet.  And  there  is  the  cathedral  to  boot:  scene-like :  all 
grim,  and  swarthy,  and  mouldering,  and  cold:  just  splash- 
ing the  pavement  in  one  place  with  faint  purple  drops,  as 
the  morning  sun,  entering  by  a  little  window  on  the  eastern 
side,  struggles  through  some  stained  glass  panes,  on  the 
western. 

In  five  minutes  we  have  passed  the  iron  cross,  with  a 
little  ragged  kneeling-place  of  turf  before  it,  in  the  out- 
skirts of  the  town ;  and  are  again  upon  the  road. 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  11 


LYONS,  THE. RHONE,  AND   THE  GOBLIN  OF 
AVIGNON. 

Chalons  is  a  fair  resting-place,  in  right  of  its  good  inn 
on  the  bank  of  the  river,  and  the  little  steamboats,  gay 
with  green  and  red  paint,  that  come  and  go  upon  it: 
which  make  up  a  pleasant  and  refreshing  scene,  after  the 
dusty  roads.  But,  unless  you  would  like  to  dwell  on  an 
enormous  plain,  with  jagged  rows  of  irregular  poplars  on 
it,  that  look  in  the  distance  like  so  many  combs  with  broken 
teeth :  and  unless  you  would  like  to  pass  your  life  without 
the  possibility  of  going  up-hill,  or  going  up  anything  but 
stairs  r  you  would  hardly  approve  of  Chalons  as  a  place  of 
residence. 

You  would  probably  like  it  better,  however,  than  Lyons : 
which  you  may  reach,  if  you  will,  in  one  of  the  before- 
mentioned  steamboats,  in  eight  hours. 

What  a  city  Lyons  is!  Talk  about  people  feeling,  at 
certain  unlucky  times,  as  if  they  had  tumbled  from  the 
clouds !  Here  is  a  whole  town  that  has  tumbled,  anyhow, 
out  of  the  sky;  having  been  first  caught  up,  like  other 
stones  that  tumble  down  from  that  region,  out  of  fens  and 
barren  places,  dismal  to  behold!  The  two  great  streets 
through  which  the  two  great  rivers  dash,  and  all  the  little 
streets  whose  name  is  Legion,  were  scorching,  blistering, 
and  sweltering.  The  houses,  high  and  vast,  dirty  to  ex- 
cess, rotten  as  old  cheeses,  and  as  thickly  peopled.  All 
up  the  hills  that  hem  the  city  in,  these  houses  swarm ;  and 
the  mites  inside  were  lolling  out  of  the  windows,  and  dry- 
ing their  ragged  clothes  on  poles,  and  crawling  in  and  out 
at  the  doors,  and  coming  out  to  pant  and  gasp  upon  the 
pavement,  and  creeping  in  and  out  among  huge  piles  and 
bales  of  fusty,  musty,  stifling  goods ;  and  living,  or  rather 
not  dying  till  their  time  should  come,  in  an  exhausted 
receiver.  Every  manufacturing  town,  melted  into  one, 
would  hardly  convey  an  impression  of  Lyons  as  it  presented 
itself  to  me:  for  all  the  undrained,  unscavengered  qualities 
of  a  foreign  town,  seemed  grafted,  there,  upon  the  native 
miseries  of  a  manufacturing  one ;  and  it  bears  such  fruit  as 
I  would  go  some  miles  out  of  my  way  to  avoid  encountering 
again. 


12  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

In  the  cool  of  the  evening :  or  rather  in  the  faded  heat 
of  the  day :  we  went  to  see  the  Cathedral,  where  divers  old 
women,  and  a  few  dogs,  were  engaged  in  contemplation. 
There  was  no  difference,  in  point  of  cleanliness,  between 
its  stone  pavement  and  that  of  the  streets ;  and  there  was 
a  wax  saint,  in  a  little  box  like  a  berth  aboard  ship,  with 
a  glass  front  to  it,  whom  Madame  Tussaud  would  have 
nothing  to  say  to,  on  any  terms,  and  which  even  Westmin- 
ster Abbey  might  be  ashamed  of.  If  you  would  know  all 
about  the  architecture  of  this  church,  or  any  other,  its 
dates,  dimensions,  endowments,  and  history,  is  it  not  writ- 
ten in  Mr.  Murray's  Guide-Book,  and  may  you  not  read  it 
there,  with  thanks  to  him,  as  I  did! 

For  this  reason,  I  should  abstain  from  mentioning  the 
curious  clock  in  Lyons  Cathedral,  if  it  were  not  for  a  small 
mistake  I  made,  in  connection  with  that  piece  of  mechan- 
ism. The  keeper  of  the  church  was  very  anxious  it  should 
be  shown ;  partly  for  the  honour  of  the  establishment  and 
the  town ;  and  partly,  perhaps,  because  of  his  deriving  a 
percentage  from  the  additional  consideration.  However 
that  may  be,  it  was  set  in  motion,  and  thereupon  a  host  of 
little  doors  flew  open,  and  innumerable  little  figures  stag- 
gered out  of  them,  and  jerked  themselves  back  again,  with 
that  special  unsteadiness  of  purpose,  and  hitching  in  the 
gait,  which  usually  attaches  to  figures  that  are  moved  by 
clockwork.  Meanwhile,  the  Sacristan  stood  explaining 
these  wonders,  and  pointing  them  out,  severally,  Avith  a 
wand.  There  was  a  centre  puppet  of  the  Virgin  Mary ;  and 
close  to  her,  a  small  pigeon-hole,  out  of  which  another  and 
a  very  ill-looking  puppet  made  one  of  the  most  sudden 
plunges  I  ever  saw  accomplished :  instantly  flopping  back 
again  at  sight  of  her,  and  banging  his  little  door,  violently, 
after  him.  Taking  this  to  be  emblematic  of  the  victory 
over  Sin  and  Death,  and  not  at  all  unwilling  to  show  that 
I  perfectly  understood  the  subject,  in  anticipation  of  the 
showman,  I  rashly  said,  "  Aha !  The  Evil  Spirit.  To  be 
sure.  He  is  very  soon  disposed  of. "  "  Pardon,  Monsieur," 
said  the  Sacristan,  with  a  polite  motion  of  his  hand  towards 
the  little  door,  as  if  introducing  somebody — "  The  Angel 
Gabriel!" 

Soon  after  day-break  next  morning,  we  were  steaming 
down  the  arrowy  Rhone,  at  the  rate  of  twenty  miles  an 
hour,  in  a  very  dirty  vessel  full  of  merchandise,  and  with 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  13 

only  three  or  four  other  passengers  for  our  companions: 
among  whom,  the  most  remarkable  was  a  silly,  old,  meek- 
faced,  garlic-eating,  immeasurably  polite  Chevalier,  with  a 
dirty  scrap  of  red  ribbon  hanging  at  his  buttonhole,  as  if 
he  had  tied  it  there  to  remind  himself  of  something:  as 
Tom  Noddy,  in  the  farce,  ties  knots  in  his  pocket-handker- 
chief. 

For  the  last  two  days,  we  had  seen  great  sullen  hills, 
the  first  indications  of  the  Alps,  lowering  in  the  distance. 
Now,  we  were  rushing  on  beside  them:  sometimes  close 
beside  them :  sometimes  with  an  intervening  slope,  covered 
with  vineyards.  Villages  and  small  towns  hanging  in  mid- 
air, with  great  woods  of  olives  seen  through  the  light  open 
towers  of  their  churches,  and  clouds  moving  slowly  on, 
upon  the  steep  acclivity  behind  them ;  ruined  castles  perched 
on  every  eminence ;  and  scattered  houses  in  the  clefts  and 
gullies  of  the  hills;  made  it  very  beautiful.  The  great 
height  of  these,  too,  making  the  buildings  look  so  tiny, 
that  they  had  all  the  charm  of  elegant  models ;  their  ex- 
cessive Avhiteness,  as  contrasted  with  the  brown  rocks,  or 
the  sombre,  deep,  dull,  heavy  green  of  the  olive-tree ;  and 
the  puny  size,  and  little  slow  walk  of  the  Lilliputian  men 
and  women  on  the  bank ;  made  a  charming  picture.  There 
were  ferries  out  of  number,  too ;  bridges ;  the  famous  Pont 
d'Esprit,  with  I  don't  kuow  how  many  arches;  towns 
where  memorable  wines  are  made ;  Vallence,  where  Napo- 
leon studied ;  and  the  noble  river,  bringing  at  every  wind- 
ing turn,  new  beauties  into  view. 

There  lay  before  us,  that  same  afternoon,  the  broken 
bridge  of  Avignon,  and  all  the  city  baking  in  the  sun ;  yet 
with  an  underdone-pie-crust,  battlemented  wall,  that  never 
will  be  brown,  though  it  bake  for  centuries. 

The  grapes  were  hanging  in  clusters  in  the  streets,  and 
the  brilliant  oleander  was  in  full  bloom  everywhere.  The 
streets  are  old  and  very  narrow,  but  tolerably  clean,  and 
shaded  by  awnings  stretched  from  house  to  house.  Bright 
stuli's  and  handkerchiefs,  curiosities,  ancient  frames  of 
carved  wood,  old  chairs,  ghostly  tables,  saints,  virgins, 
angels,  and  staring  daubs  of  portraits,  being  exposed  for 
sale  beneath,  it  was  very  quaint  and  lively.  All  this  was 
much  set  off,  too,  by  the  glimpses  one  caught,  through  a 
rusty  gate  standing  ajar,  of  quiet  sleepy  court-yards,  hav- 
ing stately  old  houses  within,  as  silent  as  tombs.     It  was 


14  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

all  veiy  like  one  of  the  descriptions  in  the  Arabian  Nights. 
The  three  one-eyed  Calenders  might  have  knocked  at  any 
one  of  those  doors  till  the  street  rang  again,  and  the  porter 
who  persisted  in  asking  questions — the  man  who  had  the 
delicious  purchases  put  into  his  basket  in  the  morning — 
might  have  opened  it  quite  naturally. 

After  breakfast  next  morning,  we  sallied  forth  to  see  the 
lions.  Such  a  delicious  breeze  was  blowing  in,  from  the 
north,  as  made  the  walk  delightful :  though  the  pavement- 
stones,  and  stones  of  the  walls  and  houses,  were  far  too 
hot  to  have  a  hand  laid  on  them  comfortably. 

We  went,  first  of  all,  up  a  rocky  height,  to  the  cathe- 
dral :  where  Mass  was  performing  to  an  auditory  very  like 
that  of  Lyons,  namely,  several  old  women,  a  baby,  and  a 
very  self-possessed  dog,  who  had  marked  out  for  himself 
a  little  course  or  platform  for  exercise,  beginning  at  the 
altar-rails  and  ending  at  the  door,  up  and  down  which  con- 
stitutional walk  he  trotted,  during  the  service,  as  methodi- 
cally and  calmly,  as  any  old  gentleman  out  of  doors.  It 
is  a  bare  old  church,  and  the  paintings  in  the  roof  are  sadly 
defaced  by  time  and  damp  weather ;  but  the  sun  was  shin- 
ing in,  splendidly,  through  the  red  curtains  of  the  windows, 
and  glittering  on  the  altar  furniture;  and  it  looked  as 
bright  and  cheerful  as  need  be. 

Going  apart,  in  this  church,  to  see  some  painting  which 
was  being  executed  in  fresco  by  a  French  artist  and  his 
pupil,  I  was  led  to  observe  more  closely  than  I  might  other- 
wise have  done,  a  great  number  of  votive  offerings  with 
which  the  walls  of  the  different  chapels  were  profusely 
hung.  I  will  not  say  decorated,  for  they  were  very  roughly 
and  comically  got  up ;  most  likely  by  poor  sign-painters, 
who  eke  out  their  living  in  that  way.  They  were  all  little 
pictures :  each  representing  some  sickness  or  calamity  from 
which  the  person  placing  it  there,  had  escaped,  through 
the  interposition  of  his  or  her  patron  saint,  or  of  the  Ma- 
donna; and  I  may  refer  to  them  as  good  specimens  of  the 
class  generally.     They  are  abundant  in  Italy. 

In  a  grotesque  squareness  of  outline,  and  impossibility  of 
perspective,  they  are  not  unlike  the  woodcuts  in  old  books; 
but  they  were  oil-paintings,  and  the  artist,  like  the  painter 
of  the  Primrose  family,  had  not  been  sparing  of  his  colours. 
In  one,  a  lady  was  having  a  toe  amputated — an  operation 
which  a  saintly  personage  had  sailed  into  the  room,  upon 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  15 

a  cloud,  to  superintend.  In  another,  a  lady  was  lying  in 
bed,  tucked  up  very  tight  and  prim,  and  staring  with  much 
composure  at  a  tripod,  with  a  slop-basin  on  it ;  the  usual 
form  of  washing-stand,  and  the  only  piece  of  furniture,  be- 
sides the  bedstead,  in  her  chamber.  One  would  never  have 
supposed  her  to  be  labouring  under  any  complaint,  beyond 
the  inconvenience  of  being  miraculously  wide  awake,  if 
the  painter  had  not  hit  upon  the  idea  of  putting  all  her 
family  on  their  knees  in  one  corner,  with  their  legs  sticking 
out  behind  them  on  the  floor,  like  boot-trees.  Above  whom, 
the  Virgin,  on  a  kind  of  blue  divan,  promised  to  restore  the 
patient.  In  another  case,  a  lady  was  in  the  very  act  of 
being  run  over,  immediately  outside  the  city  walls,  by  a 
sort  of  pianoforte  van.  But  the  Madonna  was  there  again. 
Whether  the  supernatural  appearance  had  startled  the 
horse  (a  buy  griffin),  or  whether  it  was  invisible  to  him,  I 
don't  know ;  but  he  was  galloping  away,  ding  dong,  with- 
out the  smallest  reverence  or  compunction.  On  every  pic- 
ture "Ex  voto"  was  painted  in  yellow  capitals  in  the 
sky. 

Though  votive  offerings  were  not  unknown  in  pagan 
temples,  and  are  evidently  among  the  many  compromises 
made  between  the  false  religion  and  the  true,  when  the 
true  was  in  its  infancy,  I  could  wish  that  all  the  other  com- 
promises were  as  harmless.  Gratitude  and  Devotion  are 
Christian  qualities ;  and  a  grateful,  humble.  Christian  spirit 
may  dictate  the  observance. 

Hard  by  the  cathedral  stands  the  ancient  Palace  of  the 
Popes,  of  which  one  portion  is  now  a  common  jail,  and 
another  a  noisy  barrack :  while  gloomy  suites  of  state  apart- 
ments, shut  up  and  deserted,  mock  their  own  old  state  and 
glory,  like  the  embalmed  bodies  of  kings.  But  we  neither 
went  there,  to  see  state  rooms,  nor  soldiers'  quarters,  nor 
a  common  jail,  though  Ave  dropped  some  money  into  a  pris- 
oners' box  outside,  wli list  the  prisoners,  themselves,  looked 
through  tlie  iron  bars,  high  xvp,  and  watched  us  eagerly. 
We  went  to  see  the  ruins  of  the  dreadful  rooms  in  which 
the  Inquisition  used  to  sit 

A  little,  old,  suarthy  woman,  with  a  pair  of  flashing 
black  eyes,^pro()f  that  tlie  world  hadn't  conjured  down 
the  devil  within  licr,  tliougli  it  had  had  between  sixty  and 
seventy  years  to  do  it  in, — came  out  of  the  Barrac^k  Cabaret, 
of  wiiich  she  was  the  keeper,  with  some  large  keys  in  her 


16  i»ICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

hands,  and  marshalled  us  the  way  that  we  should  go. 
How  she  told  us,  on  the  way,  that  she  was  a  Government 
Officer  (concierge  du  palais  aj)ostolique) ,  and  had  been,  for 
I  don't  know  how  many  years;  and  how  she  had  shown 
these  dungeons  to  princes ;  and  how  she  was  the  best  of 
dungeon  demonstrators ;  and  how  she  had  resided  in  the 
pala(;e  from  an  infa.nt, — had  been  born  there,  if  I  recollect 
right, — I  needn't  relate.  But  such  a  fierce,  little,  rapid, 
sparkling,  energetic  she-devil  I  never  beheld.  She  was 
alight  and  flaming,  all  the  time.  Her  action  was  violent 
in  the  extreme.  She  never  spoke,  without  stopping 
expressly  for  the  purpose.  She  stamped  her  feet,  clutched 
us  by  the  arms,  flung  herself  into  attitudes,  hammered 
against  walls  with  her  keys,  for  mere  emphasis:  now 
whispered  as  if  the  Inquisition  were  there  still:  now 
shrieked  as  if  she  were  on  the  rack  herself;  and  had  a 
mysterious,  hag-like  way  with  her  forefinger,  when  ap- 
proaching the  remains  of  some  new  horror — looking  back 
and  walking  stealthily  and  making  horrible  grimaces — that 
might  alone  have  qualified  her  to  walk  up  and  down  a  sick 
man's  counterpane,  to  the  exclusion  of  all  other  figures, 
through  a  whole  fever. 

Passing  through  the  court-yard,  among  groups  of  idle 
soldiers,  we  turned  off  by  a  gate,  which  this  She-Goblin 
unlocked  for  our  admission,  and  locked  again  behind  us : 
and  entered  a  narrow  court,  rendered  narrower  by  fallen 
stones  and  heaps  of  rubbish;  part  of  it  choking  up  the 
mouth  of  a  ruined  subterranean  passage,  that  once  commu- 
nicated (or  is  said  to  have  done  so)  with  another  castle  on 
the  opposite  bank  of  the  river.  Close  to  this  court-yard 
is  a  dungeon — we  stood  within  it,  in  another  minute — in 
the  dismal  tower  des  oubliettes,  where  Rienzi  was  impris- 
oned, fastened  by  an  iron  chain  to  the  very  wall  that  stands 
there  now,  but  shut  out  from  the  sky  which  now  looks 
down  into  it.  A  few  steps  brought  us  to  the  Cachots,  in 
which  the  prisoners  of  the  Inquisition  were  confined  for 
forty-eight  hours  after  their  capture,  without  food  or  drink, 
that  their  constancy  might  be  shaken,  even  before  they 
were  confronted  with  their  gloomy  judges.  The  day  has 
not  got  in  there  yet.  They  are  still  small  cells,  shut  in  by 
four  unyielding,  close,  hard  walls;  still  profoundly  dark; 
still  massively  doored  and  fastened,  as  of  old. 

Goblin,  looking  back  as  I  have  described,  went  softly  on, 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  11 

into  a  vaulted  chamber,  now  used  as  a  store-room :  once 
the  Chapel  of  the  Holy  Office.  The  place  where  the  tribu- 
nal sat,  was  plain.  The  platform  might  have  been  removed 
but  yesterday.  Conceive  the  parable  of  the  Good  Samari- 
tan having  been  painted  on  the  wall  of  one  of  these  Inqui- 
sition chambers!  But  it  was,  and  may  be  traced  there 
yet. 

High  up  in  the  jealous  wall,  are  niches  where  the  falter- 
ing replies  of  the  accused  were  heard  and  noted  down. 
Many  of  them  had  been  brought  out  of  the  very  cell  we  had 
just  looked  into,  so  awfully ;  along  the  same  stone  passage. 
We  had  trodden  in  their  very  footsteps. 

I  am  gazing  round  me,  with  the  horror  that  the  place  in- 
spires, when  Goblin  clutches  me  by  the  wrist,  and  lays,  not 
her  skinny  finger,  but  the  handle  of  a  key,  upon  her  lip. 
She  invites  me,  with  a  jerk,  to  follow  her.  I  do  so.  She 
leads  me  out  into  a  room  adjoining — a  rugged  room,  with 
a  funnel-shaped,  contracting  roof,  open  at  the  top,  to  the 
bright  day.  I  ask  her  what  it  is.  She  folds  her  arms, 
leers  hideously,  and  stares.  I  ask  again.  She  glances 
round,  to  see  that  all  the  little  company  are  there ;  sits 
down  upon  a  mound  of  stones ;  throws  up  her  arms,  and 
yells  out,  like  a  fiend,  "  La  Salle  de  la  Question ! " 

The  Chamber  of  Torture !  And  the  roof  was  made  of 
that  shape  to  stifle  the  victim's  cries!  Oh  Goblin,  Goblin, 
let  us  think  of  this  awhile,  in  silence.  Peace,  Goblin! 
Sit  with  your  short  arms  crossed  on  your  short  legs,  upon 
that  heap  of  stones,  for  only  five  minutes,  and  then  flame 
out  again. 

Minutes !  Seconds  are  not  marked  upon  the  Palace  clock, 
when,  with  her  eyes  flashing  fire,  Goblin  is  up,  in  the  mid- 
dle of  the  chamber,  describing,  with  her  sunburnt  arms,  a 
wheel  of  heavy  blows.  Thus  it  ran  round !  cries  Goblin. 
Mash,  mash,  mash !  An  endless  routine  of  heavy  hammers. 
Mash,  mash,  mash!  upon  the  sufferer's  limbs.  See  the 
stone  trough!  says  Goblin.  For  the  water  torture!  Gur- 
gle, swill,  bloat,  burst,  for  the  Redeemer's  honour!  Suck 
the  bloody  rag,  deep  down  into  your  unbelieving  body, 
Heretic,  at  every  breath  you  draw !  And  when  the  execu- 
tioner plucks  it  out,  reeking  with  the  smaller  mysteries  of 
God's  own  Image,  know  us  for  His  chosen  servants,  true 
believers  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  elect  disciples  of 
Him  who  never  did  a  miracle  but  to  heal ;  who  never  atruck 


IB  PICTURES  PROM  ITALY. 

a  man  with  palsy,  blindness,  deafness,  dumbness,  mad- 
ness, anyone  affliction  of  mankind;  and  never  stretched 
His  blessed  hand  out,  but  to  give  relief  and  ease ! 

See !  cries  Goblin.  There  the  furnace  was.  There  they 
made  the  irons  red-hot.  Those  holes  supported  the  sharp 
stake,  on  which  the  tortured  persons  hung  poised:  dan- 
gling with  their  whole  weight  from  the  roof.  "  But ;  "  and 
Goblin  whispers  this ;  "  Monsieur  has  heard  of  this  tower? 
Yes?     Let  Monsieur  look  down,  then !  " 

A  cold  air,  laden  with  an  earthy  smell,  falls  upon  the 
face  of  Monsieur ;  for  she  has  opened,  while  speaking,  a 
trap-door  in  the  wall.  Monsieur  looks  in.  Downward  to 
the  bottom,  upward  to  the  top,  of  a  steep,  dark,  lofty 
tower:  very  dismal,  very  dark,  very  cold.  The  Execu- 
tioner of  the  Inquisition,  says  Goblin,  edging  in  her  head 
to  look  down  also,  flung  those  who  were  past  all  further 
torturing,  down  here.  "  But  look !  does  Monsieur  see  the 
black  stains  on  the  wall?  "  A  glance,  over  his  shoulder, 
at  Goblin's  keen  eye,  shows  Monsieur — and  would  without 
the  aid  of  the  directing-key — where  they  are.  "  What  are 
they?"     "Blood!" 

In  October,  1791,  when  the  Revolution  was  at  its  height 
here,  sixty  persons :  men  and  women  ("  and  priests,"  says 
Goblin,  "  priests ") :  were  murdered,  and  hurled,  the  dy- 
ing and  the  dead,  into  this  dreadful  pit,  where  a  quantity 
of  quicklime  was  tumbled  down  upon  their  bodies.  Those 
ghastly  tokens  of  the  massacre  were  soon  no  more ;  but 
while  one  stone  of  the  strong  building  intwhich  the  deed 
was  done,  remains  upon  another,  there  tliey  will  lie  in  the 
memories  of  men,  as  plain  to  see  as  the  splashing  of  their 
blood  upon  the  wall  is  now. 

Was  it  a  portion  of  the  great  scheme  of  Retribution,  that 
the  cruel  deed  should  be  committed  in  this  place !  That  a 
part  of  the  atrocities  and  monstrous  institutions,  which  had 
been,  for  scores  of  years,  at  work,  to  change  men's  nature, 
should  in  its  last  service,  tempt  them  with  the  ready  means 
of  gratifying  their  furious  and  beastly  rage !  Should  ena- 
ble them  to  show  themselves,  in  the  height  of  their  frenzy, 
ao  worse  than  a  great,  solemn,  legal  establishment,  in  the 
height  of  its  power !  No  worse !  Much  better.  They  used 
the  Tower  of  the  Forgotten,  in  the  name  of  Liberty — their 
liberty ;  an  earth-born  creature,  nursed  in  the  black  mud 
of  the  Bastile  moats  and  dungeons,  and  necessarily  betray- 


PICTURES  PROM  ITALY.  19 

ing  many  evidences  of  its  unwholesome  bringing-up — but 
the  Inquisition  used  it  in  the  name  of  Heaven. 

Goblin's  finger  is  lifted;  and  she  steals  out  again,  into 
the  Chapel  of  the  Holy  Office.  She  stops  at  a  certain  part 
of  the  flooring.  Her  great  effect  is  at  hand.  She  waits  for 
the  rest.  She  darts  at  the  brave  Courier,  who  is  explain- 
ing something ;  hits  him  a  sounding  rap  on  the  hat  with 
the  largest  key ;  and  bids  him  be  silent.  She  assembles 
us  all,  round  a  little  trap-door  in  the  floor,  as  round  a 
grave.  "Voila!"  she  darts  down  at  the  ring,  and  flings 
the  door  open  with  a  crash,  in  her  goblin  energy,  though 
it  is  no  light  weight.  "Voila  les  oubliettes!  Voila  les 
oubliettes!  Subterranean!  Frightful!  Black!  Terrible! 
Deadly!     Les  oubliettes  de  I'Inquisition!  " 

My  blood  ran  cold,  as  I  looked  from  Goblin,  down  into 
the  vaults,  where  these  forgotten  creatures,  with  recollec- 
tions of  the  world  outside :  of  wives,  friends,  children, 
brothers:  starved  to  death,  and  made  the  stones  ring  with 
their  unavailing  groans.  But,  the  thrill  I  felt  on  seeing 
the  accursed  wall  below,  decayed  and  broken  through,  and 
the  sun  shining  in  through  its  gaping  wounds,  was  like  a 
sense  of  victory  and  triumph.  I  felt  exalted  with  the 
proud  delight  of  living,  in  these  degenerate  times,  to  see 
it.  As  if  I  were  the  hero  of  some  high  achievement !  The 
light  in  the  doleful  vaults  was  typical  of  the  light  that  has 
streamed  in,  on  all  persecution  in  God's  name,  but  which 
is  not  yet  at  its  noon !  It  cannot  look  more  lovely  to  a 
blind  man  newly  restored  to  sight,  than  to  a  traveller  who 
sees  it,  calmly  and  majestically,  treading  down  the  dark- 
ness of  that  Infernal  Well. 


AVIGNON  TO  GENOA. 

Goblin,  having  shown  les  oubliettes,  felt  that  her  great 
co^lp  was  struck.  She  let  the  door  fall  with  a  crash,  and 
stood  upon  it  with  her  arms  a-kimbo,  sniffing  prodigiously. 

When  we  left  the  place,  I  accompanied  her  into  her 
house,  under  the  outer  gateway  of  the  fortress,  to  buy  a 
little  history  of  the  building.  Her  cabaret,  a  dark  low 
room,  lighted  by  small  windows,  sunk  in  the  thick  wall — 
in  the  softened  light,  and  with  its  forge-like  chimney ;  its 


io 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY 


little  counter  by  the  door,  with  bottles,  jars",  and  glasses 
on  it ;  its  household  implements  and  scraps  of  dress  against 
the  wall;  and  a  sober-looking  woman  (she  must  have  a 
congenial  life  of  it,  with  Goblin)  knitting  at  the  door — 
looked  exactly  like  a  picture  by  Ostade. 

I  walked  round  the  building  on  the  outside,  in  a  sort  of 
dream,  and  yet  with  the  delightful  sense  of  having  awak- 
ened from  it,  of  which  the  light,  down  in  the  vaults,  had 
given  me  the  assurance.  The  immense  thickness  and  giddy 
height  of  the  walls,  the  enormous  strength  of  the  massive 
towers,  the  great  extent  of  the  building,  its  gigantic  pro- 
portions, frowning  aspect,  and  barbarous  irregularity, 
awaken  awe  and  wonder.  The  recollection  of  its  opposite 
old  uses:  an  impregnable  fortress,  a  luxurious  palace,  a 
horrible  prison,  a  place  of  torture,  the  court  of  the  Inquisi- 
tion :  at  one  and  the  same  time,  a  house  of  feasting,  fighting, 
religion,  and  blood :  gives  to  every  stone  in  its  huge  form  a 
fearful  interest,  and  imparts  new  meaning  to  its  incongrui- 
ties. I  could  think  of  little,  however,  then,  or  long  after- 
wards, but  the  sun  in  the  dungeons.  The  palace  coming 
down  to  be  the  lounging-place  of  noisy  soldiers,  and  being 
forced  to  echo  their  rough  talk,  and  common  oaths,  and  to 
have  their  garments  fluttering  from  its  dirty  windows,  was 
some  reduction  of  its  state,  and  something  to  rejoice  at; 
but  the  day  in  its  cells,  and  the  sky  for  the  roof  of  its  cham- 
bers of  cruelty — that  was  its  desolation  and  defeat !  If  I 
had  seen  it  in  a  blaze  from  ditch  to  rampart,  I  should  have 
felt  that  not  that  light,  nor  all  the  light  in  all  the  fire  that 
burns,  could  waste  it,  like  the  sunbeams  in  its  secret  coun- 
cil-chamber, and  its  prisons. 

Before  I  quit  this  Palace  of  the  Popes,  let  me  translate 
from  the  little  history  I  mentioned  just  now,  a  short  anec- 
dote, quite  appropriate  to  itself,  connected  with  its  adven- 
tures. 

"  An  ancient  tradition  relates,  that  in  1441,  a  nephew  of 
Pierre  de  Lude,  the  Pope's  legate,  seriously  insulted  some 
distinguished  ladies  of  Avignon,  whose  relations,  in  re- 
venge, seized  the  young  man,  and  horribly  mutilated  him. 
For  several  years  the  legate  kept  his  revenge  within  his 
own  breast,  but  he  was  not  the  less  resolved  upon  its  grati- 
fication at  last.  He  even  made,  in  the  fulness  of  time, 
advances  towards  a  complete  reconciliation ;  and  when  their 
apparent  sincerity  had  prevailed,  he  invited  to  a  splendid 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  21 

banquet,  in  this  palace,  certain  families,  whole  families, 
whom  he  sought  to  exterminate.  The  utmost  gaiety  ani- 
mated the  repast ;  but  the  measures  of  the  legate  were  well 
taken.  When  the  dessert  was  on  the  board,  a  Swiss  pre- 
sented himself,  with  the  announcement  that  a  strange  am- 
bassador solicited  an  extraordinary  audience.  The  legate, 
excusing  himself,  for  the  moment,  to  his  guests,  retired, 
followed  by  his  officers.  Within  a  few  moments  after- 
wards, five  hundred  persons  were  reduced  to  ashes:  the 
whole  of  that  wing  of  the  building  having  been  blown  into 
the  air  with  a  terrible  explosion !  " 

After  seeing  the  churches  (I  will  not  trouble  you  with 
churches  just  now),  we  left  Avignon  that  afternoon.  The 
heat  being  very  great,  the  roads  outside  the  walls  were 
strewn  with  people  fast  asleep  in  every  little  slip  of  shade, 
and  with  lazy  groups,  half  asleep  and  half  awake,  who 
were  waiting  until  the  sun  should  be  low  enough  to  admit 
of  their  playing  bowls  among  the  burnt-up  trees,  and  on 
the  dusty  road.  The  harvest  here,  was  already  gathered 
in,  and  mules  and  horses  were  treading  out  the  corn  in  the 
fields.  We  came,  at  dusk,  upon  a  wild  and  hilly  country, 
once  famous  for  brigands :  and  travelled  slowly  up  a  steep 
ascent.  So  we  went  on,  until  eleven  at  night,  when  we 
halted  at  the  town  of  Aix  (within  two  stages  of  Marseilles) 
to  sleep. 

The  hotel,  with  all  the  blinds  and  shutters  closed  to  keep 
the  light  and  heat  out,  was  comfortable  and  airy  next 
morning,  and  the  town  was  very  clean ;  but  so  hot,  and  so 
intensely  light,  that  when  I  walked  out  at  noon  it  was  like 
coming  suddenly  from  the  darkened  room  into  crisp  blue 
fire.  The  air  was  so  very  clear,  that  distant  hills  and 
rocky  points  appeared  within  an  hour's  walk :  while  the 
town  immediately  at  hand — with  a  kind  of  blue  wind  be- 
tween me  and  it — seemed  to  be  white  hot,  and  to  be  throw- 
ing off  a  fiery  air  from  its  surface. 

We  left  this  town  towards  evening,  and  took  the  road  to 
Marseilles,  A  dusty  road  it  was ;  the  houses  shut  up  close ; 
and  the  vines  powdered  white.  At  nearly  all  the  cottage 
doors,  women  were  peeling  and  slicing  onions  into  earthen 
bowls  for  supper.  So  they  had  been  doing  last  night  all 
the  way  from  Avignon.  We  passed  one  or  two  shady  dark 
ch§,teaux,  surrounded  by  trees,  and  embellished  with  cool 
basins  of  water :  which  were  the  more  refreshing  to  behold, 


22  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

from  the  great  scarcity  of  such  residences  on  the  road  we 
had  travelled.  As  we  approached  Marseilles,  the  road  be- 
gan to  be  covered  with  holiday  people.  Outside  the  public- 
houses  were  parties  smoking,  drinking,  playing  draughts 
and  cards,  and  (once)  dancing.  But  dust,  dust,  dust, 
everywhere.  We  went  on,  through  a  long,  straggling, 
dirty  suburb,  thronged  with  people ;  having  on  our  left  a 
dreary  slope  of  land,  on  which  the  country-houses  of  the 
Marseilles  merchants,  always  staring  white,  are  jumbled 
and  heaped  without  the  slightest  order:  backs,  fronts, 
sides,  and  gables  towards  all  points  of  the  compass ;  until, 
at  last,  we  entered  the  town. 

I  was  there,  twice  or  thrice  afterwards,  in  fair  weather 
and  foul ;  and  I  am  afraid  there  is  no  doubt  that  it  is  a 
dirty  and  disagreeable  place.  But  the  prospect,  from  the 
fortified  heights,  of  the  beautiful  Mediterranean,  with  its 
lovely  rocks  and  islands,  is  most  delightful.  These  heights 
are  a  desirable  retreat,  for  less  picturesque  reasons — as  an 
escape  from  a  compound  of  vile  smells  perpetually  arising 
from  a  great  haibour  full  of  stagnant  water,  and  befouled 
by  the  refuse  of  innumerable  ships  with  all  sorts  of  cargoes: 
which,  in  hot  weather,  is  dreadful  in  the  last  degree. 

There  were  foreign  sailors,  of  all  nations,  in  the  streets ; 
with  red  shirts,  blue  shirts,  buff  shirts,  tawny  shirts,  and 
shirts  of  orange  colour;  with  red  caps,  blue  caps,  green 
caps,  great  beards,  and  no  beards;  in  Turkish  turbans, 
glazed  English  hats,  and  Neapolitan  head-dresses.  There 
were  the  townspeople  sitting  in  clusters  on  the  pavement, 
or  airing  themselves  on  the  tops  of  their  houses,  or  walk- 
ing up  and  down  the  closest  and  least  airy  of  Boulevards ; 
and  there  were  crowds  of  lierce-looking  people  of  the  lower 
sort,  blocking  up  the  way,  constantly.  In  the  very  heart 
of  all  this  stir  and  uproar,  was  the  common  madhouse ;  a 
low,  contracted,  miserable  building,  looking  straight  upon 
the  street,  without  the  smallest  screen  or  court-yard ;  where 
chattering  madmen  and  mad-women  were  peeping  out, 
through  rusty  bars,  at  the  staring  faces  below,  while  the 
sun,  darting  fiercely  aslant  into  their  little  cells,  seemed  to 
dry  up  their  brains,  and  worry  them,  as  if  they  were  baited 
by  a  pack  of  dogs. 

We  were  pretty  well  accommodated  at  the  Hotel  du 
Paradis,  situated  in  a  narrow  street  of  very  high  houses, 
with  a  hairdresser's  shop  opposite,  exhibiting  in  one  of  its 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  23 

windows  two  full-length  waxen  ladies,  twirling  round  and 
round :  which  so  enchanted  the  hairdresser  himself,  that  he 
and  his  family  sat- in  arm-chairs,  and  in  cool  undresses,  on 
the  pavement  outside,  enjoying  the  gratification  of  the 
passers-by,  with  lazy  dignity.  The  family  had  retired  to 
rest  when  we  went  to  bed,  at  midnight ;  but  the  hairdresser 
(a  corpulent  man,  in  drab  slippers)  was  still  sitting  there, 
with  his  legs  stretched  out  before  him,  and  evidently 
couldn't  bear  to  have  the  shutters  put  up. 

Next  day  we  went  down  to  the  harbour,  where  the  sail- 
ors of  all  nations  were  discharging  and  taking  in  cargoes 
of  all  kinds :  fruits,  wines,  oils,  silks,  stutfs,  velvets,  and 
every  manner  of  merchandise.  Taking  one  of  a  great  num- 
ber of  lively  little  boats  with  gay-striped  awnings,  we 
rowed  away,  under  the  sterns  of  great  ships,  under  tow- 
ropes  and  cables,  against  and  among  other  boats,  and  very 
much  too  near  the  sides  of  vessels  that  were  faint  with 
oranges,  to  the  Marie  Antoinette,  a  handsome  steamer  bound 
for  Genoa,  lying  near  the  mouth  of  the  harbour.  By-and- 
by,  the  carriage,  that  unwieldy  "  trifle  from  the  Pantechni- 
con," on  a  flat  barge,  bumping  against  everything,  and  giv- 
ing occasion  for  a  prodigious  quantity  of  oaths  and  grimaces, 
came  stupidly  alongside;  and  by  live  o'clock  we  were 
steaming  out  in  the  open  sea.  The  vessel  was  beautifully 
clean ;  the  meals  were  served  under  an  awning  on  deck ; 
the  night  was  calm  and  clear ;  the  quiet  beauty  of  the  sea 
and  sky  unspeakable. 

We  were  olf  Nice,  early  next  morning,  and  coasted  alopg, 
within  a  few  miles  of  the  Cornice  road  (of  which  more  in 
its  place)  nearly  all  day.  We  could  see  Genoa  before  three ; 
and  watching  it  as  it  gradually  developed  its  spendid  am- 
phitheatre, terrace  rising  above  terrace,  garden  above  gar- 
den, palace  above  palace,  height  above  height,  was  ample 
occupation  for  us,  till  we  ran  into  the  stately  harbour. 
Having  been  duly  astonished,  here,  by  the  sight  of  a  few 
Cappuccini  monks,  who  were  watching  the  fair- weighing 
of  some  wood  upon  the  wharf,  we  drove  off  to  Albaro,  two 
miles  distant,  where  we  had  engaged  a  house. 

The  way  lay  through  the  main  streets,  but  not  through 
the  Strada  Nuova,  or  the  Strada  Balbi,  which  are  the  fa- 
mous streets  of  palaces.  I  never,  in  my  life,  was  so  dis- 
mayed !  The  wonderful  novelty  of  everything,  the  unusual 
smells,  the  unaccoiintable  filth  (though  it  is  reckoned  the 


24  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY, 

cleanest  of  Italian  towns),  the  disorderly  jumbling  of  dirty 
houses,  one  upon  the  roof  of  another ;  the  passages  more 
squalid  and  more  close  than  any  in  St.  Giles's  or  old  Paris: 
in  and  out  of  which,  not  vagabonds,  but  well-dressed 
women,  with  white  veils  and  great  fans,  were  passing  and 
repassing ;  the  perfect  absence  of  resemblance  in  any  dwell- 
ing-house, or  shop,  or  wall,  or  post,  or  pillar,  to  anything 
one  had  ever  seen  before ;  and  the  disheartening  dirt,  dis- 
comfort, and  decay ;  perfectly  confounded  me.  I  fell  into 
a  dismal  reverie.  I  am  conscious  of  a  feverish  and  bewil- 
dered vision  of  saints  and  virgins'  shrines  at  the  street  cor- 
ners— of  great  numbers  of  friars,  'nonks,  and  soldiers — of 
vast  red  curtains,  waving  in  the  door-ways  of  the  churches 
— of  always  going  uphill,  and  yet  seeing  every  other  street 
and  passage  going  higher  up — of  fruit-stalls,  with  fresh 
lemons  and  oranges  hanging  in  garlands  made  of  vine- 
leaves — of  a  guard -house,  and  a  drawbridge' — and  some 
gateways — and  vendors  of  iced  water,  sitting  with  little 
trays  upon  the  margin  of  the  kennel — and  this  is  all  the 
consciousness  I  had,  until  I  was  set  down  in  a  rank,  dull, 
weedy  court-yard,  attached  to  a  kind  of  pink  jail ;  and  was 
told  I  lived  there. 

I  little  thought,  that  day,  that  I  should  ever  come  to 
have  an  attachment  for  the  very  stones  in  the  streets  of 
Genoa,  and  to  look  back  upon  the  city  with  affection  as 
connected  with  many  hours  of  happiness  and  quiet !  But 
these  are  my  first  impressions  honestly  set  down;  and  how 
they  changed,  I  will  set  down  too.  At  present,  let  us 
breathe  after  this  long-winded  journey. 


GENOA  AND  ITS  NEIGHBOURHOOD. 

The  first  impressions  of  such  a  place  as  Albaro,  the 
suburb  of  Genoa  where  I  am  now,  as  my  American  friends 
would  say,  "located,"  can  hardly  fail,  I  should  imagine, 
to  be  mournful  and  disappointing.  It  requires  a  little 
time  and  use  to  overcome  the  feeling  of  depression  conse- 
quent, at  first,  on  so  much  ruin  and  neglect.  Novelty, 
pleasant  to  most  people,  is  particularly  delightful,  I  think, 
to  me.  I  am  not  easily  dispirited  when  I  have  the  means 
of  pursuing  my  own  fancies  and  occupations ;  and  I  believe 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  25 

I  have  some  natural  aptitude  for  aocommodating  myself  to 
circumstances.  But,  as  yet,  I  stroll  about  here,  in  all  the 
holes  and  corners  of  the  neighbourhood,  in  a  perpetual  state 
of  forlorn  surprise;  and  returning  to  my  villa:  the  Villa 
Baguerello  (it  sounds  romantic,  but  Signor  Bagnerello  is 
a  butcher  hard  by)  ;  have  sufficient  occupation  in  ponder- 
ing over  my  new  experiences,  and  comparing  them,  very 
much  to  my  own  amusement,  with  my  expectations,  until 
I  wander  out  again. 

The  Villa  Bagnerello :  or  the  Pink  Jail,  a  far  more  ex- 
pressive name  for  the  mansion :  is  in  one  of  the  most  splen- 
did situations  imaginable.  The  noble  bay  of  Genoa,  with 
the  deep  blue  Mediterranean,  lies  stretched  out  near  at 
hand ;  monstrous  old  desolate  houses  and  palaces  are  dotted 
all  about ;  lofty  hills,  with  their  tops  often  hidden  in  the 
clouds,  and  with  strong  forts  perched  high  up  on  their 
craggy  sides,  are  close  upon  the  left;  and  in  front,  stretch- 
ing from  the  walls  of  the  house,  down  to  a  ruined  chapel 
which  stands  upon  the  bold  and  picturesque  rocks  on  the 
sea-shore,  are  green  vineyards,  where  you  may  wander  all 
day  long  in  partial  shade,  through  interminable  vistas  of 
grapes,  trained  on  a  rough  trellis-work  across  the  narrow 
paths. 

This  sequestered  spot  is  approached  by  lanes  so  very 
narrow,  that  when  we  arrived  at  the  Custom-house,  we 
found  the  people  here  had  taken  the  measure  of  the  nar- 
rowest among  them,  and  were  waiting  to  apply  it  to  the 
carriage ;  which  ceremony  was  gravely  performed  in  the 
street,  while  we  all  stood  by,  in  breathless  suspense.  It 
was  found  to  be  a  very  tight  fit,  but  just  a  possibility,  and 
no  more — as  I  am  reminded  every  day,  by  the  sight  of 
various  large  holes  which  it  punched  in  the  walls  on 
either  side  as  it  came  along.  We  are  more  fortunate,  I 
am  told,  than  an  old  lady  who  took  a  house  in  these 
parts  not  long  ago,  and  who  stuck  fast  in  her  carriage  in 
a  lane  ;  and  as  it  was  impossible  to  open  one  of  the 
doors,  she  was  obliged  to  submit  to  the  indignity  of  being 
hauled  through  one  of  the  little  front  windows,  like  a 
harlequin. 

When  you  have  got  through  these  narrow  lanes,  you 
come  to  an  archway,  imperfectly  stopped  up  by  a  rusty  old 
gate — my  gate.  The  rusty  old  gate  has  a  bell  to  corre- 
spond, which  you  ring  as  long  as  you  like,  and  which  nobody 


26  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

answers  as  it  has  no  connexion  whatever  with  the  house. 
But  there  is  a  rusty  old  kuocker,  too — very  loose,  so  that  it 
slides  round  when  you  touch  it— and  if  you  learn  the  trick 
of  it,  and  knock  long  enough,  somebody  comes.  The  Brave 
Courier  comes,  and  gives  you  admittance.  You  walk  into 
a  seedy  little  garden ;  all  wild  and  weedy,  from  which  the 
vineyard  opens ;  cross  it,  enter  a  square  hall  like  a  cellar, 
walk  up  a  cracked  marble  staircase,  and  pass  into  a  most 
enormous  room  with  a  vaulted  roof  and  whitewaslied  walls : 
not  unlike  a  great  Methodist  chapel.  This  is  the  sala.  It 
has  five  windows  and  live  doors,  and  is  decorated  with  pic- 
tures which  would  gladden  the  heart  of  one  of  those 
picture-cleaners  in  London  who  hang  up,  as  a  sign ,  a  picture 
divided,  like  Death  and  the  Lady,  at  the  top  of  the  old  bal- 
lad: which  always  leaves  you  in  a  state  of  uncertainty 
whether  the  ingenious  professor  has  cleaned  one  half  or 
dirtied  the  other.  The  furniture  of  this  sala  is  a  sort  of 
red  brocade.  All  the  chairs  are  immovable,  and  the  sofa 
weighs  several  tons. 

On  the  same  floor,  and  opening  out  of  the  same  chamber, 
are  dining-room,  drawing-room,  and  divers  bedrooms ;  each 
with  a  multiplicity  of  doors  and  windows.  Up  stairs  are 
divers  other  gaunt  chambers,  and  a  kitchen;  and  down 
stairs  is  another  kitchen,  which,  with  all  sorts  of  strange 
contrivances  for  burning  charcoal,  looks  like  an  alchemical 
laboratory.  There  are  also  some  half-dozen  small  sitting- 
rooms,  where  the  servants,  in  this  hot  July,  may  escape 
from  the  heat  of  the  fire,  and  where  the  Brave  Courier 
plays  all  sorts  of  musical  instruments  of  his  own  manufac- 
ture, all  the  evening  long.  A  mighty  old,  wandering, 
ghostly,  echoing,  grim,  bare  house  it  is,  as  ever  I  beheld 
or  thought  of. 

There  is  a  little  vine-covered  terrace,  opening  from  the 
drawing-room;  and  under  this  terrace,  and  forming  one 
side  of  the  little  garden,  is  what  used  to  be  the  stable.  It 
is  now  a  cow-house,  and  has  three  cows  in  it,  so  that 
we  get  new  milk  by  the  bucketful.  There  is  no  pasturage 
near,  and  they  never  go  out,  but  are  constantly  lying  down 
and  surfeiting  themselves  with  vine-leaves — -perfect  Italian 
cows — enjoying  the  dolce  far*  niente  all  day  long.  They 
are  presided  over,  and  slept  with,  by  an  old  man  named 
Antonio,  and  his  son :  two  burnt-sienna  natives  with  naked 
legs  and  feet,  who  wear,  each,  a  shirt,  a  pair  of  trousers. 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  27 

and  a  red  sash,  with  a  relic,  or  some  sacred  charm  like  a 
bonbon  off  a  twelfth-cake,  hanging  round  the  neck.  The  old 
man  is  very  anxious  to  convert  me  to  the  Catholic  faith ; 
and  exhorts  me  frequently.  We  sit  upon  a  stone  by  the 
door,  sometimes,  in  the  evening,  like  Robinson  Crusoe  and 
Friday  reversed;  and  he  generally  relates,  towards  my 
conversion,  an  abridgment  of  the  History  of  Saint  Peter 
— chiefly,  I  believe,  from  the  unspeakable  delight  he  has 
in  his  imitation  of  the  cock. 

The  view,  as  I  have  said,  is  charming;  but  in  the  day 
you  must  keep  the  lattice-blinds  close  shut,  or  the  sun 
would  drive  you  mad ;  and  when  the  sun  goes  down  you 
must  shut  up  all  the  windows,  or  the  mosquitoes  would 
tempt  you  to  commit  suicide.  So  at  this  time  of  the  year, 
you  don't  see  much  of  the  prospect  within  doors.  As  for 
the  flies,  you  don't  mind  them.  Nor  the  fleas,  whose  size 
is  prodigious,  and  whose  name  is  Legion,  and  who  popu- 
late the  coach-house  to  that  extent  that  I  daily  expect  to 
see  the  carriage  going  off  bodily,  drawn  by  myriads  of  in- 
dustrious fleas  in  harness.  The  rats  are  kept  away,  quite 
comfortably,  by  scores  of  lean  cats,  who  roam  about  the 
garden  for  that  purpose.  The  lizards,  of  course,  nobody 
cares  for;  they  play  in  the  sun,  and  don't  bite.  The  little 
scorpions  are  merely  curious.  The  beetles  are  rather  late, 
and  have  not  appeared  yet.  The  frogs  are  company. 
There  is  a  preserve  of  them  in  the  grounds  of  the  next 
villa ;  and  after  nightfall,  one  would  think  that  scores  upon 
scores  of  women  in  pattens  were  going  up  and  down  a  wet 
stone  pavement  without  a  moment's  cessation.  That  is 
exactly  the  noise  they  make. 

The  ruined  chapel,  on  the  picturesque  and  beautiful  sea- 
shore, was  dedicated,  once  upon  a  time,  to  Saint  John  the 
Baptist.  I  believe  there  is  a  legend  that  Saint  John's 
bones  Were  received  there,  with  various  solemnities,  when 
they  were  first  brought  to  Genoa;  for  Genoa  possesses 
them  to  this  day.  When  there  is  any  uncommon  tempest 
at  sea,  they  are  brought  out  and  exhibited  to  the  raging 
weather,  which  they  never  fail  to  calm.  In  consequence 
of  this  connexion  of  Saint  John  with  the  city,  great  num- 
bers of  the  common  people  are  christened  Giovanni  Battista, 
which  latter  name  is  pronounced  in  the  Genoese  patois 
"Batcheetcha,"  like  a  sneeze.  To  hear  everybody  calling 
everybody  else  Batcheetcha,  on  a  Sunday,  or  Festa-day, 


28  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

when  there  are  crowds  in  the  streets,  is  not  a  little  singu- 
lar and  amusing  to  a  stranger. 

The  narrow  lanes  have  great  villas  opening  into  them, 
whose  walls  (outside  walls,  1  mean)  are  profusely  painted 
with  all  sorts  of  subjects,  grim  and  holy.  But  time  and 
the  sea-air  have  nearly  obliterated  them ;  and  they  look  like 
the  entrance  to  Vauxhall  Gardens  on  a  sunny  day.  The 
court-yards  of  these  houses  are  overgrown  with  grass  and 
weeds ;  all  sorts  of  hideous  patches  cover  the  bases  of  the 
statues,  as  if  they  were  afflicted  with  a  cutaneous  disorder; 
the  outer  gates  are  rusty ;  and  the  iron  bars  outside  the 
lower  windows  are  all  tumbling  down.  Firewood  is  kept 
in  halls  wher6  costly  treasures  might  be  heaped  up,  moun- 
tains high ;  waterfalls  are  dry  and  choked ;  fountains,  too 
dull  to  play,  and  too  lazy  to  work,  have  just  enough  recol- 
lection of  their  identity,  in  their  sleep,  to  make  the  neigh- 
bourhood damp ;  and  the  sirocco  wind  is  often  blowing  over 
all  these  things  for  days  together,  like  a  gigantic  oven  out 
for  a  holiday. 

Not  long  ago,  there  was  a  festa-day,  in  honour  of  the 
Virgin^ s  mother,  when  the  youug  men  of  the  neighbourhood, 
having  worn  green  wreaths  of  the  vine  in  some  procession 
or  other,  bathed  in  them,  by  scores.  It  looked  very  odd 
and  pretty.  Though  I  am  bound  to  confess  (not  knowing 
of  the  festa  at  that  time),  that  I  thought,  and  was  quite 
satisfied,  they  wore  them  as  horses  do — to  keep  the  flies  off. 

Soon  afterwards,  there  was  another  festa-day,  in  honour 
of  St.  Nazaro.  One  of  the  Albaro  young  men  brought  two 
large  bouquets  soon  after  breakfast,  and  coming  up-stairs 
into  the  great  sala,  presented  them  himself.  This  was  a 
polite  way  of  begging  for  a  contribution  towards  the  ex- 
penses of  some  music  in  the  Saint's  honour,  so  we  gave 
him  whatever  it  may  have  been,  and  his  messenger  de- 
parted :  well  satisfied.  At  six  o'clock  in  the  evening  we 
went  to  the  church — close  at  hand — a  very  gaudy  place, 
hung  all  over  with  festoons  and  bright  draperies,  and  filled, 
from  the  altar  to  the  main  door,  with  women,  all  seated. 
They  wear  no  bonnets  here,  simply  a  long  white  veil — the 
"mezzero; "  and  it  was  the  most  gauzy,  ethereal-looking 
audience  I  ever  saw.  The  young  women  are  not  generally 
pretty,  but  they  walk  remarkably  well,  and  in  their  per- 
sonal carriage  and  the  management  of  their  veils,  display 
much  innate  grace  and  elegance.     There  were  some  men 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  29 

present :  not  very  many :  and  a  few  of  these  were  kneeling 
about  the  aisles,  while  everybody  else  tumbled  over  them. 
Innumerable  tapers  were  burning  in  the  church ;  the  bits 
of  silver  and  tin  about  the  saints  (especially  in  the  Virgin's 
necklace)  sparkled  brilliantly;  the  priests  were  seated 
about  the  chief  altar ;  the  organ  played  away,  lustily,  and 
a  full  band  did  the  like ;  while  a  conductor,  in  a  little  gal- 
lery opposite  to  the  band,  hammered  away  on  the  desk  be- 
fore him,  with  a  scroll ;  and  a  tenor,  without  any  voice, 
sang.  The  band  played  one  way,  the  organ  played  another, 
the  singer  went  a  third,  and  the  unfortunate  conductor 
banged  and  banged,  and  flourished  his  scroll  on  some  prin- 
ciple of  his  own :  apparently  well  satisfied  with  the  whole 
performance.  I  never  did  hear  such  a  discordant  din. 
The  heat  was  intense  all  the  time. 

The  men,  in  red  caps,  and  with  loose  coats  hanging  on 
their  shoulders  (they  never  put  them  on),  were  playing 
bowls,  and  buying  sweetmeats,  immediately  outside  the 
church.  AVlien  half-a-dozen  of  them  finished  a  game,  they 
came  into  the  aisle,  crossed  themselves  with  the  holy  water, 
knelt  on  one  knee  for  an  instant,  and  walked  off  again  to 
play  another  game  at  bowls.  They  are  remarkably  expert 
at  this  diversion,  and  will  play  in  the  stony  lanes  and 
streets,  and  on  the  most  uneven  and  disastrous  ground  for 
such  a  purpose,  with  as  much  nicety  as  on  a  billiard-table. 
But  the  most  favourite  game  is  the  national  one  of  Mora, 
which  they  pursue  with  surprising  ardour,  and  at  which 
they  will  stake  everything  they  possess.  It  is  a  destruc- 
tive kind  of  gambling,  requiring  no  accessories  but  the 
ten  fingers,  which  are  always — I  intend  no  pun — at  hand. 
Two  men  play  together.  One  calls  a  number — say  the  ex- 
treme one,  ten.  He  marks  what  portion  of  it  he  pleases 
by  throwing  out  three,  or  four,  or  five  fingers ;  and  his  ad- 
versary has,  in  the  same  instant,  at  hazard,  and  without 
seeing  his  hand,  to  throw  out  as  many  fingers,  as  will  make 
the  exact  balance.  Their  eyes  and  hands  become  so  used 
to  this,  and  act  with  such  astonishing  rapidity,  that  an  un- 
initiated bystander  would  find  it  very  difficult,  if  not  im- 
possible, to  follow  the  progress  of  the  game.  The  initiated, 
however,  of  whom  there  is  always  an  eager  group  looking 
on,  devour  it  with  the  most  intense  avidity ;  and  as  they 
are  always  ready  to  champion  one  side  or  the  other  in  case 
of  a  dispute,  and  are  frequently  divided  in  their  partisan" 


30'-#  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY, 

ship,  it  is  often  a  very  noisy  proceeding.  It  is  never  the 
quietest  game  in  the  world;  for  the  numbers  are  always 
called  in  a  loud  sharp  voice,  and  follow  as  close  upon  each 
other  as  they  can  be  counted.  On  a  holiday  evening,  stand- 
ing at  a  window,  or  walking  in  a  garden,  or  passing  through 
the  streets,  or  sauntering  in  any  quiet  place  about  the  town, 
you  will  hear  this  game  in  progress  in  a  score  of  wine-shops 
at  once;  and  looking  over  any  vineyard  walk,  or  turning 
almost  any  corner,  will  come  upon  a  knot  of  players  in  full 
cry.  It  is  observable  that  most  men  have  a  propensity  to 
throw  out  some  particular  number  of tener  than  another ; 
and  the  vigilance  with  which  two  sharp-eyed  players  will 
mutually  endeavour  to  detect  this  weakness,  and  adapt 
their  game  to  it,  is  very  curious  and  entertaining.  The 
effect  is  greatly  heightened  by  the  universal  suddenness 
and  vehemence  of  gesture ;  two  men  playing  for  half  a 
farthing  with  an  intensity  as  all-absorbing  as  if  the  stake 
were  life. 

Hard  by  here  is  a  large  Palazzo,  formerly  belonging  to 
some  member  of  the  Brignole  family,  but  just  now  hired 
by  a  school  of  Jesuits  for  their  summer  quarters,  I  walked 
into  its  dismantled  precincts  the  other  evening  about  sun- 
set, and  couldn't  help  pacing  up  and  down  for  a  little  time, 
drowsily  taking  in  the  aspect  of  the  place :  which  is  re- 
peated hereabouts  in  all  directions. 

I  loitered  to  and  fro,  under  a  colonnade,  forming  two 
sides  of  a  weedy,  grass-grown  court-yard,  whereof  the 
house  formed  a  third  side,  and  a  low  terrace-walk,  over- 
looking the  garden  and  the  neighbouring  hills,  the  fourth. 
I  don't  believe  there  was  an  uncracked  stone  in  the  whole 
pavement.  In  the  centre  was  a  melancholy  statue,  so  pie- 
bald in  its  decay,  that  it  looked  exactly  as  if  it  had  been 
covered  with  sticking-plaster,  and  afterwards  powdered. 
The  stables,  coach-houses,  offices,  were  all  empty,  all  ruin- 
ous, all  utterly  deserted. 

Doors  had  lost  their  hinges,  and  were  holding  on  by 
their  latches;  windows  were  broken,  painted  plaster  had 
peeled  off,  and  was  lying  about  in  clods;  fowls  and  cats 
had  so  taken  possession  of  the  outbuildings,  that  I  couldn't 
help  thinking  of  the  fairy  tales,  and  eyeing  them  with 
suspicion,  as  transformed  retainers,  waiting  to  be  changed 
back  again.  One  old  Tom  in  particular:  a  scraggy  brute, 
with  a  hungry  green  eye  (a  poor  relation,  in  reality,  I  am 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  31 

inclined  to  think)  :  came  prowling  round  and  round  me,  as 
if  he  half  believed,  for  the  moment,  that  I  might  be  the 
hero  come  to  marry  the  lady,  and  set  all  to  rights ;  but  dis- 
covering his  mistake,  he  suddenly  gave  a  grim  snarl,  ana 
walked  away  with  such  a  tremendous  tail,  that  he  couldn^t 
get  into  the  little  hole  where  he  lived,  but  was  obliged  to 
wait  outside,  until  his  indignation  and  his  tail  had  gone 
dowu  together. 

In  a  sort  of  summer-house,  or  whatever  it  may  be,  in 
this  colonnade,  some  Englishmen  had  been  living,  like 
grubs  in  a  nut ;  but  the  Jesuits  had  given  them  notice  to 
go,  and  they  had  gone,  and  that  was  shut  up  too.  The 
house:  a  wandering,  echoing,  thundering  barrack  of  a 
place,  with  the  lower  windows  barred  up,  as  usual,  was 
wide  open  at  the  door :  and  I  have  no  doubt  I  might  have 
gone  in,  and  gone  to  bed,  and  gone  dead,  and  nobody  a  bit 
the  wiser.  Only  one  suite  of  rooms  on  an  upper  floor  was 
tenanted ;  and  from  one  of  these,  the  voice  of  a  young-lady 
vocalist,  practising  bravura  lustily,  came  flaunting  out 
upon  the  silent  evening. 

I  went  down  into  the  garden,  intended  to  be  prim  and 
quaint,  with  avenues,  and  terraces,  and  orange-trees,  and 
statues,  and  water  in  stone  basins;  and  everything  was 
green,  gaunt,  weedy,  straggling,  under  grown  or  over 
grown,  mildewy,  damp,  redolent  of  all  sorts  of  slabby, 
clammy,  creeping,  and  uncomfortable  life.  There  was 
nothing  bright  in  the  whole  scene  but  a  firefly — one  solitary 
firefly — showing  against  the  dark  bushes  like  the  last  little 
speck  of  the  departed  Glory  of  tlie  house ;  and  even  it  went 
flitting  up  and  down  at  sudden  angles,  and  leaving  a  place 
with  a  jerk,  and  describing  an  irregular  circle,  and  return- 
ing to  the  same  place  with  a  twitch  that  startled  one :  as  if 
it  were  looking  for  the  rest  of  the  Glory,  and  wondering 
(Heaven  knows  it  might!)  what  had  become  of  it. 

In  the  course  of  two  months,  the  flitting  shapes  and 
shadows  of  my  dismal  entering  reverie  gradually  resolved 
themselves  into  familiar  forms  and  substances;  and  I 
already  began  to  think  that  when  the  time  should  come,  a 
year  hence,  for  closing  the  long  holiday  and  turning  back 
to  England,  I  might  part  from  Genoa  with  anything  but  a 
glad  heart. 

It  is  a  place  that  "  grows  upon  you  "  every  day.     There 


32  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

seems  to  be  always  something  to  find  out  in  it.  There  are 
the  most  extraordinary  alleys  and  by-ways  to  walk  about 
in.  You  can  lose  your  way  (what  a  comfort  that  is,  when 
you  are  idle !)  twenty  times  a-day,  if  you  like ;  and  turn  up 
again,  under  the  most  unexpected  and  surprising  difficul- 
ties. It  abounds  in  the  strangest  contrasts ;  things  that 
are  picturesque,  ugly,  mean,  magnificent,  delightful,  and 
offensive,  break  upon  the  view  at  every  turn. 

They  who  would  know  how  beautiful  the  country  im- 
mediately surrounding  Genoa  is,  should  climb  (in  clear 
weather)  to  the  top  of  Monte  Faccio,  or,  at  least,  ride 
round  the  city  walls :  a  feat  more  easily  performed.  No 
prospect  can  be  more  diversified  and  lovely  than  the  chang- 
ing views  of  the  harbour,  and  the  valleys  of  the  two  rivers, 
the  Polcevera  and  the  Bizagno,  from  the  heights  along 
which  the  strongly-fortified  walls  are  carried,  like  the  great 
wall  of  China  in  little.  In  not  the  least  picturesque  part 
of  this  ride,  there  is  a  fair  specimen  of  a  real  Genoese  tav- 
ern, where  the  visitor  may  derive  good  entertainment  from 
real  Genoese  dishes,  such  as  Tagliarini ;  Ravioli ;  German 
sausages,  strong  of  garlic,  sliced  and  eaten  with  fresh  green 
figs;  cocks'  combs  and  sheep-kidneys,  chopped  up  with 
mutton-chops  and  liver;  small  pieces  of  some  unknown 
part  of  a  calf,  twisted  into  small  shreds,  fried,  and  served 
up  in  a  great  dish  like  whitebait;  and  other  curiosities  of 
that  kind.  They  often  get  wine  at  these  suburban  Trat- 
torie,  from  France  and  Spain  and  Portugal,  which  is 
brought  over  by  small  captains  in  little  trading-vessels. 
They  buy  it  at  so  much  a  bottle,  without  asking  what  it  is, 
or  caring  to  remember  if  anybody  tells  them,  and  usually 
divide  it  into  two  heaps ;  of  which  they  label  one  Cham- 
pagne, and  the  other  Madeira.  The  various  opposite  fla- 
vours, qualities,  countries,  ages,  and  vintages  that  are 
comprised  under  these  two  general  heads  is  quite  extraor- 
dinary. The  most  limited  range  is  probably  from  cool 
Gruel  up  to  old  Marsala,  and  down  again  to  apple  Tea. 

The  great  majority  of  the  streets  are  as  narrow  as  any 
thoroughfare  can  well  be,  where  people  (even  Italian  peo- 
ple) are  supposed  to  live  and  walk  about ;  being  mere  lanes, 
with  here  and  there  a  kind  of  well,  or  breathing-place. 
The  houses  are  immensely  high,  painted  in  all  sorts  of 
colours,  and  are  in  every  stage  and  state  of  damage,  dirt, 
and  lack  of  repair.     They  are  commonly  let  off  in  floors, 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  33 

or  flats,  like  the  houses  in  the  old  town  of  Edinburgh,  or 
many  houses  in  Paris.  There  are  few  street  doors ;  the 
entrance  halls  are,  for  the  most  part,  looked  upon  as  public 
property ;  and  any  moderately  enterprising  scavenger  might 
make  a  fine  fortune  by  now  and  then  clearing  them  out. 
As  it  is  impossible  for  coaches  to  penetrate  into  these 
streets,  there  are  sedan  chairs,  gilded  and  otherwise,  for 
hire  in  divers  places.  A  great  many  private  chairs  are  also 
kept  among  the  nobility  and  gentry ;  and  at  night  these  aie 
trotted  to  and  fro  in  all  directions,  preceded  by  bearers  of 
great  lanthorns,  made  of  linen  stretched  upon  a  frame. 
The  sedans  and  lanthorns  are  the  legitimate  successors  of 
the  long  strings  of  patient  and  much-abused  mules,  that  go 
jingling  their  little  bells  through  these  confined  streets 
all  day  long.  .  They  follow  them,  as  regularly  as  the  stars 
the  sun. 

When  shall  I  forget  the  Streets  of  Palaces :  the  Strada 
Nuova  and  the  Strada  Baldi !  or  how  the  former  looked  one 
summer  day,  when  I  first  saw  it  underneath  the  brightest 
and  most  intensely  blue  of  summer  skies :  which  its  nar- 
row perspective  of  immense  mansions,  reduced  to  a  taper- 
ing and  most  precious  strip  of  brightness,  looking  down 
upon  the  heavy  shade  below !  A  brightness  not  too  com- 
mon, even  in  July  and  August,  to  be  well  esteemed:  for, 
if  the  Truth  must  out,  there  were  not  eight  blue  skies  in  as 
many  midsummer  weeks,  saving,  sometimes,  early  in  the 
morning;  when,  looking  out  to  sea,  the  water  and  the  fir- 
mament were  one  world  of  deep  and  brilliant  blue.  At 
other  times,  there  were  clouds  and  haze  enough  to  make  an 
Englishman  grumble  in  his  own  climate. 

The  endless  details  of  these  rich  Palaces:  the  walls 
of  some  of  them,  within,  alive  with  masterpieces  by  Van- 
dyke !  The  great,  heavy,  stone  balconies,  one  above  an- 
other, and  tier  over  tier ;  with  here  and  there,  one  larger 
than  the  rest,  towering  high  up — a  huge  marble  platform ; 
the  doorless  vestibules,  massively  barred  lower  windows, 
immense  public  staircases,  thick  marble  pillars,  strong 
dungeon-like  arches,  and  dreary,  dreaming,  echoing  vaulted 
chambers :  among  which  the  eye  wanders  again,  and  again, 
and  again,  as  every  palace  is  succeeded  by  another — the 
terrace  gardens  between  house  and  house,  with  green 
arches  of  the  vine,  and  groves  of  orange-trees,  and  blush- 
ing oleander  in  full  bloom,  twenty,  thirty,  forty  feet 
3 


34  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

above  the  street — the  painted  halls,  mouldering,  and  blot- 
ting, and  rotting  in  the  damp  corners,  and  still  shining  out 
in  beautiful  colours  and  voluptuous  designs,  where  the 
walls  are  dry — the  faded  figures  on  the  outsides  of  the 
houses,  holding  wreaths,  and  crowns,  and  flying  upward, 
and  downward,  and  standing  in  niches,  and  here  and  there 
looking  fainter  and  more  feeble  than  elsewhere,  by  contrast 
with  some  fresh  little  Cupids,  who  on  a  more  recently  dec- 
orated portion  of  the  front,  are  stretching  out  what  seems 
to  be  the  semblance  of  a  blanket,  but  is,  indeed,  a  sun-dial 
— the  steep,  steep,  up-hill  streets  of  small  palaces  (but  very 
large  palaces  for  all  that),  with  marble  terraces  looking 
down  into  close  by-ways — the  magnificent  and  innumerable 
Churches ;  and  the  rapid  passage  from  a  street  of  stately 
edifices,  into  a  maze  of  the  vilest  squalor,  steaming  with 
unwholesome  stenches,  and  swarming  with  half -naked  chil- 
dren and  whole  worlds  of  dirty  people — make  up,  alto- 
gether, such  a  scene  of  wonder :  so  lively,  and  yet  so  dead : 
so  noisy,  and  yet  so  quiet :  so  obtrusive,  and  yet  so  shy  and 
lowering:  so  wide  awake,  and  yet  so  fast  asleep:  that  it 
is  a  sort  of  intoxication  to  a  stranger  to  walk  on,  and  on, 
and  on,  and  look  about  him.  A  bewildering  phantasma- 
goria, with  all  the  inconsistency  of  a  dream,  and  all  the 
pain  and  all  the  pleasure  of  an  extravagant  reality ! 

The  different  uses  to  which  some  of  these  Palaces  are  ap- 
plied, all  at  once,  is  characteristic.  For  instance,  the  Eng- 
lish Banker  (my  excellent  and  hospitable  friend)  has  his 
office  in  a  good-sized  Palazzo  in  the  Strada  Nuova.  In 
the  hall  (every  inch  of  which  is  elaborately  painted,  but 
which  is  as  dirty  as  a  police-station  in  London),  a  hook- 
nosed Saracen's  Head  with  an  immense  quantity  of  black 
hair  (there  is  a  man  attached  to  it)  sells  walking-sticks. 
On  the  other  side  of  the  doorway,  a  lady  with  a  showy 
handkerchief  for  head-dress  (wife  to  the  Saracen's  Head, 
I  believe)  sells  articles  of  her  own  knitting;  and  some- 
times flowers.  A  little  further  in,  two  or  three  blind  men 
occasionally  beg.  Sometimes,  they  are  visited  by  a  man 
without  legs,  on  a  little  go-cart,  but  who  has  such  a  fresh- 
coloured,  lively  face,  and  such  a  respectable,  well-condi- 
tioned body,  that  he  looks  as  if  he  had  sunk  into  the 
ground  up  to  his  middle,  or  had  come,  but  partially,  up  a 
flight  of  cellar-steps  to  speak  to  somebody.  A  little  fur- 
ther in,  a  few  men,  perhaps,  lie  asleep  in  the  middle  of  the 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  35 

day  J  or  they  may  be  chairmen  waiting  for  their  absent 
freight.  If  so,  they  have  brought  their  chairs  in  with 
them,  and  there  they  stand  also.  On  the  left  of  the  hall  is 
a  little  room:  a  hatter's  shop.  On  the  first  floor,  is  the 
English  bank.  On  the  first  floor  also,  is  a  whole  house, 
and  a  good  large  residence  too.  Heaven  knows  what  there 
may  be  above  that ;  but  when  you  are  there,  you  have  only 
just  begun  to  go  up  stairs.  And  yet,  coming  down  stairs 
again,  thinking  of  this ;  and  passing  out  at  a  great  crazy 
door  in  the  back  of  the  hall,  instead  of  turning  the  other 
way,  to  get  mto  the  street  again;  it  bangs  behind  you, 
making  the  dismallest  and  most  lonesome  echoes,  and  you 
stand  in  a  yard  (the  yard  of  the  same  house)  which  seems 
to  have  been  unvisited  by  human  foot,  for  a  hundred  years. 
Not  a  sound  disturbs  its  repose.  Not  a  head,  thrust  out 
of  any  of  the  grim,  dark,  jealous  windows,  within  sight, 
makes  the  weeds  in  the  cracked  pavement  faint  of  heart, 
by  suggesting  the  possibility  of  there  being  hands  to  grub 
them  up.  Opposite  to  you,  is  a  giant  figure  carved  in 
stone,  reclinmg,  with  an  urn,  upon  a  lofty  piece  of  artificial 
rockwork;  and  out  of  the  urn,  dangles  the  fag  end  of  a 
leaden  pipe,  which,  once  upon  a  time,  poured  a  small  tor- 
rent down  the  rocks.  But  the  eye-sockets  of  the  giant  are 
not  drier  than  this  channel  is  now.  He  seems  to  have  given 
his  urn,  which  is  nearly  upside  down,  a  final  tilt ;  and  after 
crying,  like  a  sepulchral  child,  "  All  gone !  "  to  have  lapsed 
into  a  stony  silence. 

In  the  streets  of  shops,  the  houses  are  much  smaller,  but 
of  great  size  notwithstanding,  and  extremely  high.  They 
are^very  dirty :  quite  un drained,  if  my  nose  be  at  all  reliable : 
and  emit  a  peculiar  fragrance,  like  the  smell  of  very  bad 
cheese,  kept  in  very  hot  blankets.  Notwithstanding  the 
height  of  the  houses,  there  would  seem  to  have  been  a  lack 
of  room  in  the  City,  for  new  houses  are  thrust  in  every- 
where. Wherever  it  has  been  possible  to  cram  a  tumble- 
down tenement  into  a  crack  or  corner,  in  it  has  gone.  If 
there  be  a  nook  or  angle  in  the  wall  of  a  church,  or  a  crev- 
ice in  any  other  dead  wall,  of  any  sort,  there  you  are  sure 
to  find  some  kind  of  habitation :  looking  as  if  it  had  grown 
there,  like  a  fungus.  Against  the  Government  House, 
against  the  old  Senate  House,  round  about  any  large  build- 
ing, little  shops  stick  close,  like  parasite  vermin  to  the 
great  carcase.     And  for  all  this,  look  where  you  may :  up 


36  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

steps,  down  steps,  anywhere,  everywhere:  there  are 
irregular  houses,  receding,  starting  forward,  tumbling  down, 
leaning  against  their  neighbours,  crippling  tliemselves  or 
their  friends  by  some  means  or  other,  until  one,  more 
irregular  than  the  rest,  chokes  up  the  way,  and  you  can't 
see  any  further. 

One  of  the  rottenest-looking  parts  of  the  town,  I  think, 
is  down  by  the  landing-wharf :  though  it  may  be,  that  its 
being  associated  with  a  great  deal  of  rottenness  on  the 
evening  of  our  arrival,  has  stamped  it  deeper  in  my  mind. 
Here,  again,  the  houses  are  very  high,  and  are  of  an  infinite 
variety  of  deformed  shapes,  and  have  (as  most  of  the  houses 
have)  something  hanging  out  of  a  great  many  windows,  and 
wafting  its  frowsy  fragrance  on  the  breeze.  Sometimes,  it 
is  a  curtain ;  sometimes,  it  is  a  carpet ;  sometimes,  it  is  a 
bed ;  sometimes,  a  whole  line-full  of  clothes ;  but  there  is 
almost  always  something.  Before  the  basement  of  these 
houses,  is  an  arcade  over  the  pavement:  very  massive, 
dark,  and  low,  like  an  old  crypt.  The  stone,  or  plaster, 
of  which  it  is  made,  has  turned  quite  black ;  and  against 
every  one  of  these  black  piles,  all  sorts  of  filth  and  garbage 
seem  to  accumulate  spontaneously.  Beneath  some  of  the 
arches,  the  sellers  of  maccaroni  and  polenta  establish  their 
stalls,  which  are  by  no  means  inviting.  The  olfal  of  a  fish- 
market,  near  at  hand — that  is  to  say,  of  a  back  lane, 
where  people  sit  upon  the  ground  and  on  various  old  bulk- 
heads and  sheds,  and  sell  fish  when  they  have  any  to  dis- 
pose of — and  of  a  vegetable  market,  constructed  on  the 
same  principle — are  contributed  to  the  decoration  of  this 
quarter ;  and  as  all  the  mercantile  business  is  transacted 
here,  and  it  is  crowded  all  day,  it  has  a  very  decided  fla- 
vour about  it.  The  Porto  Franco,  or  Free  Port  (where 
goods  brought  in  from  foreign  countries  pay  no  duty  until 
they  are  sold  and  taken  out,  as  in  a  bonded  warehouse  in 
England),  is  down  here  also;  and  two  portentous  officials, 
in  cocked  hats,  stand  at  the  gate  to  search  you  if  they 
choose,  and  to  keep  out  Monks  and  Ladies.  For,  Sanctity 
as  well  as  Beauty  has  been  known  to  yield  to  the  tempta- 
tion of  smuggling,  and  in  the  same  way :  that  is  to  say,  by 
concealing  the  smuggled  property  beneath  the  loose  folds 
of  its  dress.  So  Sanctity  and  Beauty  may,  by  no  means, 
enter. 

The  streets  of  Genoa  would  be  all  the  better  for  the 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY,  3V 

importation  of  a  few  Priests  of  prepossessing  appearance. 
Every  fourth  or  fifth  man  in  the  streets  is  a  Priest  or  a 
Mcuk ;  and  there  is  pretty  sure  to  be  at  least  one  itinerant 
ecclesiastic  inside  or  outside  every  hackney  carriage  on  the 
neighbouring  roads.  I  have  no  knowledge,  elsewhere,  of 
more  repulsive  countenances  than  are  to  be  found  among 
these  gentry.  If  Nature's  handwriting  be  at  all  legible, 
greater  varieties  of  sloth,  deceit,  and  intellectual  torpor, 
could  hardly  be  observed  among  any  class  of  men  in  the 
world. 

Mr.  Pepts  once  heard  a  clergyman  assert  in  his  sermon, 
in  illustration  of  his  respect  for  the  Priestly  office,  that  if 
he  could  meet  a  Priest  and  angel  together,  he  would  salute 
the  Priest  first.  I  am  rather  of  the  opinion  of  Petrarch, 
who,  when  his  pupil  Boccaccio  wrote  to  him  in -great  trib- 
ulation, that  he  had  been  visited  and  admonished  for  his 
writings  by  a  Carthusian  Friar  who  claimed  to  be  a  messen- 
ger immediately  commissioned  by  Heaven  for  that  purpose, 
replied,  that  for  his  own  part,  he  would  take  the  liberty  of 
testing  the  reality  of  the  commission  by  personal  observa- 
tion of  the  Messenger's  face,  eyes,  forehead,  behaviour, 
and  discourse.  I  cannot  but  believe  myself,  from  similar 
observation,  that  many  unaccredited  celestial  messengers 
may  be  seen  skulking  through  the  streets  of  Genoa,  or 
droning  away  their  lives  in  other  Italian  towns. 

Perhaps  the  Cappuccini,  though  not  a  learned  body,  are, 
as  an  order,  the  best  friends  of  the  people.  They  seem  to 
mingle  with  them  more  immediately,  as  their  counsellors 
aud  comforters;  and  to  go  among  them  more,  when  they 
are  sick ;  and  to  pry  less  than  some  other  orders,  into  the 
secrets  of  families,  for  the  purpose  of  establishing  a  bale- 
ful ascendancy  over  their  weaker  members ;  and  to  be  in- 
fluenced by  a  less  fierce  desire  to  make  converts,  and  once 
made,  to  let  them  go  to  ruin,  soul  and  body.  They  may 
be  seen,  in  their  coarse  dress,  in  all  parts  of  the  town  at 
all  times,  and  begging  in  the  markets  early  in  the  morning. 
The  Jesuits  too,  muster  strong  in  the  streets,  and  go  slink- 
ing noiselessly  about,  in  pairs,  like  black  cats. 

In  some  of  the  narrow  passages,  distinct  trades  congre- 
gate. There  is  a  street  of  jewellers,  and  there  is  a  row  of 
booksellers ;  but  even  down  in  places  where  nobody  ever 
can,  or  ever  could,  penetrate  in  a  carriage,  there  are  mighty 
old  palaces  shut  in  among  the  gloomiest  and  closest  walls, 


3S  PICTURES    FROM  ITALY. 

and  almost  shut  out  from  the  sun.  Very  few  of  the  trades- 
men have  any  idea  of  setting  forth  their  goods,  or  disposing 
them  for  show.  If  you,  a  stranger,  want  to  buy  anything, 
you  usually  look  round  the  shop  till  you  see  it;  then  clutch 
it,  if  it  be  within  reach ;  and  inquire  how  much.  Every- 
thing is  sold  at  the  most  unlikely  place.  If  you  want  coffee, 
you  go  to  a  sweetmeat  shop ;  and  if  you  want  meat,  you 
will  probably  find  it  behind  an  old  checked  curtain,  down 
half-a-dozen  steps,  in  some  sequestered  nook  as  hard  to  find 
as  if  the  commodity  were  poison,  and  Genoa's  law  were 
death  to  any  that  uttered  it. 

Most  of  the  apothecaries'  shops  are  great  lounging  places. 
Here,  grave  men  with  sticks,  sit  down  in  the  shade  for 
hours  together,  passing  a  meagre  Genoa  paper  from  hand 
to  hand,  .and  talking,  drowsily  and  sparingly,  about  the 
News.  Two  or  three  of  these  are  poor  physicians,  ready 
to  proclaim  themselves  on  an  emergency,  and  tear  off  with 
any  messenger  who  may  arrive.  You  may  know  them  by 
the  way  in  which  they  stretch  their  necks  to  listen,  when 
you  enter ;  and  by  the  sigh  with  which  they  fall  back  again 
into  their  dull  corners,  on  finding  that  you  only  want  medi- 
cine. Few  people  lounge  in  the  barbers'  shops;  though  they 
are  very  numerous,  as  hardly  any  man  shaves  himself.  But 
the  apothecary's  has  its  group  of  loungers,  who  sit  back 
among  the  bottles,  with  their  hands  folded  over  the  tops 
of  their  sticks.  So  still  and  quiet,  that  either  you  don't 
see  them  in  the  darkened  shop,  or  mistake  them — as  I  did 
one  ghostly  man  in  bottle-green,  one  day,  with  a  hat  like  a 
stopper — for  Horse  Medicine. 

On  a  summer  evening,  the  Genoese  are  as  fond  of  put- 
ting themselves,  as  their  ancestors  were  of  putting  houses, 
in  every  available  inch  of  space  within  and  about  the  town. 
In  all  the  lanes  and  alleys,  and  up  every  little  ascent,  and 
on  every  dwarf  wall,  and  on  every  flight  of  steps,  they 
cluster  like  bees.  Meanwhile  (and  especially  on  Festa- 
days)  the  bells  of  the  churches  ring  incessantly;  not  in 
peals,  or  any  known  form  of  sound,  but  in  a  horrible,  ir- 
regular, jerking,  dingle,  dingle,  dingle :  with  a  sudden  stop 
at  every  fifteenth  dingle  or  so,  which  is  maddening.  This 
performance  is  usually  achieved  by  a  boy  up  in  the  steeple, 
who  takes  hold  of  the  clapper,  or  a  little  rope  attached  to 
it,  and  tries  to  dingle  louder  than  every  other  boy  similarly 


PICTURES  PROM  ITALY.  39 

employed  The  noise  is  supposed  to  be  particularly  obnox- 
ious to  Evil  Spirits ;  but  looking  up  into  the  steeples,  and 
seeing  (and  hearing)  these  young  Christians  thus  engaged, 
one  might  very  naturally  mistake  them  for  the  Enemy. 

Festa-days,  early  in  the  autumn,  are  very  numerous.  All 
the  shops  were  shut  up,  twice  within  a  week,  for  these  holi- 
days; and  one  night,  all  the  houses  in  the  neighbourhood 
of  a  particular  church  were  illuminated,  while  the  church 
itself  was  lighted,  outside,  with  torches;  and  a  grove  of 
blazing  links  was  erected,  in  an  open  place  outside  one  of 
the  city  gates.  This  part  of  the  ceremony  is  prettier  and 
more  singular  a  little  way  in  the  country,  where  you  can 
trace  the  illuminated  cottages  all  the  way  up  a  steep  hillside ; 
and  where  you  pass  festoons  of  tapers,  wasting  away  in  the 
starlight  night,  before  some  lonely  little  house  upon  the 
road. 

On  these  days,  they  always  dress  the  church  of  the  saint 
in  whose  honour  the  Festa  is  holden,  very  gaily.  Gold- 
embroidered  festoons  of  different  colours,  hang  from  the 
arches;  the  altar  furniture  is  set  forth;  and,  sometimes, 
even  the  lofty  pillars  are  swathed  from  top  to  bottom  in 
tight-fitting  draperies.  The  cathedral  is  dedicated  to-  St. 
Lorenzo.  On  St.  Lorenzo's  day,  we  went  into  it,  just  as 
the  sun  was  setting.  Although  these  decorations  are  usu- 
ally in  very  indifferent  taste,  the  effect,  just  then,  was  very 
superb,  indeed.  For  the  whole  building  was  dressed  in  red ; 
and  the  sinking  sun,  streaming  in,  through  a  great  red  cur- 
tain in  the  chief  doorway,  made  all  the  gorgeousness  its 
own.  When  the  sun  went  down,  and  it  gradually  grew 
quite  dark  inside,  except  for  a  few  twinkling  tapers  on  the 
principal  altar,  and  some  small  dangling  silver  lamps,  it 
was  very  mysterious  and  effective.  But,  sitting  in  any  of 
the  churches  towards  evening,  is  like  a  mild  dose  of  opium. 

With  the  money  collected  at  a  Festa,  they  usually  pay 
for  the  dressing  of  the  church,  and  for  the  hiring  of  the 
band,  and  for  the  tapers.  If  there  be  any  left  (which  sel- 
dom happens,  I  believe)  the  souls  in  Purgatory  get  the 
benefit  of  it.  They  are  also  supposed  to  have  the  benefit 
of  the  exertions  of  certain  small  boys,  who  shake  money- 
boxes before  some  mysterious  little  buildings  like  rural 
turnpikes,  which  (usually  shut  up  close)  fly  open  on  Red- 
letter  days,  and  disclose  an  image  and  some  flowers  inside. 

Just  without  the  city  gate,  on  the  Albaro  road,  is  a  small 


40  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

house,  with  an  altar  in  it,  and  a  stationary  money-box :  also 
for  the  benefit  of  the  souls  in  Purgatory.  Still  further  to 
stimulate  the  charitable,  there  is  a  monstrous  painting  on 
the  plaster,  on  either  side  of  the  grated  door,  representing  a 
select  party  of  souls,  frying.  One  of  them  has  a  grey 
moustache,  and  an  elaborate  head  of  grey  hair :  as  if  he  had 
been  taken  out  of  a  hairdresser's  window  and  cast  into  the 
furnace.  There  he  is:  a  most  grotesque  and  hideously 
comic  old  soul:  for  ever  blistering  in  the  real  sun,  and 
melting  in  the  mimic  fire,  for  the  gratification  and  improve- 
ment (and  tlie  contributions)  of  the  poorer  Genoese. 

They  are  not  a  very  joyous  people,  and  are  seldom  seen  to 
dance  on  their  holidays :  the  staple  places  of  entertainment 
among  the  women,  being  the  churches  and  the  public  walks 
They  are  very  good-tempered,  obliging,  and  industrious. 
Industry  has  not  made  them  clean,  for  their  habitations  are 
extremely  filthy,  and  their  usual  occupation  on  a  fine  Sunday 
morning,  is  to  sit  at  their  doors,  hunting  in  each  other's 
heads.  But  their  dwellings  are  so  close  and  confined  that 
if  those  parts  of  the  city  had  been  beaten  down  by  Massena 
in  the  time  of  the  terrible  Blockade,  it  would  have  at  least 
occasioned  one  public  benefit  among  many  misfortunes. 

The  Peasant  Women,  with  naked  feet  and  legs,  are  so 
constantly  washing  clothes,  in  the  public  tanks,  and  in 
every  stream  and  ditch,  that  one  cannot  help  wondering, 
in  the  midst  of  all  this  dirt,  who  wears  them  when  they  are 
clean.  The  custom  is  to  lay  the  wet  linen  which  is  being 
operated  upon,  on  a  smooth  stone,  and  hammer  away  at  it, 
with  a  flat  wooden  mallet.  This  they  do,  as  furiously  as 
if  they  were  revenging  themselves  on  dress  in  general  for 
being  connected  with  the  Fall  of  Mankind. 

It  is  not  unusual  to  see,  lying  on  the  edge  of  the  tank  at 
these  times,  or  on  another  flat  stone,  an  unfortunate  baby, 
tightly  swathed  up,  arms  and  legs  and  all,  in  an  enormous 
quantity  of  wrapper,  so  that  it  is  unable  to  move  a  toe  or 
finger.  This  custom  (which  we  often  see  represented  in 
old  pictures)  is  universal  among  the  common  people.  A 
child  is  left  anywhere  without  the  possibility  of  crawling 
away,  or  is  accidentally  knocked  off  a  shelf,  or  tumbled  out 
of  bed,  or  is  hung  up  to  a  hook  now  and  then,  and  left 
dangling  like  a  doll  at  an  English  rag  shop,  without  the 
least  inconvenience  to  anybody. 

I  was  sitting,  one  Sunday,  soon  after  my  arrival,  in  the 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  41 

little  country  church  of  San  Martino,  a  couple  of  mile? 
from  the  city,  while  a  baptism  took  place.  I  saw  the  priest, 
and  an  attendant  with  a  large  taper,  and  a  man,  and  a 
woman,  and  some  others;  but  I  had  no  more  idea,  until  the 
ceremony  was  all  over,  that  it  was  a  baptism,  or  that  the 
curious  little  stiff  instrument,  that  was  passed  from  one  to 
another,  in  the  course  of  the  ceremony,  by  the  handle — like 
a  short  poker — was  a  child,  than  I  had  that  it  was  my  own 
christening.  I  borrowed  the  child  afterwards,  for  a  minute 
or  two  (it  was  lying  across  the  font  then"),  and  found  it 
very  red  in  the  face  but  perfectly  quiet,  an  1  not  to  be  bent 
on  any  terms.  The  number  of  cripples  in  the  streets, 
soon  ceased  to  surprise  me. 

There  are  plenty  of  Saints'  and  Virgin's  Shrines,  of 
course ;  generally  at  the  corners  of  streets.  The  favourite 
memento  to  the  Faithful,  about  Genoa,  is  a  painting,  rep- 
resenting a  peasant  on  his  knees,  with  a  spade  and  some 
other  agricultural  implements  beside  him ;  and  the  Madon- 
na, with  the  Infant  Saviour  in  her  arms,  appearing  to  him 
in  a  cloud.  This  is  the  legend  of  the  Madonna  della  Guar- 
dia:  a  chapel  on  a  mountain  within  a  few  miles,  which  is 
in  high  repute.  It  seems  that  this  peasant  lived  all  alone 
by  himself,  tilling  some  land  atop  of  the  mountain,  where, 
being  a  devout  man,  he  daily  said  his  prayers  to  the  Virgin 
in  the  open  air;  for  his  hut  was  a  very  poor  one.  Upon  a 
certain  day,  the  Virgin  appeared  to  him,  as  in  the  picture, 
and  said,  "  Why  do  you  pray  in  the  open  air,  and  without 
a  priest?"  The  peasant  explained  because  there  was 
neither  priest  nor  church  at  hand — a  very  uncommon  com- 
plaint indeed  in  Italy.  "I  should  wish,  then,"  said  the 
Celestial  Visitor,  "  to  have  a  chapel  built  here,  in  which 
the  prayers  of  the  Faithful  may  be  offered  up."  "But 
Santissima  Madonna,"  said  the  peasant,  "  I  am  a  poor  man ; 
and  chapels  cannot  be  built  without  money.  They  must  be 
supported,  too,  Santissima ;  for  to  have  a  chapel  and  not 
support  it  liberally,  is  a  wickedness — a  deadly  sin."  This 
sentiment  gave  great  satisfaction  to  the  visitor.  "Go!" 
said  she.  "  There  is  such  a  village  in  the  valley  on  the  left, 
and  such  another  village  in  the  valley  on  the  right,  and  such 
another  village  elsewhere,  that  will  gladly  contribute  to 
the  building  of  a  chapel.  Go  to  them !  Relate  what  you 
have  seen;  and  do  not  doubt  that  sufficient  money  will  be 
forthcoming  to  erect  my  chapel,  or  that  it  will,  afterwards, 


^  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

be  handsomely  maintaiued."  All  of  which  (miraculously) 
turned  out  to  be  quite  true.  And  in  proof  of  this  predic- 
tion and  revelation,  there  is  the  chapel  of  the  Madonna 
della  Guardia,  rich  and  flourishing  at  this  day. 

The  splendour  and  variety  of  the  Genoese  churches,  can 
hardly  be  exaggerated.  The  church  of  the  Annunciata  es- 
pecially :  built,  like  many  of  the  others,  at  the  cost  of  one 
noble  family,  and  now  in  slow  progress  of  repair :  from  the 
outer  door  to  the  utmost  height  of  the  high  cupola,  is  so 
elaborately  painted  and  set  in  gold,  that  it  looks  (as  Simond 
describes  it,  in  his  charming  book  on  Italy)  like  a  great 
enamelled  snuff-box.  Most  of  the  richer  churches  contain 
some  beautiful  pictures,  or  other  embellishments  of  great 
price,  almost  universally  set,  side  by  side,  with  sprawling 
effigies  of  maudlin  monks,  and  the  veriest  trash  and  tinsel 
ever  seen. 

It  may  be  a  consequence  of  the  frequent  direction  of  the 
popular  mind,  and  pocket,  to  the  souls  in  Purgatory,  but 
there  is  very  little  tenderness  for  the  bodies  of  the  dead 
here.  For  the  very  poor,  there  are,  immediately  outside 
one  angle  of  the  walls,  and  behind  a  jutting  point  of  the 
fortification,  near  the  sea,  certain  common  pits — one  for 
every  day  in  the  year — which  all  remain  closed  up>  until 
the  turn  of  each  comes  for  its  daily  reception  of  dead  bod- 
ies. Among  the  troops  in  the  town,  there  are  usually  some 
Swiss :  more  or  less.  When  any  of  these  die,  they  are 
buried  out  of  .a  fund  maintained  by  such  of  their  country- 
men as  are  resident  in  Genoa.  Their  providing  coffins  for 
these  men,  is  matter  of  great  astonishment  to  the  authori- 
ties. 

Certainly,  the  effect  of  this  promiscuous  and  indecent 
splashing  down  of  dead  people  into  so  many  wells,  is  bad. 
It  surrounds  Death  with  revolting  associations,  that  insen- 
sibly become  connected  with  those  whom  Death  is  approach- 
ing. Indifference  and  avoidance  are  the  natural  result; 
and  all  the  softening  influences  of  the  great  sorrow  are 
harshly  disturbed. 

There  is  a  ceremony  when  an  old  Cavali^re  or  the  like, 
expires,  of  erecting  a  pile  of  benches  iti  the  cathedral,  to  rep- 
resent his  bier ;  covering  them  over  with  a  pall  of  black 
velvet ;  putting  his  hat  and  sword  on  the  top ;  making  a 
little  square  of  seats  about  the  whole;  and  sending  out 
formal  invitations  to  his  friends  and  acquaintance  to  come 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  43 

and  sit  tliere,  and  hear  Mass :  which  is  performed  at  the 
principal  Altar,  decorated  with  an  infinity  of  caudles  for 
that  purpose. 

When  the  better  kind  of  people  die,  or  are  at  the  point 
of  death,  their  nearest  relations  generally  walk  off :  retiring 
into  the  country  for  a  little  change,  and  leaving  the  body 
to  be  disposed  of,  without  any  superintendence  from  them. 
The  procession  is  usually  formed,  and  the  coffin  borne,  and 
the  funeral  conducted,  by  a  body  of  persons  called  a  Con- 
fraternita,  who,  as  a  kind  of  voluntary  penance,  undertake 
to  perform  these  offices,  in  regular  rotation,  for  the  dead ; 
but  who,  mingling  something  of  pride  with  their  humility, 
are  dressed  in  a  loose  garment  covering  their  whole  person, 
and  wear  a  hood  concealing  the  face ;  with  breathing  holes 
and  apertures  for  the  eyes.  The  effect  of  this  costume  is 
very  ghastly :  especially  in  the  case  of  a  certain  Blue  Con- 
fraternita  belonging  to  Genoa,  who,  to  say  the  least  of  them, 
are  very  ugly  customers,  and  who  look — suddenly  encoun- 
tered in  their  pious  ministration  in  the  streets — as  if  they 
were  Ghoules  or  Demons,  bearing  off  the  body  for  them- 
selves. 

Although  such  a  custom  may  be  liable  to  the  abuse  at- 
tendant on  many  Italian  customs,  of  being  recognised  as  a 
means  of  establishing  a  current  account  with  Heaven,  on 
which  to  draw,  too  easily,  for  future  bad  actions,  or  as  an 
expiation  for  past  misdeeds,  it  must  be  admitted  to  be  a 
good  one,  and  a  practical  one,  and  one  involving  unques- 
tionably good  works.  A  voluntary  service  like  this,  is 
surely  better  than  the  imposed  penance  (not  at  all  an  in- 
frequent one)  of  giving  so  many  licks  to  such  and  such  a 
stone  in  the  pavement  of  the  cathedral;  or  than  a  vow  to 
the  Madonna  to  wear  nothing  but  blue  for  a  year  or  two. 
This  is  supposed  to  give  great  delight  above ;  blue  being  (as 
is  well  known)  the  Madonna's  favourite  colour.  Women 
who  have  devoted  themselves  to  this  act  of  Faith,  are  very 
commonly  seen  walking  in  the  streets. 

There  are  three  theatres  in  the  city,  besides  an  old  one 
now  rarely  opened.  The  most  important — the  Carlo  Feli- 
ce :  the  opera-house  of  Genoa — is  a  very  splendid,  commo- 
dious, and  beautiful  theatre.  A  company  of  comedians 
were  acting  there,  when  we  arrived :  and  after  their  depart- 
ure, a  second-rate  opera  company  came.  The  great  season 
is  not  until  the  carnival  time — in  the  spring.     Nothing  im- 


M  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

pressed  me,  so  much,  in  my  visits  here  (which  were  pretty 
numerous)  as  the  uncommonly  hard  and  cruel  character  of 
the  audience,  who  resent  the  slightest  defect,  take  nothing 
good-humouredly,  seem  to  be  always  lying  in  wait  for  an 
opportunity  to  hiss,  and  spare  the  actresses  as  little  as  the 
actors.  But,  as  there  is  nothing  else  of  a  public  nature  at 
which  they  are  allowed  to  express  the  least  disapproba- 
tion, perhaps  they  are  resolved  to  make  the  most  of  this 
opportunity. 

There  are  a  great  number  of  Piedmontese  officers  too, 
who  are  allowed  the  privilege  of  kicking  their  heels  in  the 
pit,  for  next  to  nothing :  gratuitous,  or  cheap  accommoda- 
tion for  these  gentlemen  being  insisted  on,  by  the  Govern- 
or, in  all  public  or  semi-public  entertainments.  They  are 
lofty  critics  in  consequence,  and  infinitely  more  exacting 
than  if  they  made  the  unhappy  manager's  fortune. 

The  Teatro  Diur^to,  or  Day  Theatre,  is  a  covered 
stage  in  the  open  air,  where  the  performances  take  place  by 
daylight,  in  the  cool  of  the  afternoon  ;  commencing  at  four 
or  five  o'clock,  and  lasting  some  three  hours.  It  is  curi- 
ous, sitting  among  the  audience,  to  have  a  fine  view  of  the 
neighbouring  hills  and  houses,  and  to  see  the  neighbours 
at  their  windows  looking  on,  and  to  hear  the  bells  of  the 
churches  and  convents  ringing  at  most  complete  cross- 
purposes  with  the  scene.  Beyond  this,  and  the  novelty  of 
seeing  a  play  in  the  fresh  pleasant  air,  with  the  darkening 
evening  closing  in,  there  is  nothing  very  exciting  or  charac- 
teristic in  the  performances.  The  actors  are  indifferent; 
and  though  they  sometimes  represent  one  of  Goldoni's 
comedies,  the  staple  of  the  Drama  is  French.  Anything 
like  nationality  is  dangerous  to  despotic  governments,  and 
Jesuit-beleaguered  kings. 

The  Theatre  of  Puppets,  or  Marionetti^ — a  famous  com- 
pany from  Milan — is,  without  any  exception,  the  drollest 
exhibition  I  ever  beheld  in  my  life.  I  never  saw  anything 
so  exquisitely  ridiculous.  They  looJc  between  four  and  five 
feet  high,  but  are  really  much  smaller ;  for  when  a  musi- 
cian in  the  orchestra  happens  to  put  his  hat  on  the  stage, 
it  becomes  alarmingly  gigantic,  and  almost  blots  out  an 
actor.  They  usually  play  a  comedy,  and  a  ballet.  The 
comic  man  in  the  comedy  I  saw  one  summer  night,  is  a 
waiter  at  an  hotel.  There  never  was  such  a  locomotive 
actor,  since  the  world  began.     Great  pains  are  taken  with 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  45 

him.  He  has  extra  joints  in  his  legs :  and  a  practical  eye, 
with  which  "he  winks  at  the  pit,  in  a  manner  that  is  abso- 
lutely insupportable  to  a  stranger,  but  w  hich  the  initiated 
audience,  mainly  composed  of  the  common  people,  receive 
(so  they  do  everything  else)  quite  as  a  matter  of  course, 
and  as  if  he  were  a  man.  His  spirits  are  prodigious.  He 
continually  shakes  his  legs,  and  winks  his  eye.  And 
there  is  a  heavy  father  with  grey  hair,  who  sits  down  on 
the  regular  conventional  stage-bank,  and  blesses  his  daugh- 
ter in  the  regular  conventional  way,  who  is  tremendous. 
No  one  would  suppose  it  possible  that  anything  short  of  a 
.  real  man  could  be  so  tedious.     It  is  the  triumph  of  art. 

In  the  ballet,  an  Enchanter  runs  away  with  the  Bride, 
in  the  very  hour  of  her  nuptials.  He  brings  her  to  his  cave, 
and  tries  to  soothe  her.  They  sit  down  on  a  sofa  (the  reg- 
ular sofa!  in  the  regular  place,  0.  P.  Second  Entrance!) 
and  a  procession  of  musicians  enters ;  one  creature  playing 
a  drum,  and  knocking  himself  off  his  legs  at  every  blow. 
These  failing  to  delight  her,  dancers  appear.  Four  first ; 
then  two ;  the  two ;  the  flesh-coloured  two.  The  way  in 
which  they  dance ;  the  height  to  which  they  spring ;  the 
impossible  and  inhuman  extent  to  which  they  pirouette ; 
the  revelation  of  their  preposterous  legs ;  the  coming  down 
with  a  pause,  on  the  very  tips  of  their  toes,  when  the  music 
requires  it;  the  gentleman's  retiring  up,  when  it  is  the 
lady's  turn ;  and  the  lady's  retiring  up,  when  it  is  the  gen- 
tleman's turn;  the  final  passion  of  a  pas-de-deux;  and  the 
going  off  with  a  bound ! — I  shall  never  see  a  real  ballet, 
with  a  composed  countenance,  again. 

I  went,  another  night,  to  see  these  Puppets  act  a  play 
called  "  St.  Helena,  or  the  Death  of  Napoleon."  It  began 
by  the  disclosure  of  Napoleon,  with  an  immense  head,  seated 
on  a  sofa  in  his  chamber  at  St.  Helena ;  to  whom  his  valet 
entered,  with  this  obscure  announcement : 

"  Sir  Yew  ud  se  on  Low  I  "  (the  ow,  as  in  cow). 

Sir  Hudson  (that  you  could  have  seen  his  regimentals!) 
was  a  perfect  mammoth  of  a  man,  to  Napoleon ;  hideously 
ugly;  with  a  monstrously  disproportionate  face,  and  a 
great  clump  for  the  lower-jaw,  to  express  his  tyrannical 
and  obdurate  nature.  He  began  his  system  of  persecution, 
by  calling  his  prisoner  "  General  Buonaparte ; "  to  which 
the  latter  replied,  with  the  deepest  tragedy,  "  Sir  Yew  ud 
se  on  Low,  call  me  not  thus.     Repeat  that  phrase  and  leave 


46  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

me!  I  am  Napoleon,  Emperor  of  France!"  Sir  Yew  ud 
se  on,  nothing  daunted,  proceeded  to  entertain  him  with  an 
ordinance  of  the  British  Government,  regulating  the  state 
he  should  preserve,  and  the  furniture  of  his  rooms :  and 
limiting  his  attendants  to  four  or  live  persons.  "Four  or 
five  for  me.''"  said  Napoleon.  "Me!  One  hundred  thou- 
sand men  were  lately  at  my  sole  command ;  and  this  English 
officer  talks  of  four  or  live  for  me !  "  Throughout  the 
piece,  Napoleon  (who  talked  very  like  the  real  Napoleon, 
and  was,  for  ever,  having  small  soliloquies  by  himself) 
was  very  bitter  on  "these  English  officers,"  and  "these 
English  soldiers :  "  to  the  great  satisfaction  of  the  audience, 
who  were  perfectly  delighted  to  have  Low  bullied ;  and 
who,  whenever  Low  said  "General  Buonaparte  "  (which  he 
always  did:  always  receiving  the  same  correction)  quite 
execrated  him.  It  would  be  hard  to  say  why ;  for  Italians 
have  little  cause  to  sympathise  with  Napoleon,  Heaven 
knows. 

There  was  no  plot  at  all,  except  that  a  French  officer, 
disguised  as  an  Englishman,  came  to  propound  a  plan  of 
escape ;  and  being  discovered,  but  not  before  Napoleon  had 
magnanimously  refused  to  steal  his  freedom,  was  imme- 
diately ordered  off  by  Low  to  be  hanged.  In  two  vei-y  long 
speeches,  which  Low  made  memorable,  by  winding  up 
with  "  Yas !  " — to  show  that  he  was  English — which  brought 
down  thunders  of  applause.  Napoleon  was  so  affected 
by  this  catastrophe,  that  he  fainted  away  on  the  spot, 
and  was  carried  out  by  two  other  puppets.  Judging  from 
what  followed,  it  would  appear  that  he  never  recovered  the 
shock ;  for  the  next  act  showed  him,  in  a  clean  shirt,  in 
his  bed  (curtains  crimson  and  white),  where  a  lady,  pre- 
maturely dressed  in  mourning,  brought  two  little  children, 
who  kneeled  down  by  the  bed-side,  while  he  made  a  decent 
end;  the  last  word  on  his  lips  being  "Vatterlo." 

It  was  unspeakably  ludicrous.  Baonaparte's  boots  were 
so  wonderfully  beyond  control,  and  did  such  marvellous 
things  of  their  own  accord ;  doubling  themselves  up,  and 
getting  under  tables,  and  dangling  in  the  air,  and  some- 
times skating  away  with  him,  out  of  all  human  knowledge, 
when  he  was  in  full  speech — mischances  which  were  not 
rendered  the  less  absurd,  by  a  settled  melancholy  depicted 
in  his  face.  To  put  an  end  to  one  conference  with  Low, 
he  had  to  go  to  a  table,  and  read  a  book .  when  it  was  the 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  41 

finest  spectacle  I  ever  beheld,  to  see  his  body  bending  ovei 
the  volume,  like  a  boot-jack,  and  his  sentimental  eyes  glar- 
ing obstinately  into  the  pit.  He  was  prodigiously  good,  in 
bed,  with  an  immense  collar  to  his  shirt,  and  his  little  hands 
outside  the  coverlet.  So  was  Dr.  Antonomarchi,  repre- 
sented by  a  puppet  with  long  lank  hair,  like  Maw  worm's, 
who,  in  consequence  of  some  derangement  of  his  wires, 
hovered  about  the  couch  like  a  vulture,  and  gave  medical 
opinions  in  the  air.  He  was  almost  as  good  as  Low,  though 
the  latter  was  great  at  all  times — a  decided  brute  and  vil- 
lain, beyond  all  possibility  of  mistake.  Low  was  especially 
fine  at  the  last,  when,  hearing  the  doctor  and  the  valet 
say,  "  The  Emperor  is  dead !  "  he  pulled  out  his  watch,  and 
wound  up  the  piece  (not  the  watch)  by  exclaiming,  with 
characteristic  brutality,  "  Ha !  ha !  Eleven  minutes  to  six ! 
The  General  dead!  and  the  spy  hanged!"  This  brought 
the  curtain  down,  triumphantly. 

There  is  not  in  Italy,  they  say  (and  I  believe  them),  a 
lovelier  residence  than  the  Palazzo  Peschiere,  or  Palace  of 
the  Fishponds,  whither  we  removed  as  soon  as  our  three 
months'  tenancy  of  the  Pink  Jail  at  Albaro  had  ceased  and 
determined. 

It  stands  on  a  height  within  the  walls  of  Genoa,  but 
aloof  from  the  town :  surrounded  by  beautiful  gardens  of 
its  own,  adorned  with  statues,  vases,  fountains,  marble 
basins,  terraces,  walks  of  orange-trees  and  lemon-trees, 
groves  of  roses  and  camellias.  All  its  apartments  are  beau- 
tiful in  their  proportions  and  decorations;  but  the  great 
liall,  some  fifty  feet  in  height,  with  three  large  windows  at 
the  end,  overlooking  the  whole  town  of  Genoa,  the  harbour, 
and  the  neighbouring  sea,  affords  one  of  the  most  fascinat- 
ing and  delightful  prospects  in  the  world.  Any  house 
more  cheerful  and  habitable  than  the  great  rooms  are,  with- 
in, it  would  be  difficult  to  conceive ;  and  certainly  nothing 
more  delicious  than  the  scene  without,  in  sunshine  or  in 
moonlight,  could  be  imagined.  It  is  more  like  an  enchanted 
place  in  an  Eastern  story  than  a  grave  and  sober  lodging. 

How  you  may  wander  on,  from  room  to  room,  and  never 
tire  of  the  wild  fancies  on  the  walls  and  ceilings,  as  bright 
in  their  fresh  colouring  as  if  they  had  been  painted  yester- 
day ;  or  how  one  floor,  or  even  the  great  hall  which  opens 
on  eight  other  rooms,  is  a  spacious  promenade ;  or  how  there 


48  PICTURES  PROM  ITALY. 

are  corridors  and  bed-chambers  above,  which  we  never  use 
and  rarely  visit,  and  scarcely  know  the  way  through ;  or 
how  there  is  a  view  of  a  perfectly  different  character  on 
each  of  the  four  sides  of  the  building;  matters  little.  But 
that  prospect  from  the  hall  is  like  a  vision  to  me.  I  go 
back  to  it,  in  fancy,  as  I  have  done  in  calm  reality  a  hun- 
dred times  a  day ;  and  stand  there,  looking  out,  with  the 
sweet  scents  from  the  garden  rising  up  about  me,  in  a  per- 
fect dream  of  happiness. 

There  lies  all  Genoa,  in  beautiful  confusion,  with  its 
many  churches,  monasteries,  and  convents,  pointing  up 
into  the  sunny  sky ;  and  down  below  me,  just  where  the 
roofs  begin,  a  solitary  convent  parapet,  fashioned  like  a 
gallery,  with  an  iron  cross  at  the  end,  where  sometimes 
early  in  the  morning,  I  have  seen  a  little  group  of  dark- 
veiled  nuns  gliding  sorrowfully  to  and  fro,  and  stopping 
now  and  then  to  peep  down  upon  the  waking  world  in 
which  they  have  no  part.  Old  Monte  Faccio,  brightest  of 
hills  in  good  weather,  but  sulkiest  when  storms  are  coming 
on,  is  here,  upon  the  left.  The  Fort  within  the  walls  (the 
good  King  built  it  to  command  the  town,  and  beat  the 
houses  of  the  Genoese  about  their  ears,  in  case  they  should 
be  discontented)  commands  that  height  upon  the  right. 
The  broad  sea  lies  beyond,  in  front  there ;  and  that  line  of 
coast,  beginning  by  the  light-house,  and  tapering  away,  a 
mere  speck  in  the  rosy  distance,  is  the  beautiful  coast  road 
that  leads  to  Nice.  The  garden  near  at  hand,  among  the 
roofs  and  houses :  all  red  with  roses  and  fresh  with  little 
fountains :  is  the  Acqua  Sola — a  public  promenade,  where 
the  military  band  plays  gaily,  and  the  white  veils  cluster 
thick,  and  the  Genoese  nobility  ride  round,  and  round,  and 
round,  in  state-clothes  and  coaches  at  least,  if  not  in  abso- 
lute wisdom.  Within  a  stone' s-throw,  as  it  seems,  the 
audience  of  the  Day  Theatre  sit:  their  faces  turned  this 
way.  But  as  the  stage  is  hidden,  it  is  very  odd,  without  a 
knowledge  of  the  cause,  to  see  their  faces  changed  so  sud- 
denly from  earnestness  to  laughter ;  and  odder  still,  to  heai 
the  rounds  upon  rounds  of  applause,  rattling  in  the  evening 
air,  to  which  the  curtain  falls.  But,  being  Sunday  night, 
they  act  their  best  and  most  attractive  play.  And  now, 
the  sun  is  going  down,  in  such  magnificent  array  of  red, 
and  green,  and  golden  light,  as  neither  pen  nor  pencil  could 
depict;   and  to  the  ringing  of  the  vesper  bells,  darkness 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  4ft 

sets  in  at  once,  without  a  twilight.  Then,  lights  begin  to 
shine  in  Genoa,  and  on  the  country  road ;  and  the  revolving 
lantern  out  at  sea  there,  ilashing,  for  an  instant,  on  this 
palace  front  and  portico,  illuminates  it  as  if  there  were  a 
bright  moon  bursting  from  behind  a  cloud ;  then,  merges  it 
in  deep  obscurity.  And  this,  so  far  as  I  know,  is  the  only 
reason  why  the  Genoese  avoid  it  after  dark,  and  think  it 
haunted. 

My  memory  will  haunt  it,  many  nights,  in  time  to  come; 
but  nothing  worse,  I  will  engage.  The  same  Ghost  will 
occasionally  sail  away,  as  I  did  one  pleasant  autumn  even- 
ing, into  the  bright  prospect,  and  snuff  the  morning  air  at 
Marseilles. 

The  corpulent  hairdresser  was  still  sitting  in  his  slippers 
outside  his  shop-door  there,  but  the  twirling  ladies  in  the 
window,  with  the  natural  inconstancy  of  their  sex,  had 
ceased  to  twirl,  and  were  languishing,  stock  still,  with  their 
beautiful  faces  addressed  to  blind  corners  of  the  establish- 
ment, where  it  was  impossible  for  admirers  to  penetrate. 

The  steamer  had  come  from  Genoa  in  a  delicious  run  of 
eighteen  hours,  and  we  were  going  to  run  back  again  by  the 
Cornice  road  from  Nice :  not  being  satisfied  to  have  seen 
only  the  outsides  of  the  beautiful  towns  that  rise  in  pictur- 
esque white  clusters  from  among  the  olive  woods,  and  rocks, 
and  hills,  upon  the  margin  of  the  Sea. 

The  Boat  which  started  for  Nice  that  night,  at  eight 
o'clock,  was  very  small,  and  so  crowded  with  goods  that 
there  was  scarcely  room  to  move ;  neither  was  there  any- 
thing to  eat  on  board,  except  bread ;  nor  to  drink,  except 
coffee.  But  being  due  at  Nice  at  about  eight  or  so  in  the 
morning,  this  was  of  no  consequence :  so  when  we  began  to 
wink  at  the  bright  stars,  in  involuntary  acknowledgment  of 
their  winking  at  us,  we  turned  into  our  berths,  in  a  crowd- 
ed, but  cool  little  cabin,  and  slept  soundly  till  morning. 

The  Boat  being  as  dull  and  dogged  a  little  boat  as  ever 
was  built,  it  was  within  an  hour  of  noon  when  we  turned 
into  Nice  Harbour,  where  we  very  little  expected  anything 
but  breakfast.  But  we  were  laden  with  wool.  Wool  must 
not  remain  in  the  Custom-house  at  Marseilles  more  than 
twelve  months  at  a  stretch,  without  paying  duty.  It  is 
the  custom  to  make  fictitious  removals  of  unsold  wool  to 
evade  this  law;  to  take  it  somewhere  when  the  twelve 
months  are  nearly  out ;  bring  it  straight  back  again ;  and 
4 


60  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

warehouse  it,  as  a  new  cargo,  for  nearly  twelve  months 
longer.  This  wool  of  ours,  had  come  originally  from  some 
place  in  the  East.  It  was  recognised  as  Eastern  produce, 
the  moment  we  entered  the  harbour.  Accordingly,  the 
gay  little  Sunday  boats,  full  of  holiday  people,  which  had 
come  off  to  greet  us,  were  warned  away  by  the  authorities ; 
we  were  declared  in  quarantine ;  and  a  great  flag  was  sol- 
emnly run  up  to  the  mast-head  on  the  wharf,  to  make  it 
known  to  all  the  town. 

It  was  a  very  hot  day  indeed.  We  were  unshaved,  un- 
washed, undressed,  unfed,  and  could  hardly  enjoy  the  ab- 
surdity of  lying  blistering  in  a  lazy  harbour,  with  the  town 
looking  on  from  a  respectable  distance,  all  manner  of  whis- 
kered men  in  cocked  hats  discussing  our  fate  at  a  remote 
guard-house,  with  gestures  (we  looked  very  hard  at  them 
through  telescopes)  expressive  of  a  week's  detention  at 
least :  and  nothing  whatever  the  matter  all  the  time.  But 
even  in  this  crisis  the  Brave  Courier  achieved  a  triumph. 
He  telegraphed  somebody  (7  saw  nobody)  either  naturally 
connected  with  the  hotel,  or  put  en  rapport  with  the  estab- 
lishment for  that  occasion  only.  The  telegraph  was  an- 
swered, and  in  half  an  hour  or  less,  there  came  a  loud 
shout  from  the  guard-house.  The  captain  was  wanted. 
Everybody  helped  the  captain  into  his  boat.  Everybody 
got  his  luggage,  and  said  we  were  going.  The  captain 
rowed  away,  and  disappeared  behind  a  little  jutting  corner 
of  the  Galley-slaves'  Prison :  and  presently  came  back  with 
something,  very  sulkily.  The  Brave  Courier  met  him  at 
the  side,  and  received  the  something  as  its  rightful  owner. 
It  was  a  wicket  basket,  folded  in  a  linen  cloth ;  and  in  it 
were  two  great  bottles  of  wine,  a  roast  fowl,  some  salt  fish 
chopped  with  garlic,  a  great  loaf  of  bread,  a  dozen  or  so  of 
peaches,  and  a  few  other  trifles.  When  we  had  selected 
our  own  breakfast,  the  Brave  Courier  invited  a  chosen  party 
to  partake  of  these  refreshments,  and  assured  them  that 
they  need  not  be  deterred  by  motives  of  delicacy,  as  he 
would  order  a  second  basket  to  be  furnished  at  their  ex- 
pense. Which  he  did — no  one  knew  how — and  by  and  by, 
the  captain  being  again  summoned,  again  sulkily  returned 
with  another  something;  over  which  my  popular  attend- 
ant presided  as  before:  carving  with  a  clasp-knife,  his 
own  personal  property,  something  smaller  than  a  Roman 
sword. 


PICTURES  PROM  ITALY.  51 

The  whole  party  on  board  were  made  merry  by  these 
unexpected  supplies ;  but  none  more  so  than  a  loquacious 
little  Frenchman,  who  got  drunk  in  five  minutes,  and  a 
sturdy  Cappuccino  Friar,  who  had  taken  everybody's 
fancy  mightily,  and  was  one  of  the  best  friars  in  the  world, 
I  verily  believe. 

He  had  a  free,  open  countenance;  and  a  rich  brown, 
flowing  beard;  and  was  a  remarkably  handsome  man,  of 
about  fifty.  He  had  come  up  to  us,  early  in  the  morning, 
and  inquired  whether  we  were  sure  to  be  at  Nice  by  eleven ; 
saying  that  he  particularly  wanted  to  know,  because  if  we 
reached  it  by  that  time  he  would  have  to  perform  mass, 
and  must  deal  with  the  consecrated  wafer,  fasting ;  where- 
as, if  there  were  no  chance  of  his  being  in  time,  he  would 
immediately  breakfast.  He  made  this  communication, 
under  the  idea  that  the  Brave  Courier  was  the  captain; 
and  indeed  he  looked  much  more  like  it  than  anybody  else 
on  board.  Being  assured  that  we  should  arrive  in  good 
time,  he  fasted,  and  talked,  fasting,  to  everybody,  with  the 
most  charmiug  good-humour;  answering  jokes  at  the  ex- 
pense of  friars,  with  other  jokes  at  the  expense  of  laymen, 
and  saying  that  friar  as  he  was,  he  would  engage  to  take 
up  the  two  strongest  men  on  board,  one  after  the  other, 
with  his  teeth,  and  carry  them  along  the  deck.  Nobody 
gave  him  the  opportunity,  but  I  dare  say  he  could  have 
done  it :  for  he  was  a  gallant,  noble  figure  of  a  man,  even 
in  the  Cappuccino  dress,  which  is  the  ugliest  and  most  un- 
gainly that  can  well  be. 

All  this  had  given  great  delight  to  the  loquacious  French- 
man, who  gradually  patronised  the  Friar  very  much,  and 
seemed  to  commiserate  him  as  one  who  might  have  been 
born  a  Frenchman  himself,  but  for  an  unfortunate  destiny. 
Although  his  patronage  was  such  as  a  mouse  might  bestow 
upon  a  lion,  he  had  a  vast  opinion  of  its  condescension ; 
and  in  the  warmth  of  that  sentiment,  occasionally  rose  on 
tiptoe,  to  slap  the  Friar  on  the  back. 

When  the  baskets  arrived;  it  being  then  too  late  for 
Mass :  the  Friar  went  to  work  bravely ;  eating  prodigiously 
of  the  cold  meat  and  bread,  drinking  deep  draughts  of  the 
wine,  smoking  cigars,  taking  snuff,  sustaining  an  uninter- 
rupted conversation  with  all  hands,  and  occasionally  run- 
ning to  the  boat's  side  and  hailing  somebody  on  shore  with 
the  intelligence  that  we  mv^t  be  got  out  of  this  quarantine 


62  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

somehow  or  other,  as  he  had  to  take  part  in  a  great  relig- 
ious procession  in  the  afternoon.  After  this,  he  would 
come  back,  laughing  lustily  from  pure  good-humour :  while 
the  Frenchman  wrinkled  his  small  face  into  ten  thousand 
creases,  and  said  how  droll  it  was,  and  what  a  brave  boy 
was  that  Friar !  At  length  the  heat  of  the  sun  without, 
and  the  wine  within,  made  the  Frenchman  sleepy.  So,  in 
the  noontide  of  his  patronage  of  his  gigantic  protege,  he 
lay  down  among  the  wool,  and  began  to  snore. 

It  was  four  o'clock  before  we  were  released;  and  the 
Frenchman,  dirty  and  woolly,  and  snuffy,  was  still  sleep- 
ing when  the  Friar  went  ashore.  As  soon  as  we  were  free, 
we  all  hurried  away,  to  wash  and  dress,  that  we  might 
make  a  decent  appearance  at  the  procession ;  and  I  saw  no 
more  of  the  Frenchman  until  we  took  up  our  station  in  the 
main  street  to  see  it  pass,  when  he  squeezed  himself  into  a 
front  place,  elaborately  renovated;  threw  back  his  little 
coat,  to  show  a  broad-barred  velvet  waistcoat,  sprinkled  all 
over  with  stars ;  and  adjusted  himself  and  his  cane  so  as 
utterly  to  bewilder  and  transfix  the  Friar,  when  he  should 
appear. 

The  procession  was  a  very  long  one,  and  included  an  im- 
mense number  of  people  divided  into  small  parties ;  each 
party  chanting  nasally,  on  its  own  account,  without  refer- 
ence to  any  other,  and  producing  a  most  dismal  result. 
There  were  angels,  crosses.  Virgins  carried  on  flat  boards 
surrounded  by  Cupids,  crowns,  saints,  missals,  infantry, 
tapers,  monks,  nuns,  relics,  dignitaries  of  the  Church  in 
green  hats,  walking  under  crimson  parasols :  and,  here  and 
there,  a  species  of  sacred  street-lamp  hoisted  on  a  pole. 
We  looked  out  anxiously  for  the  Cappuccini,  and  presently 
their  brown  robes  and  corded  girdles  were  seen  coming  on, 
in  a  body. 

I  observed  the  little  Frenchman  chuckle  over  the  idea 
that  when  the  Friar  saw  him  in  the  broad-barred  waistcoat, 
he  would  mentally  exclaim,  "Is  that  my  Patron!  That 
distinguished  man !  "  and  would  be  covered  with  confusion. 
Ah !  never  was  the  Frenchman  so  deceived.  As  our  friend 
the  Cappuccino  advanced,  with  folded  arms,  he  looked 
straight  into  the  visage  of  the  little  Frenchman,  with  a 
bland,  serene,  coni})osed  abstraction,  not  to  be  described. 
There  was  not  the  faintest  trace  of  recognition  or  amuse- 
ment on  his  features;  not  the  smallest  consciousness  of 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  «KJ 

bread  and  meat,  wine,  snuff,  or  cigars.  "C'est  lui-m§me," 
I  heard  the  little  Frenchman  say,  in  some  doubt.  Oh  yes, 
it  was  himself.  It  was  not  his  brother  or  his  nephew,  very 
like  him.  It  was  he.  He  walked  in  great  state :  being 
one  of  the  Superiors  of  the  Order :  and  looked  his  part  to 
admiration.  There  never  was  anything  so  perfect  of  its 
kind  as  the  contemplative  way  in  which  he  allowed  his 
placid  gaze  to  rest  on  us,  his  late  companions,  as  if  he  had 
never  seen  us  in  his  life  and  didn't  see  us  then.  The 
Frenchman,  quite  humbled,  took  off  his  hat  at  last,  but  the 
Friar  still  passed  on,  with  the  same  imperturbable  serenity; 
and  the  broad-barred  waistcoat,  fading  into  the  crowd,  was 
seen  no  more. 

The  procession  wound  up  with  a  discharge  of  musketry 
that  shook  all  the  windows  in  the  town.  Next  afternoon 
we  started  for  Genoa,  by  the  famed  Cornice  road. 

The  half-French,  half-Italian  Vetturino,  who  undertook, 
with  his  little  rattling  carriage  and  pair,  to  convey  us  thither 
in  three  days,  was  a  careless,  good-looking  fellow,  whose 
light-heartedness  and  singing  propensities  knew  no  bounds 
as  long  as  we  went  on  smoothly.  So  long,  he  had  a  word 
and  a  smile,  and  a  flick  of  his  whip,  for  all  the  peasant 
girls,  and  odds  and  ends  of  the  Sonnambula  for  all  the 
echoes.  So  long,  he  went  jingling  through  every  little 
village,  with  bells  on  his  horses  and  rings  in  his  ears:  a 
very  meteor  of  gallantry  and  cheerfulness.  But,  it  was 
highly  characteristic  to  see  him  under  a  slight  reverse  of 
circumstances,  when,  in  one  part  of  the  journey,  we  came 
to  a  narrow  place  where  a  waggon  had  broken  down  and 
stopped  up  the  road.  His  hands  were  twined  in  his  hair 
immediately,  as  if  a  combination  of  all  the  direst  accidents 
in  life  had  suddenly  fallen  on  his  devoted  head.  He  swore 
in  French,  prayed  in  Italian,  and  went  up  and  down,  beat- 
ing his  feet  on  the  ground  in  a  very  ecstasy  of  despair. 
There  were  various  carters  and  mule-drivers  assembled 
round  the  broken  waggon,  and  at  last  some  man  of  an  orig- 
inal turn  of  mind,  proposed  that  a  general  and  joint  effort 
should  be  made  to  get  things  to  rights  again,  and  clear  the 
way — an  idea  which  I  verily  believe  would  never  have  pre- 
sented itself  to  our  friend,  though  we  had  remained  there 
until  now.  It  was  done  at  no  great  cost  of  labour ;  but  at 
every  pause  in  the  doing,  his  hands  were  wound  in  his  hair 
again,  as  if  there  were  no  ray  of  hope  to  lighten  his  misery. 


54  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

The  moment  he  was  on  his  box  once  more,  and "  clattering 
briskly  down  hill,  he  returned  to  the  Sonnambula  and  the 
peasant  girls,  as  if  it  were  not  in  the  power  of  misfortune 
to  depress  him. 

Much  of  the  romance  of  the  beautiful  towns  and  villages 
on  this  beautiful  road,  disappears  when  they  are  entered, 
for  many  of  them  are  very  miserable.  The  streets  are 
narrow,  dark,  and  dirty ;  the  inhabitants  lean  and  squalid ; 
and  the  withered  old  women,  with  their  wiry  grey  hair 
twisted  up  into  a  knot  on  the  top  of  the  head,  like  a  pad  to 
carry  loads  on,  are  so  intensely  ugly,  both  along  the  Riviera, 
and  in  Genoa  too,  that,  seen  straggling  about  in  dim  door- 
ways with  their  spindles,  or  crooning  together  in  by-corners, 
they  are  like  a  population  of  Witches — except  that  they 
certainly  are  not  to  be  suspected  of  brooms  or  any  other  in- 
strument of  cleanliness.  Neither  are  the  pig-skins,  in 
common  use  to  hold  wine,  and  hung  out  in  the  sun  in  all 
directions,  by  any  means  ornamental,  as  they  always  pre- 
serve the  form  of  very  bloated  pigs,  with  their  heads  and 
legs  cut  off,  dangling  upside-down  by  their  own  tails. 

These  towns,  as  they  are  seen  in  the  approach,  however : 
nestling,  with  their  clustering  roofs  and  towers,  among 
trees  on  steep  hill-sides,  or  built  upon  the  brink  of  noble 
bays :  are  charming.  The  vegetation  is,  everywhere,  luxu- 
riant and  beautiful,  and  the  Palm-tree  makes  a  novel  feat- 
ure in  the  novel  scenery.  In  one  town,  San  Remo — a  most 
extraordinary  place,  built  on  gloomy  open  arches,  so  tliat 
one  might  ramble  underneath  the  whole  town — there  are 
pretty  terrace  gardens ;  in  other  towns,  there  is  the  clang 
of  shipwrights'  hammers,  and  the  building  of  small  vessels 
on  the  beach.  In  some  of  the  broad  bays,  the  fleets  of 
Europe  might  ride  at  anchor.  In  every  case,  eacli  little 
group  of  houses  presents,  in  the  distance,  some  enchanting 
confusion  of  picturesque  and  fanciful  shapes. 

The  road  itself — now  high  above  the  glittering  sea,  which 
breaks  against  the  foot  of  the  precipice :  now  turning  inland 
to  sweep  the  shore  of  a  bay :  now  crossing  the  stony  bed 
of  a  mountain  stream :  now  low  down  on  the  beach :  now 
winding  among  riven  rocks  of  many  forms  and  colours : 
now  chequered  by  a  solitary  ruined  tower,  one  of  a  chain 
of  towers  built,  in  old  time,  to  protect  the  coast  from  the 
invasions  of  the  Barbary  Corsairs— presents  new  beauties 
every  moment.     When  its  own  striking  scenery  is  passed, 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  55 

and  it  trails  on  through  a  long  line  of  suburb,  lying  on  the 
flat  sea-shore,  to  Genoa,  then,  the  changing  glimpses  of 
that  noble  city  and  its  harbour,  awaken  a  new  source  of  in- 
terest; freshened  by  every  huge,  unwieldy,  half -inhabited 
old  house  in  its  outskirts ;  and  coming  to  its  climax  when 
the  city  gate  is  reached,  and  all  Genoa  with  its  beautiful 
harbour,  and  neighbouring  hills,  bursts  proudly  on  the 
view. 


TO  PAEMA,  MODENA,  AND  BOLOGNA. 

I  STROLLED  Eway  from  Genoa  on  the  6th  of  November, 
bound  for  a  good  many  places  (England  among  them),  but 
first  for  Piacenza ;  for  which  town  I  started  in  the  cotqje  of 
a  machine  something  like  a  travelling  caravan,  in  company 
with  the  Brave  Courier  and  a  lady  with  a  large  dog,  who 
howled  dolefully,  at  intervals,  all  night.  It  was  very  wet, 
and  very  cold ;  very  dark,  and  very  dismal ;  we  travelled 
at  the  rate  of  barely  four  miles  an  hour,  and  stopped  no- 
Avhere  for  refreshment.  At  ten  o'clock  next  morning,  we 
changed  coaches  at  Alessandria,  where  we  were  packed  up 
in  another  coach  (the  body  whereof  would  have  been  small 
for  a  fly),  in  company  with  a  very  old  priest ;  a  young 
Jesuit,  his  companion — who  carried  their  breviaries  and 
other  books,  and  who,  in  the  exertion  of  getting  into  the 
coach,  had  made  a  gash  of  pink  leg  between  his  black  stock- 
ing and  his  black  knee-shorts,  that  reminded  one  of  Hamlet 
in  Ophelia's  closet,  only  it  was  visible  on  both  legs — a  pro- 
vincial Avvocato ;  and  a  gentleman  with  a  red  nose  that 
had  an  uncommon  and  singular  sheen  upon  it,  which  I  never 
observed  in  the  human  subject  before.  In  this  way  we 
travelled  on,  until  four  o'clock  in  the  afternoon ;  the  roads 
being  still  very  heavy,  and  the  coach  very  slow.  To  mend 
the  matter,  the  old  priest  was  troubled  with  cramps  in  his 
legs,  so  that  he  had  to  give  a  terrible  yell  every  ten  minutes 
or  so,  and  be  hoisted  out  by  the  united  efforts  of  the  com- 
pany ;  the  coach  always  stopping  for  him,  with  great  grav- 
ity. This  disorder,  and  the  roads,  formed  the  main  subject 
of  conversation.  Finding,  in  the  afternoon,  that  the  coupe 
had  discharged  two  people,  and  had  only  one  passenger  in- 
side— a  monstrous  ugly  Tuscan,  with  a  great  purple  mous- 
tache, of  which  no  man  could  see  the  ends  when  he  had 


56  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

his  hat  on — I  took  advantage  of  its  better  accommodation, 
and  in  company  with  this  gentleman  (who  was  very  conver- 
sational and  good-humoured)  travelled  on,  until  nearly 
eleven  o'clock  at  night,  when  the  driver  reported  that  he 
couldn't  think  of  going  any  farther,  and  we  accordingly 
made  a  halt  at  a  place  called  Stradella. 

The  inn  was  a  series  of  strange  galleries  surrounding  a 
yard;  where  our  coach,  and  a  waggon  or  two,  and  a  lot  of 
fowls,  and  firewood,  were  all  heaped  up  together,  higgledy- 
piggledy  ;  so  that  you  didn't  know,  and  couldn't  have 
taken  your  oath,  which  was  a  fowl  and  which  was  a  cart. 
We  followed  a  sleepy  man  with  a  flaring  torch,  into  a 
great,  cold  room,  where  there  were  two  immensely  broad 
beds,  on  what  looked  like  two  immensely  broad  deal  diniug- 
tables;  another  deal  table  of  similar  dimensions  in  the 
middle  of  the  bare  floor ;  four  windows ;  and  two  chairs. 
Somebody  said  it  was  my  room ;  and  I  walked  up  and  down 
it,  for  half  an  hour  or  so,  staring  at  the  Tuscan,  the  old 
priest,  the  young  priest,  and  the  Avvocato  (Red-Nose 
lived  in  the  town,  and  had  gone  home),  who  sat  upon  their 
beds,  and  stared  at  me  in  return. 

The  rather  dreary  whimsicality  of  this  stage  of  the  pro- 
ceedings, is  interrupted  by  an  announcement  from  the 
Brave  (he  has  been  cooking)  that  supper  is  ready ;  and  to 
the  priest's  chamber  (the  next  room  and  the  counterpart  of 
mine)  we  all  adjourn.  The  first  dish  is  a  cabbage,  boiled 
with  a  great  quantity  of  rice  in  a  tureen  full  of  water,  and 
flavoured  with  cheese.  It  is  so  hot,  and  Ave  are  so  cold, 
that  it  appears  almost  jolly.  The  second  dish  is  some  little 
bits  of  pork,  fried  with  pigs'  kidneys.  .  The  third,  two  red 
fowls.  The  fourth,  two  little  red  turkeys.  The  fifth, 
a  huge  stew  of  garlic  and  truffles,  and  I  don't  know  what 
else ;  and  this  concludes  the  entertainment. 

Before  I  can  sit  down  in  my  own  chamber,  and  think  it 
of  the  dampest,  the  door  opens,  and  the  Brave  comes  mov- 
ing in,  in  the  middle  of  such  a  quantity  of  fuel  that  he 
looks  like  Birnam  Wood  taking  a  winter  walk.  He  kin- 
dles this  heap  in  a  twinkling,  and  produces  a  jorum  of  hot 
brandy  and  water;  for  that  bottle  of  his  keeps  company 
with  the  seasons,  and  now  holds  nothing  but  the  purest 
eau  de  vie.  When  he  has  accomplished  this  feat,  he  retires 
for  the  night ;  and  I  hear  him,  for  an  hour  afterwards,  and 
indeed  until  I  fall  asleep,  making  jokes  in  some  out-house 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  '*7 

(apparently  under  the  pillow),  where  he  is  smoking  cigars 
with  a  party  of  confidential  friends.  He  never  was  in  the 
house  in  his  life  before ;  but  he  knows  everybody  every- 
where, before  he  has  been  anywhere  five  minutes ;  and  is 
certain  to  have  attracted  to  himself,  in  the  meantime,  the 
enthusiastic  devotion  of  the  whole  establishment. 

This  is  at  twelve  o'clock  at  night.  At  four  o'clock  next 
morning,  he  is  up  again,  fresher  than  a  new-blown  rose ; 
making  blazing  fires  without  the  least  authority  from  the 
•landlord ;  producing  mugs  of  scalding  coffee  when  nobody 
else  can  get  anything  but  cold  water ;  and  going  out  into 
the  dark  streets,  and  roaring  for  fresh  milk,  on  the  chance 
of  somebody  with  a  cow  getting  up  to  supply  it.  While  the 
horses  are  "  coming,"  I  stumble  out  into  the  town  too.  It 
seems  to  be  all  one  little  Piazza,  with  a  cold  damp  wind 
blowing  in  and  out  of  the  arches,  alternately,  in  a  sort  of 
pattern.  But  it  is  profoundly  dark,  and  raining  heavily ; 
and  I  shouldn't  know  it  to-morrow,  if  I  were  taken  there  to 
try.     Which  Heaven  forbid. 

The  horses  arrive  in  about  an  hour.  In  the  interval,  the 
driver  swears :  sometimes  Christian  oaths,  sometimes  Pagan 
oaths.  Sometimes,  when  it  is  a  long,  compound  oath,  he 
begins  with  Christianity  and  merges  into  Paganism.  Va- 
rious messengers  are  despatched;  not  so  much  after  the 
horses,  as  after  each  other;  for  the  first  messenger  nev6r 
comes  back,  and  all  the  rest  imitate  him.  At  length  the 
horses  appear,  surrounded  by  all  the  messengers;  some 
kicking  them,  and  some  dragguig  them,  and  all  shouting 
abuse  to  them.  Then,  the  old  priest,  the  young  priest, 
the  Awocato,  the  Tuscan,  and  all  of  us,  take  our  places ; 
and  sleepy  voices  proceeding  from  the  doors  of  extraordi- 
nary hutches  in  divers  parts  of  the  yard,  cry  out  "  Addio 
corriere  mio!  Buon'  viaggio,  corriere!"  Salutations 
which  the  courier,  with  his  face  one  monstrous  grin,  re- 
turns in  like  manner  as  we  go  jolting  and  wallowing  away, 
through  the  mud. 

At  Piacenza,  which  was  four  or  five  hours'  journey  from 
the  inn  at  Stradella,  we  broke  up  our  little  company  before 
the  hotel  door,  with  divers  manifestations  of  friendly  feel- 
ing on  all  sides.  The  old  priest  was  taken  with  the  cramp 
again,  before  he  had  got  half-way  down  the  street;  and  the 
young  priest  laid  the  bundle  of  books  on  a  doorstep,  while 
he  dutifully  rubbed  the  old  gentleman's  legs.     The  client 


58  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

of  the  AvToc^to  was  waiting  for  him  at  the  yard-gate,  and 
kissed  him  on  each  cheek,  with  such  a  resounding  smack, 
that  I  am  afraid  he  had  either  a  very  bad  case,  or  a  scan- 
tily-furnished purse.  The  Tuscan,  with  a  cigar  in  his 
mouth,  went  loitering  off,  carrying  his  hat  in  his  hand  that 
he  might  the  better  trail  up  the  ends  of  his  dishevelled 
moustache.  And  the  Brave  Courier,  as  he  and  I  strolled 
away  to  look  about  us,  began  immediately  to  entertain  me 
with  the  private  histories  and  family  affairs  of  the  whole 
party. 

A  brown,  decayed,  old  town,  Piacenza  is,  A  deserted, 
solitary,  grass-grown  place,  with  ruined  ramparts;  half 
filled-up  trenches,  which  afford  a  frowsy  pasturage  to  the 
lean  kine  that  wander  about  them ;  and  streets  of  stern 
houses,  moodily  frowning  at  the  other  houses  over  the  way. 
The  sleepiest  and  shabbiest  of  soldiery  go  wandering  about, 
with  the  double  curse  of  laziness  and  poverty,  uncouthly 
wrinkling  their  misfitting  regimentals ;  the  dirtiest  of  chil- 
dren play  with  their  impromptu  toys  (pigs  and  mud)  in  the 
feeblest  of  gutters ;  and  the  gauntest  of  dogs  trot  in  and 
out  of  the  dullest  of  archways,  in  perpetual  search  of  some- 
thing to  eat,  which  they  never  seem  to  find.  A  mysterious 
and  solemn  Palace,  guarded  by  two  colossal  statues,  twin 
Genii  of  the  place,  stands  gravely  in  the  midst  of  the  idle 
town ;  and  the  king  with  the  marble  legs,  who  flourished 
in  the  time  of  the  Thousand  and  One  Nights,  might  live 
contentedly  inside  of  it,  and  never  have  the  energy,  in  his 
upper  half  of  flesh  and  blood,  to  want  to  come  out. 
■  What  a  strange,  half-sorrowful  and  half-delicious  doze  it 
is,  to  ramble  through  these  places  gone  to  sleep  and  basking 
in  the  sun!  Each,  in  its  turn,  appears  to  be,  of  all  the 
mouldy,  dreary,  God-forgotten  towns  in  the  wide  world, 
the  chief.  Sitting  on  this  hillock  where  a  bastion  used  to 
be,  and  where  a  noisy  fortress  was,  in  the  time  of  the  old 
Roman  station  here,  I  became  aware  that  i  have  never 
known  till  now,  what  it  is  to  be  lazy.  A  dormouse  must 
surely  be  in  very  much  the  same  condition  before  he  retires 
under  the  wool  in  his  cage ;  or  a  tortoise  before  he  buries 
himself.  I  feel  that  I  am  getting  rusty.  That  any  at- 
tempt to  think,  would  be  accompanied  with  a  creaking 
noise.  That  there  is  nothing,  anywhere,  to  be  done,  or 
needing  to  be  done.  That  there  is  no  more  human  prog- 
ress, motion,  effort,  or  advancement,  of  any  kind  beyond 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  6t> 

this.     That  the  whole  scheme  stopped  here  centuries  ago, 
aud  laid  down  to  rest  until  the  Day  of  Judgment. 

Never  while  the  Brave  Courier  lives !  Behold  him  jin- 
gling out  of  Piacenza,  and  staggering  this  way,  in  the  tallest 
posting-chaise  ever  seen,  so  that  he  looks  out  of  the  front 
window  as  if  he  were  peeping  over  a  garden  wall ;  while 
the  postilion,  concentrated  essence  of  all  the  shabbiness  of 
Italy,  pauses  for  a  moment  in  his  animated  conversation, 
to  touch  his  hat  to  a  blunt-nosed  little  Virgin,  hardly  less 
shabby  than  himself,  enshrined  in  a  plaster  Punch's  show 
outside  the  town. 

In  Genoa,  and  thereabouts,  they  train  the  vines  on  trel- 
lis-work, supported  on  square  clumsy  pillars,  which,  in 
themselves,  are  anything  but  picturesque.  But,  here,  they 
twine  them  around  trees,  and  let  them  trail  among  the 
hedges;  and  the  vineyards  are  full  of  trees,  regularly 
planted  for  this  purpose,  each  with  its  own  vine  twining 
and  clustering  about  it.  Their  leaves  are  now  of  the  bright- 
est gold  and  deepest  red ;  and  never  was  anything  so  en- 
chautingly  graceful  and  full  of  beauty.  Through  miles  of 
these  delightful  forms  and  colours,  the  road  winds  its 
way.  The  wild  festoons,  the  elegant  wreaths,  and  crowns, 
and  garlands  of  all  shapes;  the  fairy  nets  flung  over  great 
trees,  and  making  them  prisoners  in  sport;  the  tumbled 
heaps  and  mounds  of  exquisite  shapes  upon  the  ground ; 
how  rich  and  beautiful  they  are !  And  every  now  and  then, 
a  long,  long  line  of  trees,  will  be  all  bound  aud  garlanded 
together:  as  if  they  had  taken  hold  of  one  another,  and 
were  coming  dancing  down  the  field ! 

Parma  has  cheerful,  stirring  streets,  for  an  Italian  town ; 
and  consequently  is  not  so  characteristic  as  many  places  of 
less  note.  Always  excepting  the  retired  Piazza,  where  the 
Cathedral,  Baptistery,  and  Campanile — ancient  buildings, 
of  a  sombre  brown,  embellished  with  innumerable  grotesque 
monsters  and  dreamy-iookiug  creatures  carved  in  marble 
and  red  stone — are  clustered  in  a  noble  and  magnificent 
repose.  Their  silent  presence  was  only  invaded,  when  I 
saw  tliem,  by  the  twittering  of  the  many  birds  that  were 
flying  in  and  out  of  the  crevices  in  the  stones  and  little 
nooks  in  the  architecture,  where  they  had  made  their  nests 
They  were  busy,  rising  from  the  cold  shade  of  Temples 
made  with  hands,  into  the  sunny  air  of  Heaven.  Not  so 
the  worshippers  within,  who  were  listening  to  the  same 


60  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

drowsy  chaunt,  or  kneeliug  before  the  same  kinds  of  im- 
ages and  tapers,  or  whispering,  with  their  heads  bowed 
down,  in  the  selfsame  dark  confessionals,  as  I  had  left  in 
Genoa  and  everywhere  else. 

The  decayed  and  mutilated  paintings  with  which  this 
church  is  covered,  have,  to  my  thinking,  a  remarkably 
mournful  and  depressing  influence.  It  is  miserable  to  see 
great  works  of  art — something  of  the  Souls  of  Painters — 
perishing  and  fading  away,  like  human  forms.  This  cathe- 
dral is  odorous  with  the  rotting  of  Correggio's  frescoes  in 
the  Cupola.  Heaven  knows  how  beautiful  they  may  have 
been  at  one  time.  Connoisseurs  fall  into  raptures  with 
them  now ;  but  such  a  labyrinth  of  arms  and  legs :  such 
heaps  of  foreshortened  limbs,  entangled  and  involved  and 
jumbled  together:  no  operative  surgeon,  gone  mad,  could 
imagine  in  his  wildest  delirium. 

There  is  a  very  interesting  subterranean  church  here ;  the 
roof  supported  by  marble  pillars,  behind  each  of  which 
there  seemed  to  be  at  least  one  beggar  in  ambush :  to  say 
nothing  of  the  tombs  and  secluded  altars.  From  every  one 
of  these  lurking-places,  such  crowds  of  phantom-looking 
men  and  women,  leading  other  men  and  women  Avith  twist- 
ed limbs,  or  chattering  jaws,  or  paralytic  gestures,  or  idiotic 
heads,  or  some  other  sad  infirmity,  came  hobbling  out  to 
beg,  that  if  the  ruined  frescoes  in  the  cathedral  above,  had 
been  suddenly  animated,  and  had  retired  to  this  lower 
church,  they  could  hardly  have  made  a  greater  confusion, 
or  exhibited  a  more  confounding  display  of  arms  and  legs. 

There  is  Petrarch's  Monument,  too;  and  there  is  the 
Baptistery,  with  its  beautiful  arches  and  immense  font; 
and  there  is  a  gallery  containing  some  very  remarkable  pic- 
tures, whereof  a  few  were  being  copied  by  hairy-faced  ar- 
tists, with  little  velvet  caps  more  off  their  heads  than  on. 
There  is  the  Farnese  Palace,  too ;  and  in  it  one  of  the  dreari- 
est spectacles  of  decay  that  ever  was  seen — a  grand,  old, 
gloomy  theatre,  mouldering  away. 

It  is  a  large  wooden  structure,  of  the  horse-shoe  shape; 
the  lower  seats  arranged  upon  the  Roman  plan,  but  above 
them,  great  heavy  chambers,  rather  than  boxes,  where  the 
Nobles  sat,  remote  in  their  proud  state.  Such  desolation 
as  has  fallen  on  this  theatre,  enhanced  in  the  spectator's 
fancy  by  its  gay  intention  and  design,  none  but  worms  can 
be  familiar  with.     A  hundred  and  ten  years  have  passed, 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  61 

since  any  play  was  acted  here.  The  sky  shines  in  through 
the  gashes  in  the  roof;  the  boxes  are  dropping  down,  wast- 
ing away,  and  only  tenanted  by  rats ;  damp  and  mildew 
smear  the  faded  colours,  and  maJte  spectral  maps  upon  the 
panels ;  lean  rags  are  dangling  down  where  there  were  gay 
festoons  on  the  Proscenium ;  the  stage  has  rotted  so,  that  a 
narrow  wooden  gallery  is  thrown  across  it,  or  it  would  sink 
beneath  the  tread,  and  bury  the  visitor  in  the  gloomy  depth 
beneath.  The  desolation  and  decay  impress  themselves  on 
all  the  senses.  The  air  has  a  mouldering  smell,  and  an 
earthy  taste ;  any  stray  outer  sounds  that  straggle  in  with 
some  lost  sunbeam,  are  muffled  and  heavy;  and  the  worm, 
the  maggot,  and  the  rot  have  changed  the  surface  of  the 
wood  beneath  the  touch,  as  time  will  seam  and  roughen  a 
smooth  hand.  If  ever  Ghosts  act  plays,  they  act  them 
on  this  ghostly  stage. 

It  was  most  delicious  weather,  when  we  came  into  Mo- 
dena,  where  the  darkness  of  the  sombre  colonnades  over 
the  footways  skirting  the  main  street  on  either  side,  was 
made  refreshing  and  agreeable  by  the  bright  sky,  so  won- 
derfully blue.  I  passed  from  all  the  glory  of  the  day,  into 
a  dim  cathedral,  where  High  Mass  was  performing,  feeble 
tapers  were  burning,  people  were  kneeling  in  all  directions 
before  all  manner  of  shrines,  and  officiating  priests  were 
crooning  the  usual  chaunt,  in  the  usual  low,  dull,  drawling, 
melancholy  tone. 

Thinking  how  strange  it  was  to  find,  in  every  stagnant 
town,  this  same  Heart  beating  with  the  same  monotonous 
pulsation,  the  centre  of  the  same  torpid,  listless  system,  I 
came  out  by  another  door,  and  was  suddenly  scared  to 
death  by  a  blast  from  the  shrillest  trumpet  that  ever  was 
blown.  Immediately,  came  tearing  round  the  corner,  an 
equestrian  company  from  Paris :  marshalling  themselves 
under  the  walls  of  the  church,  and  flouting,  with  their 
horses'  heels,  the  griffins,  lions,  tigers,  and  other  monsters 
in  stone  and  marble,  decorating  its  exterior.  First,  there 
came  a  stately  nobleman  with  a  great  deal  of  hair,  and  no 
hat,  bearing  an  enormous  banner,  on  which  was  inscribed, 
Mazeppa!  to-night!  Then,  a  Mexican  chief,  with  a  great 
pear-shaped  club  on  his  shoulder,  like  Hercules.  Then, 
six  or  eight  Roman  chariots :  each  with  a  beautiful  lady  in 
extremely  short  petticoats,  and  unnaturally  pink  tights, 
erect  within :  shedding  beaming  looks  upon  the  crowd,  in 


d2  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

which  there  was  a  latent  expression  of  discomposure  and 
anxiety,  for  which  I  couldn't  account,  until,  as  the  open 
back  of  each  chariot  presented  itself,  I  saw  the  immense 
difficulty  with  which  the  pink  legs  maintained  their  per- 
pendicular, over  the  uneven  pavement  of  the  town :  which 
gave  me  quite  a  new  idea  of  the  ancient  Romans  and  Brit- 
ons. The  procession  was  brought  to  a  close,  by  some  dozen 
indomitable  warriors  of  different  nations,  riding  two  and 
two,  and  haughtily  surveying  the  tame  population  of 
Modena :  among  whom,  however,  they  occasionally  conde- 
scended to  scatter  largesse  in  the  form  of  a  few  handbills. 
After  caracolling  among  the  lions  and  tigers,  and  proclaim- 
ing that  evening's  entertainments  with  blast  of  trumpet,  it 
then  filed  off,  by  the  other  end  of  the  square,  and  left  a 
new  and  greatly  increased  dulness  behind. 

When  the  procession  had  so  entirely  passed  away,  that 
the  shrill  trumpet  was  mild  in  the  distance,  and  the  tail  of 
the  last  horse  was  hopelessly  round  the  corner,  the  people 
who  had  come  out  of  the  church  to  stare  at  it,  went  back 
again.  But  one  old  lady,  kneeling  on  the  pavement  with- 
in, near  the  door,  had  seen  it  all,  and  had  been  immensely 
interested,  without  getting  up ;  and  this  old  lady's  eye,  at 
that  juncture,  I  happened  to  catch :  to  our  mutual  confu- 
sion. She  cut  our  embarrassment  very  short,  however,  by 
crossing  herself  devoutly,  and  going  down,  at  full  length, 
on  her  face,  before  a  figure  in  a  fancy  petticoat  and  a  gilt 
crown;  which  was  so  like  one  of  the  procession-figures, 
that  perhaps  at  this  hour  she  may  think  the  whole  appear- 
ance a  celestial  vision.  Anyhow,  I  must  certainly  have  for- 
given her  her  interest  in  the  Circus,  though  I  had  been  her 
Father  Confessor. 

There  was  a  little  fiery-eyed  old  man  with  a  crooked 
shoulder,  in  the  cathedral,  who  took  it  very  ill  that  I  made 
no  effort  to  see  the  bucket  (kept  in  an  old  tower)  which  the 
people  of  Modena  took  away  from  the  people  of  Bologna  in 
the  fourteenth  century,  and  about  which  there  was  war 
made  and  a  mock-heroic  poem  by  Tasso,  too.  Being  quite 
content,  however,  to  look  at  the  outside  of  the  tower,  and 
feast,  in  imagination,  on  the  bucket  within;  and  preferring 
to  loiter  in  the  shade  of  the  tall  Campanile,  and  about  the 
cathedral ;  I  have  no  personal  knowledge  of  this  bucket, 
even  at  the  present  time. 

Indeed,  we  were  at  Bologna,  before  the  little  old  mm  (oi 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  63 

the  Guide-Rook)  would  have  considered  that  we  had  half 
done  justice  to  the  wonders  of  Modena.  But  it  is  such  a 
delight  to  me  to  leave  new  scenes  behind,  and  still  go  on, 
encountering  newer  scenes — and,  moreover,  I  have  such  a 
perverse  disposition  in  respect  of  sights  that  are  cut,  and 
dried,  and  dictated — that  I  fear  I  sin  against  similar  au- 
thorities in  every  place  I  visit. 

Be  this  as  it  may,  in  the  pleasant  Cemetery  of  Bologna, 
I  found  myself  walking  next  Sunday  morning,  among  the 
stately  marble  tombs  and  colonnades,  in  company  with  a 
crowd  of  Peasants,  and  escorted  by  a  little  Cicerone  of  that 
town,  who  was  excessively  anxious  for  the  honour  of  the 
place,  and  most  solicitous  to  divert  my  attention  from  the 
bad  monuments :  whereas  he  was  never  tired  of  extolling 
tlie  good  ones.  Seeing  this  little  man  (a  good-humoured 
little  m.an  he  was,  who  seemed  to  have  nothing  in  his  face 
but  shining  teeth  and  eyes)  looking,  wistfully,  at  a  certain 
plot  of  grass,  I  asked  him  who  was  buried  there.  "  The 
poor  people,  Signore,"  he  said,  with  a  shrug  and  a  smile, 
and  stopping  to  look  back  at  me — for  he  always  went  on  a 
little  before,  and  took  off  his  hat  to  introduce  every  new 
monument.  "Only  the  poor,  Signore!  It's  very  cheerful. 
It's  very  lively.  How  gi-een  it  is,  how  cool!  It's  like  a 
meadow!  There  are  five," — holding  up  all  the  fingers  of 
his  right  hand  to  express  the  number,  which  an  Italian 
peasant  will  always  do,  if  it  be  within  the  compass  of  his 
ten  fingers, — "there  are  five  of  my  little  children  buried 
there,  Signore;  just  there;  a. little  to  the  right.  Well! 
Thanks  to  God!  It's  very  cheerful.  How  green  it  is, 
how  cool  it  is !     It's  quite  a  meadow !  " 

He  looked  me  very  hard  in  the  face,  and  seeing  I  was 
sorry  for  him,  took  a  pinch  of  snuff  (every  Cicerone  takes 
snuff),  and  made  a  little  bow ;  partly  in  deprecation  of  his 
having  alluded  to  such  a  subject,  and  partly  in  memory  of 
the  children  and  of  his  favourite  saint.  It  was  as  unaffected 
and  as  perfectly  natural  a  little  bow,  as  ever  man  made. 
Immediately  afterwards,  he  took  his  hat  off  altogether,  and 
begged  to  introduce  me  to  the  next  monument;  and  hia 
eyes  and  his  teeth  shone  brighter  than  before. 


64  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 


THROUGH  BOLOGNA  AND  FERRARA. 

There  was  such  a  very  smart  official  in  attendance  at 
the  Cemetery  where  the  little  Cicerone  had  buried  his 
children,  that  when  the  little  Cicerone  suggested  to  me,  in 
a  whisper,  that  there  would  be  no  offence  in  presenting  this 
officer,  in  return  for  some  slight  extra  service,  with  a 
couple  of  pauls  (about  tenpence,  English  money),  I  looked 
incredulously  at  his  cocked  hat,  wash-leather  gloves,  well- 
made  uniform,  and  dazzling  buttons,  and  rebuked  the  little 
Cicerone  with  a  grave  shake  of  the  head.  For,  in  splen- 
dour of  appearance,  he  was  at  least  equal  to  the  Deputy 
Usher  of  the  Black  Rod;  and  the  idea  of  his  carrying,  as 
Jeremy  Diddler  would  say,  "  such  a  thing  as  tenpence  "  away 
with  him,  seemed  monstrous.  He  took  it  in  excellent  part, 
however,  when  I  made  bold  to  give  it  him,  and  pulled  off 
his  cocked  hat  with  a  flourish  that  would  have  been  a  bar- 
gain at  double  the  money. 

It  seemed  to  be  his  duty  to  describe  the  monuments  to 
the  people — at  all  events  he  was  doing  so;  and  when  I 
compared  him,  like  Gulliver  in  Brobdingnag,  "  with  the 
Institutions  of  my  own  beloved  country,  I  could  not  refrain 
from  tears  of  pride  and  exultation."  He  had  no  pace  at  all ; 
no  more  than  a  tortoise.  He  loitered  as  the  people  loitered, 
that  they  might  gratify  their  curiosity;  and  positively 
allowed  them,  now  and  then,  to  read  the  inscriptions  on 
the  tombs.  He  was  neither  shabby,  nor  insolent,  nor  churl- 
ish, nor  ignorant.  He  spoke  his  own  language  with  perfect 
propriety,  and  seemed  to  consider  himself,  in  his  way,  a 
kind  of  teacher  of  the  people,  and  to  entertain  a  just  respect 
both  for  himself  and  them.  They  would  no  more  have 
such  a  man  for  a  Verger  in  Westminster  Abbey,  than  they 
Avould  let  the  people  in  (as  they  do  at  Bologna)  to  see  the 
monuments  for  nothing. 

Again,  an  ancient  sombre  town,  under  the  brilliant  sky; 
with  heavy  arcades  over  the  footways  of  the  older  streets, 
and  lighter  and  more  cheerful  archways  in  the  newer  por- 
tions of  the  town.  Again,  brown  piles  of  sacred  buildings, 
with  more  birds  flying  in  and  out  of  chinks  in  the  stones ; 
and  more  snarling  monsters  for  the  bases  of  the  pillars. 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  «6 

Again,  rich  churches,  drowsy  masses,  curling  incense,  tink- 
ling bells,  priests  in  bright  vestments :  pictures,  tapers, 
laced  altar  cloths,  crosses,  images,  and  artificial  flowers. 

There  is  a  grave  and  learned  air  about  the  city,  and  a 
pleasant  gloom  upon  it,  that  would  leave  it,  a  distinct  and 
separate  impression  in  the  mind,  among  a  crowd  of  cities, 
though  it  were  not  still  further  marked  in  the  traveller's 
remembrance  by  the  two  brick  leanmg  towers  (sufficiently 
unsightly  in  themselves,  it  must  be  acknowledged),  inclin- 
ing cross-wise  as  if  they  were  bowing  stiffly  to  each  other 
— a  most  extraordinary  termination  to  the  perspective  of 
some  of  the  narrow  streets.  The  colleges,  and  churches 
too,  and  palaces :  and  above  all  the  Academy  of  Fine  Arts, 
where  there  are  a  host  of  interesting  pictures,  especially  by 
GuiDO,  DoMExicHiNO,  and  Ludovico  Caracci  :  give  it  a 
place  of  its  own  in  the  memory.  Even  though  these  were 
not,  and  there  were  nothing  else  to  remember  it  by,  the 
great  Meridian  on  the  pavement  of  the  church  of  San  Pe- 
tronio,  where  the  sunbeams  mark  the  time  among  the  kneel- 
ing people,  would  give  it  a  fanciful  and  pleasant  interest. 

Bologna  being  very  full  of  tourists,  detained  there  by  an 
inundation  which  rendered  the  road  to  Florence  impassable, 
I  was  quartered  up  at  the  top  of  an  hotel,  in  an  out-of-the- 
way  room  which  I  never  could  find :  containing  a  bed,  big 
enough  for  a  boarding-school,  which  I  couldn't  fall  asleep 
in.  The  chief  among  the  waiters  who  visited  this  lonely 
retreat,  where  there  was  no  other  company  but  the  swal- 
lows in  the  broad  eaves  over  the  window,  was  a  man  of  one 
idea  in  connection  with  the  English ;  and  the  subject  of  this 
harmless  monomania,  was  Lord  Byron.  I  made  the  discov- 
ery by  accidentally  remarking  to  him,  at  breakfast,  that  the 
matting  with  which  the  floor  was  covered,  was  very  com- 
fortable at  that  season,  when  he  immediately  replied  that 
Milor  Beeron  had  been  much  attached  to  that  kind  of  mat- 
ting. Observing,  at  the  same  moment,  that  I  took  no  milk, 
he  exclaimed  with  enthusiasm,  that  Milor  Beeron  had  never 
touched  it.  At  first,  I  took  it  for  granted,  in  my  inno- 
cence, that  he  had  been  one  of  the  Beeron  servants ;  but 
no,  he  said,  no,  he  was  in  the  habit  of  speaking  about  my 
Lord,  tc  English  gentlemen ;  that  was  all.  He  knew  all 
about  him>  he  said.  In  proof  of  it,  he  connected  him 
with  every  possible  topic,  from  the  Monte  Pulciano  wine  at 
dinner  (which  was  grown  on  an  estate  he  had  owned),  to 
6 


66  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

the  big  bed  itself,  which  was  the  very  model  of  his.  When 
I  left  the  inn,  he  coupled  with  his  final  bow  in.  the  yard,  a 
parting  assurance  that  the  road  by  which  I  was  going,  had 
been  Milor  Beeron's  favourite  ride;  and  before  the  horse's 
feet  had  well  begun  to  clatter  on  the  pavement,  he  ran 
briskly  up  stairs  again,  I  dare  say  to  tell  some  other 
Englishman  in  some  other  solitary  room  that  the  guest  who 
had  just  departed  was  Lord  Beeron's  living  image. 

I  had  entered  Bologna  by  night — almost  midnight— and 
all  along  the  road  thither,  after  our  entrance  into  the 
Papal  territory :  which  is  not,  in  any  part,  supremely  Avell 
governed,  Saint  Peter's  keys  being  rather  rusty  now :  the 
driver  had  so  worried  about  the  danger  of  robbers  in  trav- 
elling after  dark,  and  had  so  infected  the  Brave  Courier, 
and  the  two  had  been  so  constantly  stopping  and  getting 
up  and  down  to  look  after  a  portmanteau  which  was  tied 
on  behind,  that  I  should  have  felt  almost  obliged  to  any 
one  who  would  have  had  the  goodness  to  take  it  away. 
Hence  it  was  stipulated,  that,  whenever  we  left  Bologna, 
we  should  start  so  as  not  to  arrive  at  Ferrara  later  than 
eight  at  night;  and  a  delightful  afternoon  and  evening 
journey  it  was,  albeit  through  a  flat  district  which  gradu- 
ally became  more  marshy  from  the  overflow  of  brooks  and 
rivers  in  the  recent  heavy  rains. 

At  sunset,  when  I  was  walking  on  alone,  while  the 
horses  rested,  I  arrived  upon  a  little  scene,  which,  by  one 
of  those  singular  mental  operations  of  which  we  are  all 
conscious,  seemed  perfectly  familiar  to  me,  and  which  I 
see  distinctly  now.  There  was  not  much  in  it.  In  the 
blood-red  light,  there  was  a  mournful  sheet  of  water,  just 
stirred  by  the  evening  wind ;  upon  its  margin  a  few  trees. 
In  the  foreground  was  a  group  of  silent  peasant  girls  lean- 
ing over  the  parapet  of  a  little  bridge,  and  looking,  now  up 
at  the  sky,  now  down  into  the  water;  in  the  distance,  a 
deep  bell ;  the  shadow  of  approaching  night  on  everything. 
If  I  had  been  murdered  there,  in  some  former  life,  I  could 
not  have  seemed  to  remember  the  place  more  thoroughly, 
or  with  a  more  emphatic  chilling  of  the  blood;  and  the 
real  remembrance  of  it  acquired  in  that  minute,  is  so 
strengthened  by  the  imaginary  recollection,  that  I  hardly 
think  I  could  forget  it. 

More  solitary,  more  depopulated,  more  deserted,  old 
Ferrara,  than  any  city  of  the  solemn  brotherhood!     The 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  67 

grass  so  grows  up  in  the  silent  streets,  that  any  one  might 
make  hay  there,  literally,  while  the  sun  shines.  But  the 
sun  shines  with  diminished  cheerfulness  in  grim  Ferrara; 
and  the  people  are  so  few  who  pass  and  repass  through  the 
places,  that  the  flesh  of  its  inhabitants  might  be  grass  in- 
deed, and  growing  in  the  squares. 

I  wonder  why  the  head  coppersmith  in  an  Italian  town, 
always  lives  next  door  to  the  Hotel,  or  opposite :  making 
the  visitor  feel  as  if  the  beating  hammers  were  his  own 
heart,  palpitating  with  a  deadly  energy !  I  wonder  why 
jealous  corridors  surround  the  bedroom  on  all  sides,  and 
fill  it  with  unnecessary  doors  that  can't  be  shut,  and  will 
not  open,  and  abut  on  pitchy  darkness !  I  wonder  why  it  is 
not  enough  that  these  distrustful  genii  stand  agape  at  one's 
dreams  all  night,  but  there  must  also  be  round  open  port- 
holes, high  in  the  wall,  suggestive,  when  a  mouse  or  rat  ia 
heard  behind  the  wainscot,  of  a  somebody  scraping  the 
wall  with  his  toes,  in  his  endeavours  to  reach  one  of  these 
portholes  and  look  in !  I  wonder  why  the  faggots  are  so 
constructed,  as  to  know  of  no  effect  but  an  agony  of  heat 
when  they  are  lighted  and  replenished,  and  an  agony  of 
cold  and  suffocation  at  all  other  times!  I  wonder,  above 
all,  why  it  is  the  great  feature  of  domestic  architecture  in 
Italian  inns,  that  all  the  fire  goes  up  the  chimney,  except 
the  smoke ! 

The  answer  matters  little.  Coppersmiths,  doors,  port- 
holes, smoke,  and  faggots,  are  welcome  to  me.  Give  me 
the  smiling  face  of  the  attendant,  man  or  woman;  the 
courteous  manner;  the  amiable  desire  to  please  and  to  be 
pleased ;  the  light-hearted,  pleasant,  simple  air — so  many 
jewels  set  in  dirt — and  I  am  theirs  again  to-morrow! 

Ariosto's  house,  Tasso's  prison,  a  rare  old  Gothic  cathe- 
dral, and  more  churches  of  course,  are  the  sights  of  Ferrara. 
But  the  long  silent  streets,  and  the  dismantled  palaces, 
where  ivy  waves  in  lieu  of  banners,  and  where  rank  weeds 
are  slowly  creeping  up  the  long-untrodden  stairs,  are  the 
best  sights  of  all. 

The  aspect  of  this  dreary  town,  half  an  hour  before  sun- 
rise one  fine  morning,  when  I  left  it,  was  as  picturesque  as 
it  seemed  unreal  and  spectral.  It  was  no  matter  that  the 
people  were  not  yet  out  of  bed;  for  if  they  had  all  been 
up  and  busy,  they  would  have  made  but  little  difference 
in  that  desert  of  a  place.     It  was  best  to  see  it,  without 


68  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

a  single  figure  in  the  picture;  a  city  of  the  dead,  without 
one  solitary  survivor.  Pestilence  might  have  ravaged 
streets,  squares,  and  market-places;  and  sack  and  siege 
have  ruined  the  old  houses,  battered  down  their  doors  and 
windows,  and  made  breaches  in  their  roofs.  In  one  part, 
a  great  tower  rose  into  the  air ;  the  only  landmark  in  the 
melancholy  view.  In  another,  a  prodigious  castle,  with  a 
moat  about  it,  stood  aloof :  a  sullen  city  in  itself.  In  the 
black  dungeons  of  this  castle,  Parisina  and  her  lover  were 
beheaded  in  the  dead  of  night.  The  red  light,  beginning 
to  shine  when  I  looked  back  upon  it,  stained  its  walls  with- 
out, as  they  have,  many  a  time,  been  stained  within,  in  old 
days ;  but  for  any  sign  of  life  they  gave,  the  castle  and  the 
city  might  have  been  avoided  by  all  human  creatures,  from 
the  moment  when  the  axe  went  down  upon  the  last  of  the 
two  lovers :  and  might  have  never  vibrated  to  another  sound 

Beyond  the  blow  that  to  the  block 

Pierced  through  with  forced  and  sullen  shock. 

Coming  to  the  Po,  which  was  greatly  swollen,  and  run- 
ning fiercely,  we  crossed  it  by  a  floating  bridge  of  boats, 
and  so  came  into  the  Austrian  territory,  and  resumed  our 
journey :  through  a  country  of  which,  for  some  miles,  a 
great  part  was  under  water.  The  Brave  Courier  and  the 
soldiery  had  first  quarrelled,  for  half  an  hour  or  more,  over 
our  eternal  passport.  But  this  was  a  daily  relaxation  with 
the  Brave,  who  was  always  stricken  deaf  when  shabby  func- 
tionaries in  uniform  came,  as  they  constantly  did  come, 
plunging  out  of  wooden  boxes  to  look  at  it — or  in  other 
words  to  beg — and  who,  stone  deaf  to  my  entreaties  that 
the  man  might  have  a  trifle  given  him,  and  we  resume  our 
journey  in  peace,  was  wont  to  sit  reviling  the  functionary 
in  broken  English :  while  the  unfortunate  man's  face  was 
a  portrait  of  mental  agony  framed  in  the  coach  window, 
from  his  perfect  ignorance  of  what  was  being  said  to  his 
disparagement. 

There  was  a  postilion,  in  the  course  of  this  day's  journey, 
as  wild  and  savagely  good-looking  a  vagabond  as  you 
would  desire  to  see.  He  was  a  tall,  stout-made,  dark-com- 
plexioned fellow,  with  a  profusion  of  shaggy  black  hair 
hanging  all  over  his  face,  and  great  black  whiskers  stretch- 
ing down  his  throat.  His  dress  was  a  torn  suit  of  rifle 
green,    garnished  here   and  there   with   red;    a   steeple- 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  69 

crowned  hat,  innocent  of  nap,  with  a  broken  and  bedrag- 
gled feather  stuck  in  the  band ;  and  a  flaming  red  necker- 
chief hanging  on  his  shoulders.  He  was  not  in  the  saddle, 
but  reposed,  quite  at  his  ease,  on  a  sort  of  low  footboard  in 
front  of  the  postchaise,  down  amongst  the  horses'  tails — 
convenient  for  having  his  brains  kicked  out,  at  any  mo- 
ment To  this  Brigand,  the  Brave  Courier,  when  we  were 
at  a  reasonable  trot,  happened  to  suggest  the  practicability 
of  going  faster.  He  received  the  proposal  with  a  perfect 
yell  of  derision ;  brandished  his  whip  about  his  head  (such 
a  whip!  it  was  more  like  a  home-made  bow);  flung  up  his 
heels,  much  higher  than  the  horses ;  and  disappeared,  in  a 
paroxysm,  somewhere  in  the  neighbourhood  of  the  axletree. 
I  fully  expected  to  see  him  lying  in  the  road,  a  hundred 
yards  behind,  but  up  came  the  steeple-crowned  hat  again, 
next  minute,  and  he  was  seen  reposing,  as  on  a  sofa,  enter- 
taining himself  with  the  idea,  and  crying,  "Ha  ha!  what 
next!  Oh  the  devil!  Faster  too!  Shoo — hoo — o — o!" 
(This  last  ejaculation,  an  inexpressibly  defiant  hoot.) 
Being  anxious  to  reach  our  immediate  destination  that 
night,  I  ventured,  by  and  by,  to  repeat  the  experiment  on 
my  own  account.  It  produced  exactly  the  same  effect. 
Round  flew  the  whip  with  the  same  scornful  flourish,  up 
came  the  heels,  down  went  the  steeple-crowned  hat,  and 
presently  he  reappeared,  reposing  as  before  and  saying  to 
himself,  "Ha  ha!  what  next!  Faster  too!  Oh  the  devil  I 
Shoo — hoo — o — o ! " 


AN  ITALIAN  DREAM. 

I  HAD  been  travelling,  for  some  days ;  resting  very  little 
in  the  night,  and  never  in  the  day.  The  rapid  and  unbro- 
ken succession  of  novelties  that  had  passed  before  me,  came 
back  like  half-formed  dreams:  and  a  crowd  of  objects 
wandered  in  the  greatest  confusion  through  my  mind,  as 
I  travelled  on,  by  a  solitary  road.  At  intervals,  some  one 
among  them  would  stop,  as  it  were,  in  its  restless  flitting 
to  and  fro,  and  enable  me  to  look  at  it,  quite  steadily,  and 
behold  it  in  full  distinctness.  After  a  few  moments,  it 
would  dissolve,  like  a  view  in  a  magic-lantern ;  and  while 
I  saw  some  part  of  it  quite  plainly,  and  some  faintly^  and 


70  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

some  uot  at  all,  would  show  me  another  of  the  many  places 
I  had  lately  oeen,  lingering  behind  it,  and  coming  through 
it.  This  was  no  sooner  visible  than,  in  its  turn,  it  melted 
into  something  else. 

At  one  moment,  I  was  standing  again,  before  the  brown 
old  rugged  churches  of  Modena.  As  I  recognised  the  cu- 
rious pillars  with  grim  monsters  for  their  bases,  I  seemed 
to  see  them,  standing  by  themselves  in  the  quiet  square  at 
Padua,  where  there  were  the  staid  old  University,  and  the 
figures,  demurely  gowned,  grouped  here  and  there  in  the 
open  space  about  it.  Then,  I  was  strolling  in  the  outskirts 
of  that  pleasant  cit}',  admiring  the  unusual  neatness  of  tlie 
dwelling-houses,  gardens,  and  orchards,  as  I  had  seen  them 
a  few  liours  before.  In  their  stead  arose,  immediately, 
the  two  towers  of  Bologna ;  and  the  most  obstinate  of  all 
these  objects  failed  to  hold  its  ground,  a  minute,  before 
the  monstrous  moated  castle  of  Ferrara,  which,  like  an 
illustration  to  a  wild  romance,  came  back  again  in  the  red 
sunrise,  lording  it  over  the  solitary,  grass-grown,  withered 
town.  In  short,  I  had  that  incoherent  but  delightful  jum- 
ble in  my  brain,  which  travellers  are  apt  to  have,  and  are 
indolently  willing  to  encourage.  Every  shake  of  the  coach 
in  which  I  sat,  half  dozing  in  the  dark,  appeared  to  jerk 
some  new  recollection  out  of  its  place,  and  to  jerk  some 
other  new  recollection  into  it;  and  in  this  state  I  fell 
asleep. 

I  was  awakened  after  some  time  (as  I  thought)  by  the 
stopping  of  the  coach.  It  was  now  quite  night,  and  we 
were  at  the  water-side.  There  lay  here,  a  black  boat,  with 
a  little  house  or  cabin  in  it  of  the  same  mournful  colour. 
When  I  had  taken  my  seat  in  this,  the  boat  was  paddled, 
by  two  men,  towards  a  great  light,  lying  in  the  distance  on 
the  sea. 

Ever  and  again,  there  was  a  dismal  sigh  of  wind.  It 
ruffled  the  water,  and  rocked  the  boat,  and  sent  the  dark 
clouds  flying  before  the  stars.  I  could  not  but  think  how 
strange  it  was,  to  be  floating  away  at  that  hour:  leaving 
the  land  behind,  and  going  on,  towards  this  light  upon  the 
sea.  It  soon  began  to  burn  brighter :  and  from  being  one 
light  became  a  cluster  of  tapers,  twinkling  and  shining  out 
of  the  water,  as  the  boat  approached  towards  them  by  a 
dreamy  kind  of  track,  marked  out  upon  the  sea  by  posts 
and  piles. 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  71 

We  had  floated  on,  five  miles  or  so,  over  the  dark  water, 
when  I  heard  it  rippling,  in  my  dream,  against  some  ob- 
struction near  at  hand.  Looking  out  attentively,  I  saw, 
through  the  gloom,  a  something  black  and  massive — like  a 
shore,  but  lying  close  and  flat  upon  the  water,  like  a  raft 
— which  we  were  gliding  past.  The  chief  of  the  two  rowers 
said  it  was  a  burial-place. 

Full  of  the  interest  and  wonder  which  a  cemetery  lying 
out  there,  in  the  lonely  sea,  inspired,  I  turned  to  gaze  upon 
it  as  it  should  recede  in  our  path,  when  it  was  quickly  shut 
out  from  my  view.  Before  I  knew  by  what,  or  how,  I 
found  that  we  were  gliding  up  a  street — a  phantom  street ; 
the  houses  rising  on  both  sides,  from  the  water,  and  the 
bhick  boat  gliding  on  beneath  their  windows.  Lights  were 
shining  from  some  of  these  casements,  plumbing  the  depth 
of  the  black  stream  with  their  reflected  rays ;  but  all  was 
profoundly  silent. 

So  we  advanced  into  this  ghostly  city,  continuing  to  hold 
our  course  through  narrow  streets  and  lanes,  all  tilled  and 
flowing  with  water..  Some  of  the  corners  where  our  way 
branched  oft',  were  so  acute  and  narrow,  that  it  seemed  im- 
possible for  the  long  slender  boat  to  turn  them ;  but  the 
rowers,  with  a  low  melodious  cry  of  warning,  sent  it  skim- 
ming on  without  a  pause.  Sometimes,  the  rowers  of  another 
black  boat  like  our  own,  echoed  the  cry,  and  slackening 
their  speed  (as  I  thought  we  did  ours)  would  come  flitting 
past  us,  like  a  dark  shadow.  Other  boats,  of  the  same 
sombre  hue,  were  lying  moored,  I  thought,  to  painted  pil- 
lars, near  to  dark  mysterious  doors  that  opened  straight 
upon  the  water.  Some  of  these  were  empty ;  in  some,  the 
rowers  lay  asleep ;  towards  one,  I  saw  some  figures  coming 
down  a  gloomy  archway  from  the  interior  of  a  palace: 
gaily  dressed,  and  attended  by  torch-bearers.  It  was  but 
a  glimpse  I  had  of  them ;  for  a  bridge,  so  low  and  close 
upon  the  boat  that  it  seemed  ready  to  fall  down  and  crush 
us :  one  of  the  many  bridges  that  perplexed  the  Dream : 
blotted  them  out,  instantly.  On  we  went,  floating  towards 
the  heart  of  this  strange  place — with  water  all  about  us 
where  never  water  was  elsewhere — clusters  of  houses, 
churches,  heaps  of  stately  buildings  growing  out  of  it — and, 
everywhere,  the  same  extraordinary  silence.  Presently, 
we  shot  across  a  broad  and  open  stream ;  and  passing,  as  I 
thought,  before  a  spacious  paved  quay,  where  the  bright 


72  PICrrURES  FROM  ITALY. 

lamps  with  which  it  was  iUmuinated  showed  long  rows 
of  arches  and  pillais,  of  ponderous  construction  and  great 
strength,  but  as  light  to  the  eye  as  garlands  of  hoar- 
frost or  gossamer — and  where,  for  the  first  time,  I  saw 
people  walking — arrived  at  a  flight  of  steps  leading 
from  the  water  to  a  large  mansion,  where,  having 
passed  through  corridors  and  galleries  innumerable,  I  lay 
down  to  rest  listening  to  the  black  boats  stealing  up  and 
down  below  the  window  on  the  rippling  water,  till  I  fell 
asleep. 

The  glory  of  the  day  that  broke  upon  me  'n  this  Dream ; 
its  freshness,  motion,  buoyancy ;  its  sparkles  of  the  sun  in 
water ;  its  clear  blue  sky  and  rustling  air ;  no  waking  words 
can  tell.  But,  from  my  window,  I  looked  down  on  boats 
and  barks;  on  masts,  sails,  cordage,  flags;  on  groups  of 
busy  sailors,  working  at  the  cargoes  of  these  vessels ;  on 
wide  quays,  strewn  with  bales,  casks,  merchandise  of  many 
kinds ;  on  great  ships,  lying  near  at  hand  in  stately  indo- 
lence ;  on  islands,  crownerl  with  gorgeous  domes  and  tur- 
rets :  aud  where  golden  crosses  glittered  in  the  light,  atop 
of  wondrous  churches,  springing  from  the  sea!  Going 
down  upon  the  margin  of  the  green  sea,  rolling  on  before 
the  door,  and  filling  all  the  streets,  I  came  upon  a  place  of 
such  surpassing  beauty,  and  such  grandeur,  that  all  the 
rest  was  poor  and  faded,  in  comparison  witli  its  absorbing 
loveliness. 

It  was  a  great  Piazza,  as  I  thought ;  anchored,  like  all 
the  rest,  in  the  deep  ocean.  On  its  broad  bosom,  was  a 
Palace,  more  majestic  and  magnificent  in  its  old  age,  than 
all  the  buildings  of  the  earth,  in  the  high  prime  and  fulness 
of  their  youth.  Cloisters  and  galleries :  so  light,  they  might 
have  been  the  work  of  fairy  hands :  so  strong  that  centuries 
had  battered  them  in  vain :  wound  round  and  round  this 
palace,  and  enfolded  it  with  a  Cathedral,  gorgeous  in  the 
wild  luxuriant  fancies  of  the  East.  At  no  great  distance 
from  its  porch,  a  lofty  tower,  standing  by  itself,  and  rear- 
ing its  proud  head,  alone,  into  the  sky,  looked  out  upon 
the  Adriatic  Sea.  Near  to  the  margin  of  the  stream,  were 
two  ill-omened  pillars  of  red  granite ;  one  having  on  its 
top,  a  figure  with  a  sword  and  shield ;  the  other,  a  winged 
lion.  Not  far  from  these  again,  a  second  tower:  richest 
of  the  rich  in  all  its  decorations :  even  here,  where  all  was 
rich :  sustained  aloft^  a  great  orb,  gleaming  with  gold  and 


PICTURES  FROM  iTALY.  73 

deepest  blue :  the  Twelve  Signs  painted  on  it,  and  a  mimic 
sun  revolving  in  its  course  around  them:  while  above,  two 
bronze  giants  hammered  out  the  hours  upon  a  sounding 
bell.  An  oblong  square  of  lofty  houses  of  the  whitest 
stone,  surrounded  by  a  light  and  beautiful  arcade,  formed 
part  of  this  enchanted  scene;  and,  here  and  there,  gay 
masts  for  flags  rose,  tapering,  from  the  pavement  of  the 
unsubstantial  ground. 

I  thought  I  entered  the  Cathedral,  and  went  in  and  out 
among  its  many  arches:  traversing  its  whole  extent.  A 
grand  and  dreamy  structure,  of  immense  proportions; 
golden  with  old  mosaics;  redolent  of  perfumes ;  dim  with 
the  smoke  of  incense ;  costly  treasure  of  precious  stones 
and  metals,  glittering  through  iron  bars;  holy  with  the 
bodies  of  deceased  s.?ints ;  rainbow-hued  with  windows  of 
stained  glass ;  dark  with  carved  woods  and  coloured  mar- 
bles ;  obscure  in  its  vast  heights,  and  lengthened  distances ; 
shining  with  silver  lamps  and  winking  lights;  unreal,  fan- 
tastic, solemn,  inconceivable  throughout.  I  thought  I 
entered  the  old  palace ;  pacing  silent  galleries  and  council- 
chambers,  where  the  old  rulers  of  this  mistress  of  the 
waters  looked  sternly  out,  in  pictures,  from  the  walls,  and 
where  her  high-pro  wed  galleys,  still  victorious  on  canvas, 
fought  and  conquered  as  of  old.  I  thought  I  wandered 
through  its  halls  of  state  and  triumph — bare  and  empty 
now ! — and  musing  on  its  pride  and  might,  extinct :  for 
that  was  past ;  all  past :  heard  a  voice  say,  "  Some  tokens 
of  its  ancient  rule,  and  some  consoling  reasons  for  its  down- 
fall, may  be  traced  here,  yet ! " 

I  dreamed  that  1  was  led  on,  then,  into  some  jealous 
rooms,  communicating  with  a  prison  near  the  palace ;  sepa- 
rated from  it  by  a  lofty  bridge  crossing  a  narrow  street ;■ 
and  called,  I  dreamed.  The  Bridge  of  Sighs. 

But  first  I  passed  two  jagged  slits  in  a  stone  wall;  the 
lions'  mouths — now  toothless — where,  in  the  distempered 
horror  of  my  sleep,  I  thought  denunciations  of  innocent 
men  to  the  old  wicked  Council,  had  been  dropped  through, 
many  a  time,  when  the  night  was  dark.  So,  when  I  saw 
the  council-room  to  which  such  prisoners  were  taken  for 
examination,  and  the  door  by  which  they  passed  out,  when 
they  were  condemned — a  door  that  never  closed  upon  a 
man  with  life  and  hope  before  him — my  heart  appeared  to 
die  within  me. 


74  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

It  was  smitten  harder  though,  when,  torch  in  hand,  I 
descended  from  the  cheerful  day  into  two  ranges,  one 
below  another,  of  dismal,  awful,  horrible  stone  cells. 
They  were  quite  dark.  Each  had  a  loophole  in  its  massive 
wall,  where,  in  the  old  time,  every  day,  a  torch  was  placed 
— I  dreamed — to  light  the  prisoner,  within,  for  half  an 
hour.  The  captives,  by  the  glimmering  of  these  brief  rays, 
had  scratched  and  cut  inscriptions  in  the  blackened  vaults. 
I  saw  them.  For  their  labour  with  a  rusty  nail's  point, 
had  outlived  their  agony  and  them,  through  many  genera- 
tions. 

One  cell,  I  saw,  in  which  no  man  remained  for  more  than 
four-and-twenty  hours;  being  marked  for  dead  before  he 
entered  it.  Hard  by,  another,  and  a  dismal  one,  whereto, 
at  midnight,  the  confessor  came — a  monk  brown-robed,  and 
hooded — ghastly  in  the  day,  and  free  bright  air,  but  in  the 
midnight  of  that  murky  prison,  Hope's  extinguisher,  and 
Murder's  herald.  I  had  my  foot  upon  the  spot,  where, 
at  the  same  dread  hour,  the  shriven  prisoner  was  strangled ; 
and  struck  my  hand  upon  the  guilty  door — low  browed 
and  stealthy — through  which  the  lumpish  sack  was  carried 
out  into  a  boat,  and  rowed  away,  and  drowned  where  it 
was  death  to  cast  a  net. 

Around  this  dungeon  stronghold,  and  above  some  part  of 
it:  licking  the  rough  walls  without,  and  smearing  them 
with  damp  and  slhne  within :  stuffing  dank  weeds  and 
refuse  into  chinks  and  crevices,  as  if  the  very  stones  and 
bars  had  mouths  to  stop :  furnishing  a  smooth  road  for  the 
removal  of  the  bodies  of  the  secret  victims  of  the  State — a 
road  so  ready  that  it  went  along  with  them,  and  ran  be- 
fore them,  like  a  cruel  officer — flowed  the  same  water  that 
filled  this  Dream  of  mine,  and  made  it  seem  one,  even  at 
the  time. 

Descending  from  the  palace  by  a  staircase,  called,  I 
thought,  the  Giant's — I  had  some  imaginary  recollection 
of  an  old  man  abdicating,  coming,  more  slowly  and  more 
feebly,  down  it,  when  he  heard  the  bell,  proclaiming  his 
successor — I  glided  off,  in  one  of  the  dark  boats,  until  we 
came  to  an  old  arsenal  guarded  by  four  marble  lions.  To 
make  my  Dream  more  monstrous  and  unlikely,  one  of  these 
had  words  and  sentences  upon  its  body,  inscribed  there,  at 
an  unknown  time,  and  in  an  unknown  language ;  so  that 
their  purport  was  a  mystery  to  all  men. 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  75 

There  was  little  sound  of  hammers  in  this  place  for  build- 
ing ships,  and  little  work  in  progress ;  for  the  greatness  of 
the  city  was  no  more,  as  I  have  said.  Indeed,  it  seemed 
a  very  wreck  found  drifting  on  the  sea;  a  strange  flag 
hoisted  in  its  honourable  stations,  and  strangers  standing 
at  its  helm.  A  splendid  barge  in  which  its  ancient  chief 
had  gone  forth,  pompously,  at  certain  periods,  to  wed  the 
ocean,  lay  here,  I  thought,  no  more ;  but,  in  its  place,  there 
was  a  tiny  model,  made  from  recollection  like  the  city's 
greatness;  and  it  told  of  what  had  been  (so  are  the  strong 
and  weak  confounded  in  the  dust)  almost  as  eloquently  as 
the  massive  pillars,  arches,  roofs,  reared  to  overshadow 
stately  ships  that  had  no  other  shadow  now,  upon  the 
water  or  the  earth. 

An  armoury  was  there  yet.  Plundered  and  despoiled : 
but  an  armoury.  With  a  fierce  standard  taken  from  the 
Turks,  drooping  in  the  dull  air  of  its  cage.  Rich  suits  of 
mail  worn  by  great  warriors  were  hoarded  there ;  crossbows 
and  bolts;  quivers  full  of  arrows;  spears;  swords,  daggers, 
maces,  shields,  and  heavy-headed  axes.  Plates  of  wrought 
steel  and  iron,  to  make  the  gallant  horse  a  monster  cased  in 
metal  scales ;  and  one  spring-weapon  (easy  to  be  carried 
in  the  breast)  designed  to  do  its  office  noiselessly,  and  made 
for  shooting  men  with  poisoned  darts. 

One  press  or  case  I  saw,  full  of  accursed  instruments  of 
torture :  horribly  contrived  to  cramp,  and  pinch,  and  grind, 
and  crush  men's  bones,  and  tear  and  twist  them  with  the 
torment  of  a  thousand  deaths.  Before  it,  were  two  iron 
helmets,  with  breast-pieces:  made  to  close  up  tight  and 
smooth  upon  the  heads  of  living  sufferers;  and  fastened 
on  to  each,  Avas  a  small  knob  or  anvil,  where  the  directing 
devil  could  repose  his  elbow  at  his  ease,  and  listen,  near 
the  walled-up  ear,  to  the  lamentations  and  confessions  of 
the  wretch  within.  There  was  that  grim  resemblance  in 
them  to  the  human  shape — they  were  such  moulds  of 
sweating  faces,  pained  and  cramped — that  it  was  difficult 
to  think  them  empty;  and  terrible  distortions  lingering 
within  tliem,  seemed  to  follow  me,  when,  taking  to  my 
boat  again,  I  rowed  off  to  a  kind  of  garden  or  public  walk 
in  the  sea,  where  there  were  grass  and  trees.  But  I  forgot 
them  when  I  stood  upon  its  farthest  brink — I  stood  there, 
in  my  dream — and  looked,  along  the  ripple,  to  the  setting 
sun :  before  me,  in  the  sky  and  on  the  deep,  a  crimson 


76  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

flush ;  and  behind  me  the  whole  city  resolving  into  streaks 
of  red  and  purple,  on  the  water. 

In  the  luxurious  wonder  of  so  rare  a  dream,  I  took  but 
little  heed  of  time,  and  had  but  little  understanding  of  its 
flight.  But  there  were  days  and  nights  in  it;  and  when 
the  sun  was  high,  and  when  the  rays  of  lamps  were  crooked 
in  the  running  water,  I  was  still  afloat,  I  thought :  plash- 
ing the  slippery  walls  and  houses  with  the  cleavings  of 
the  tide,  as  my  black  boat,  borne  upon  it,  skimmed  along 
the  streets. 

Sometimes,  alighting  at  the  doors  of  churches  and  vast 
palaces,  I  wandered  on,  from  room  to  room,  from  aisle  to 
aisle,  through  labyrinths  of  rich  altars,  ancient  monuments ; 
decayed  apartments  where  the  furniture,  half  awful,  half 
grotesque,  was  mouldering  away.  Pictures  were  there,  re- 
plete with  such  enduring  beauty  and  expression :  with  such 
passion,  truth,  and  power:  that  they  seemed  so  many 
young  and  fresh  realities  among  a  host  of  spectres.  I 
thought  these  often  intermingled  with  the  old  days  of 
the  city :  with  its  beauties,  tyrants,  captains,  patriots,  mer- 
chants, courtiers,  priests :  nay,  with  its  very  stones,  and 
bricks,  and  public  places ;  all  of  which  lived  again,  about 
me,  on  the  walls.  Then,  coming  down  some  marble  stair- 
case where  the  water  lapped  and  oozed  against  the  lower 
steps,  I  passed  into  my  boat  again,  and  went  on  in  my 
dream. 

Floating  down  narrow  lanes,  where  carpenters,  at  work 
with  plane  and  chisel  in  their  shops,  tossed  the  light  shav- 
ing straight  upon  the  water,  where  it  lay  like  weed,  or 
ebbed  away  before  me  in  a  tangled  heap.  Past  open  doors, 
decayed  and  rotten  from  long  steeping  in  the  wet,  through 
which  some  scanty  patch  of  vine  shone  green  and  bright, 
making  unusual  shadows  on  the  pavement  with  its  trem- 
bling leaves.  Past  quays  and  terraces,  where  women, 
gracefully  veiled,  were  passing  and  repassing,  and  where 
idlers  were  reclining  in  the  sunshine,  on  flagstones  and  on 
flights  of  steps.  Past  bridges,  where  there  were  idlers  too : 
loitering  and  looking  over.  Below  stone  balconies, 
erected  at  a  giddy  height,  before  the  loftiest  windows  of 
the  loftiest  houses.  Past  plots  of  garden,  theatres,  shrines, 
prodigious  piles  of  architecture — Gothic — Saracenic — fan- 
ciful with  all  the  fancies  of  all  times  and  countries.  Past 
buildings  that  were  high,  and  low^  and  black,  and  white, 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  77 

and  straight,  and  crooked;  mean  and  grand,  crazy  and 
strong.  Twining  among  a  tangled  lot  of  boats  and  barges, 
and  shooting  out  at  last  into  a  Grand  Canal !  There,  in 
the  errant  fancy  of  my  dream,  I  saw  old  Shylock  passing 
to  and  fro  upon  a  bridge,  all  built  upon  with  shops  and 
humming  with  the  tongues  of  men ;  a  form  I  seemed  to 
know  for  Desdemona'  s,  leaned  down  through  a  latticed 
blind  to  pluck  a  flower.  And,  in  the  dream,  I  thought  that 
•Shakespeare's  spirit  was  abroad  upon  the  water  somewhere : 
stealing  through  the  city. 

At  night,  when  two  votive  lamps  burnt  before  an  image 
of  the  Virgin,  in  a  gallery  ouside  the  great  cathedral,  near 
the  roof,  I  fancied  that  the  great  piazza  of*  the  Winged 
Lion  was  a  blaze  of  cheerful  light,  and  that  its  whole  ar- 
cade was  thronged  with  people ;  while  crowds  were  divert- 
ing themselves  in  splendid  coffee-houses  opening  from  it 
— wliich  were  never  shut,  I  tliought,  but  open  all  night 
long.  When  the  bronze  giants  struck  the  hour  of  midnight 
on  the  bell,  I  thought  the  life  and  animation  of  the  city 
were  all  centred  here ;  and  as  I  rowed  away,  abreast  the 
silent  quays,  I  only  saw  them  dotted,  here  and  there,  with 
sleeping  boatmen  wrapped  up  in  their  cloaks,  and  lying  at 
full  length  upon  the  stones. 

But,  close  about  the  quays  and  churches,  palaces  and 
prisons :  sucking  at  their  walls,  and'  welling  up  into  the 
secret  places  of  the  town :  crept  the  water  always.  Noise- 
less and  watchful :  coiled  round  and  round  it,  in  its  many 
folds,  like  an  old  serpent :  waiting  for  the  time,  I  thought, 
when  people  should  look  down  into  its  depths  for  any  stone 
of  the  old  city  that  had  claimed  to  be  its  mistress. 

Thus  it  floated  me  away,  until  I  awoke  in  the  old  market- 
place at  Verona.  I  have,  many  and  many  a  time,  thought 
since,  of  this  strange  Dream  upon  the  water :  half-wonder^ 
ing  if  it  lie  there  yet,  and  if  its  name  be  Venice. 


78  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 


BY  VEEONA,  MANTUA,  AND  MILAN,  ACEOSS 

THE  PASS  OF  THE  SIMPLON  INTO 

SWITZERLAND. 

I  HAD  been  half  afraid  to  go  to  Verona,  lest  it  should  at 
all  put  me  out  of  conceit  with  Eomeo  and  Juliet.  But,  I 
was  no  sooner  come  into  the  old  Market-place,  than  the 
misgiving  vanished.  It  is  so  fanciful,  quaint,  and  pictur- 
esque a  place,  formed  by  such  an  extraordinary  and  rich 
variety  of  fantastic  buildings,  that  there  could  be  nothing 
better  at  the  core  of  even  this  romantic  town :  scene  of  one 
of  the  most  romantic  and  beautiful  of  stories. 

It  was  natural  enough,  to  go  straight  from  the  Market- 
place, to  the  House  of  the  Capulets,  now  degenerated  into 
a  most  miserable  little  inn.  Noisy  vetturmi  and  muddy 
market-carts  were  disputing  possession  of  the  yard,  which 
was  ankle-deep  in  dirt,  with  a  brood  of  splashed  and  be- 
spattered geese ;  and  there  was  a  grim-visaged  dog,  viciously 
panting  in  a  doorway,  who  would  certainly  have  had  Eomeo 
by  the  leg,  the  moment  he  put  it  over  the  wall,  if  he  had 
existed  and  been  at  large  in  those  times.  The  orchard  fell 
into  other  hands,  and  was  parted  off  many  years  ago ;  but 
there  used  to  be  one  attached  to  the  house — or  at  all  events 
there  may  have  been, — and  the  Hat  (Cappello)  the  ancient 
cognizance  of  the  family,  may  still  be  seen,  carved  in  stone, 
over  the  gateway  of  the  yard.  The  geese,  the  market- 
carts,  their  drivers,  and  the  dog,  were  somewhat  in  the  way 
of  the  story,  it  must  be  confessed;  and  it  would  have  been 
pleasanter  to  have  found  the  house  empty,  and  to  have 
been  able  to  walk  through  the  disused  rooms.  But  the 
Hat  was  unspeakably  comfortable;  and  the  place  where 
the  garden  used  to  be,  hardly  less  so.  Besides,  the  house 
is  a  distrustful,  jealous-looking  house  as  one  would  desire 
to  see,  though  of  a  very  moderate  size.  So  I  was  quite 
satisfied  with  it,  as  the  veritable  mansion  of  old  Capulet, 
and  was  correspondingly  grateful  in  my  acknowledgments 
to  an  extremely  unsentimental  middle-aged  lady,  the  Pa- 
drona  of  the  Hotel,  who  was  lounging  on  the  threshold  look- 
ing at  the  geese ;  and  who  at  least  resembled  the  Caoulets 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  79 

in  the  one  particular  of  being  very  great  indeed  in  the 
"  Family  "  way. 

From  Juliet's  home,  to  Juliet's  tomb,  is  a  transition  as 
natural  to  the  visitor,  as  to  fair  Juliet  herself,  or  to  the 
proudest  Juliet  that  ever  has  taught  the  torches  to  burn 
bright  in  any  time.  So,  I  went  off,  with  a  guide,  to  an 
old,  old  garden,  once  belonging  to  an  old,  old  convent,  I 
suppose ;  and  being  admitted,  at  a  shattered  gate,  by  a 
bright-eyed  woman  who  was  washing  clothes,  went  down 
some  walks  where  fresh  plants  and  young  flowers  were  pret- 
tily growing  among  fragments  of  old  wall,  and  ivy-covered 
mounds;  and  was  shown  a  little  tank,  or  water-trough, 
which  the  bright-eyed  woman — drying  her  arms  upon  her 
'kerchief,  called  "La  tomba  di  Giulietta  la  sfortunata." 
With  the  best  disposition  in  the  world  to  believe,  I  could 
do  no  more  than  believe  that  the  bright-eyed  Avoman  be- 
lieved; so  I  gave  her  that  much  credit,  and  her  customary 
fee  in  ready  money.  It  was  a  pleasure,  rather  than  a  dis- 
appointment, that  Juliet's  resting-place  was  forgotten. 
However  consolatory  it  may  have  been  to  Yorick's  Ghost, 
to  hear  the  feet  upon  the  pavement  overhead,  and,  twenty 
times  a  day,  the  repetition  of  his  name,  it  is  better  for 
Juliet  to  lie  out  of  the  track  of  tourists,  and  to  have  no 
visitors  but  such  as  come  to  graves  in  spring-rain,  and 
sweet  air,  and  sunshine. 

Pleasant  Verona!  With  its  beautiful  old  palaces,  and 
charming  country  in  the  distance,  seen  from  terrace  walks, 
and  stately,  balustraded  galleries.  With  its  Roman  gates, 
still  spanning  the  fair  street,  and  casting,  on  the  sunlight 
of  to-day,  the  shade  of  fifteen  hundred  years  ago.  With 
its  marble-fitted  churches,  lofty  towers,  rich  architecture, 
and  quaint  old  quiet  thoroughfares,  where  shouts  of  Mon- 
tagues and  Capulets  once  resounded. 

And  made  Verona's  ancient  citizens 

Cast  by  their  grave,  beseeming  ornaments. 

To  wield  old  partizans. 

With  its  fast-rushing  river,  picturesque  old  bridge,  great 
castle,  waving  cypresses,  and  prospect  so  delightful,  and 
so  cheerful!     Pleasant  Verona! 

In  the  midst  of  it,  in  the  Piazza  di  Bra — a  spirit  of  old 
time  among  the  familiar  realities  of  the  passing  hour — is 
the  great  Roman  Amphitheatre.     80  well  preserved,  and 


80  nCTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

carefully  maintained,  that  every  row  of  seats  is  there,  un* 
broken.  Over  certain  of  the  arches,  the  old  Eoman  numer- 
als may  yet  be  seen;  and  there  are  corridors,  and  stair- 
cases, and  subterranean  passages  for  beasts,  and  winding 
ways,  above  ground  and  below,  as  when  the  fierce  thou- 
sands hurried  in  and  out,  intent  upon  the  bloody  shows  of 
the  arena.  Nestling  in  some  of  the  shadows  and  hollow 
places  of  the  walls,  now,  are  smiths  with  their  forges,  and 
a  few  small  dealers  of  one  kind  or  other ;  and  there  are 
green  weeds,  and  leaves,  and  grass,  upon  the  parapet.  But 
Httle  else  is  greatly  changed. 

When  I  had  traversed  all  about  it,  with  great  interest, 
and  had  gone  up  to  the  topmost  round  of  seats,  and  turning 
from  the  lovely  panorama  closed  in  by  the  distant  Alps, 
looked  down  into  the  building,  it  seemed  to  lie  before  me 
like  the  inside  of  a  prodigious  hat  of  plaited  straw,  with 
aa  enormously  broad  brim  and  a  shallow  crown ;  the  plaits 
being  represented  by  the  four-and-forty  rows  of  seats. 
The  comparison  is  a  homely  and  fantastic  one,  in  sober 
remembrance  and  on  paper,  but  it  was  irresistibly  suggested 
at  the  moment,  nevertheless. 

An  equestrian  troop  had  been  there,  a  short  time  before 
— the  same  troop,  I  dare  say,  that  appeared  to  the  old  lady 
in  the  church  at  Modena — and  had  scooped  out  a  little  ring 
at  one  end  of  the  arena ;  where  their  performances  had 
taken  place,  and  where  the  marks  of  their  horses'  feet  were 
still  fresh.  I  could  not  but  picture  to  myself,  a  handful  of 
spectators  gathered  together  on  one  or  two  of  the  old  stone 
seats,  and  a  spangled  Cavalier  being  gallant,  or  a  Polici- 
nello  funny,  with  the  grim  walls  looking  on.  Above  all,  I 
thought  how  strangely  those  Roman  mutes  would  gaze  upon 
the  favourite  comic  scene  of  the  travelling  English,  where 
a  British  nobleman  (Lord  John),  with  a  very  loose  stomach: 
dressed  in  a  blue  tailed  coat  down  to  his  heels,  bright  yel- 
low breeches,  and  a  white  hat :  comes  abroad,  riding  double 
on  a  rearing  horse,  with  an  English  lady  (Lady  Betsey)  in 
a  straw  bonnet  and  green  veil,  and  a  red  spencer ;  and  who 
always  carries  a  gigantic  reticule,  and  a  put-up  parasol. 

I  walked  through  and  through  the  towu  all  the  rest  of 
the  day,  and  could  have  walked  there  until  now,  I  think. 
Tn  one  place,  there  was  a  very  pretty  modern  theatre, 
where  they  had  just  performed  the  opera  (always  popular 
in  Verona)  of  Borneo  and  Juliet.     In  another  there  was  a 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  81 

collection,  under  a  colonnade,  of  Greek,  Roman,  and  Etrus- 
can remains,  presided  over  by  an  ancient  man  who  might 
have  been  an  Etruscan  relic  himself;  for  he  was  not  strong 
enough  to  open  the  iron  gate,  when  he  had  unlocked  it, 
and  had  neither  voice  enough  to  be  audible  when  he  de- 
scribed the  curiosities,  nor  sight  enough  to  see  them :  he 
was  so  very  old.  In  another  place,  there  was  a  galleiy 
of  pictures :  so  abominably  bad,  that  it  was  quite  delight- 
ful to  see  them  mouldering  away.  But  anywhere :  in  the 
churches,  among  the  palaces,  in  the  streets,  on  the  bridge, 
or  down  beside  the  river :  it  was  always  pleasant  Verona, 
and  in  ray  remembrance  always  will  be. 

I  read  Romeo  and  Juliet  in  my  own  room  at  the  inn  that 
night — of  course,  no  Englishman  had  ever  read  it  there, 
before — and  set  out  for  Mantua  next  day  at  sunrise,  repeat- 
ing to  myself  (in  the  coupe  of  an  omnibus,  and  next  to  the 
conductor,  who  was  reading  the  Mysteries  of  Paris) 

There  is  no  world  without  Verona's  walls 
But  purgatory,  torture,  hell  itself. 
Hence-bauished  is  banished  from  the  world, 
And  world's  exile  is  death 

which  reminded  me  that  Komeo  was  only  banished  five- 
and-twenty  miles  after  all,  and  rather  disturbed  my  confi- 
dence in  his  energy  and  boldness. 

Was  the  way  to  Mantua  as  beautiful,  in  his  time,  I  won- 
der! Did  it  wind  through  pasture  land  as  green,  bright 
with  the  same  glancing  streams,  and  dotted  with  fresh 
clumps  of  graceful  trees !  Those  purple  mountains  lay  on 
the  horizon,  then,  for  certain;  and  the  dresses  of  those 
peasant  girls,  who  wear  -a  great,  knobbed,  silver  pin  like 
an  English  "  life-preserver  "  through  their  hair  behind,  can 
hardly  be  much  changed.  The  hopeful  feeling  of  so  bright 
a  morning,  and  so  exquisite  a  sunrise,  can  have  been  no 
stranger,  even  to  an  exiled  lover's  breast;  and  Mantua 
itself  must  have  broken  on  him  in  the  prospect,  with  its 
towers,  and  walls,  and  water,  pretty  much  as  on  a  common- 
place and  matrimonial  omnibus.  He  made  the  same  sharp 
twists  and  turns,  perhaps,  over  two  rumbling  drawbridges ; 
passed  through  the  like  long,  covered,  wooden  bridge ;  and 
leaving  the  marshy  water  behind,  approached  the  rusty 
gate  of  stagnant  Mantua. 

If  ever  a  man  were  suited  to  his  place  of  residence,  and 
6 


B2  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

his  place  of  residence  to  him,  the  lean  Apothecary  and 
Mantua  came  together  in  a  perfect  fitness  of  things.  It 
may  have  been  more  stirring  then,  perhaps.  If  so,  the 
Apothecary  was  a  man  in  advance  of  his  time,  and  knew 
what  Mantua  would  be,  in  eighteen  hundred  and  forty-four. 
He  fasted  much,  and  that  assisted  him  in  his  foreknowl- 
edge. 

I  put  up  at  the  Hotel  of  the  Golden  Lion,  and  was  in 
my  own  room  arranging  plans  with  the  Brave  Courier, 
when  there  came  a  modest  little  tap  at  the  door,  which 
opened  on  an  outer  gallery  surrounding  a  courtyard ;  and 
an  intensely  shabby  little  man  looked  in,  to  inquire  if  the 
gentleman  would  have  a  Cicerone  to  show  the  town.  His 
face  was  so  very  wistful  and  anxious,  in  the  half-opened 
doorway,  and  there  was  so  much  poverty  expressed  in  his 
faded  suit  and  little  pinched  hat,  and  in  the  thread-bai-e 
worsted  glove  with  which  he  held  it — not  expressed  the  less, 
because  these  were  evidently  his  genteel  clothes,  hastily 
slipped  on — that  I  would  as  soon  have  trodden  on  him  as 
dismissed  him,  I  engaged  him  on  the  instant,  and  he 
stepped  in  directly. 

While  I  finished  the  discussion  in  which  I  was  engaged, 
he  stood,  beaming  by  himself  in  a  corner,  making  a  feint 
of  brushing  my  hat  with  his  arm.  If  his  fee  had  been  as 
many  napoleons  as  it  was  francs,  there  could  not  have  shot 
over  the  twilight  of  his  shabbiness  such  a  gleam  of  sun,  as 
lighted  up  the  whole  man,  now  that  he  was  hired. 

"Well!"  said  I,  when  I  was  ready,  "shall  we  go  out 
now?" 

"  If  the  gentleman  pleases.  It  is  a  beautiful  day.  A 
little  fresh,  but  charming ;  altogether  charming.  The  gen- 
tleman will  allow  me  to  open  the  door.  This  is  the  Inn 
Yard.  The  courtyard  of  the  Golden  Lion !  The  gentle- 
man will  please  to  mind  his  footing  on  the  stairs." 

We  were  now  in  the  street. 

"This  is  the  street  of  the  Golden  Lion.  This,  the  out- 
side of  the  Golden  Lion.  The  interesting  window  up  there, 
on  the  first  Piano,  where  the  pane  of  glass  is  broken,  is 
the  window  of  the  gentleman's  chamber!  " 

Having  viewed  all  these  remarkable  objects,  I  inquired 
if  there  were  much  to  see  in  Mantua. 

"Well!  Truly,  no.  Not  much!  So,  so,"  he  said, 
shrugging  his  shoulders  apologetically. 


PICTURES  PROM  ITALY.  8S 

"  Many  churches?  " 

"No.     Nearly  all  suppressed  by  the  French." 

"  Monasteries  or  convents?  " 

"No.  The  French  again!  Nearly  all  suppressed  by 
Napoleon." 

"Much  business?" 

"Very  little  business." 

"  Many  strangers?  " 

"Ah  Heaven!" 

I  thought  he  would  have  fainted. 

"  Then,  when  we  have  seen  the  two  large  churches  yon- 
der, what  shall  we  do  next?  "  said  I. 

He  looked  up  the  street,  and  down  the  street,  and  rubbed 
his  chin  timidly;  and  then  said,  glancing  in  my  face  as  if 
a  light  had  broken  on  his  mind,  yet  with  a  humble  appeal 
to  my  forbearance  that  was  perfectly  irresistible : 

"  We  can  take  a  little  turn  about  the  town,  Signore ! " 
(Si  puo  far'  un  piccolo  giro  della  citta.) 

It  was  impossible  to  be  anything  but  delighted  with  the 
proposal,  so  we  set  off  together  in  great  good-humour.  In 
the  relief  of  his  mind,  he  opened  his  heart,  and  gave  up  as 
much  of  Mantua  as  a  Cicerone  could. 

"  One  must  eat,"  he  said ;  "  but,  bah !  it  was  a  dull  place, 
without  doubt !  " 

He  made  as  much  as  possible  of  the  Basilica  of  Santa 
Andrea — a  noble  church — and  of  an  inclosed  portion  of  the 
pavement,  about  which  tapers  were  burning,  and  a  few 
people  kneeling,  and  under  which  is  said  to  be  preserved 
the  Sangreal  of  the  old  Eomances.  This  church  disposed 
of,  and  another  after  it  (the  cathedral  of  San  Pietro),  we 
went  to  the  Museum,  which  was  shut  up.  "  It  was  all  the 
same,"  he  said ;  "  Bah !  There  was  not  much  inside !  " 
Then,  we  went  to  see  the  Piazza  del  Diavolo,  built  by  the 
Devil  (for  no  particular  purpose)  in  a  single  night;  then, 
the  Piazza  Virgiliana ;  then,  the  statue  of  Virgil — our  Poet, 
my  little  friend  said,  plucking  up  a  spirit,  for  the  moment, 
and  putting  his  hat  a  little  on  one  side.  Then,  we  went  to 
a  dismal  sort  of  farm -yard,  by  which  a  picture-gallery  was 
approached.  The  moment  the  gate  of  this  retreat  was 
opened,  some  five  hundred  geese  came  waddling  round  us, 
stretching  out  their  necks,  and  clamouring  in  the  most  hide- 
ous manner,  as  if  they  were  ejaculating,  "Oh !  here's  some- 
body come  to  see  the  Pictures !     Don't  go  up  I     Don't  go 


84  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

up ! "  While  we  went  up,  they  waited  very  quietly  about 
the  door  in  a  crowd,  cackling  to  one  another  occasionally, 
in  a  subdued  tone ;  taut  the  instant  we  appeared  again,  their 
necks  came  out  like  telescopes,  and  setting  up  a  great  noise, 
which  meant,  I  have  no  doubt,  "  What,  you  would  go, 
would  you  I  What  do  you  think  of  it !  How  do  you  like 
it ! "  they  attended  us  to  the  outer  gate,  and  cast  us  forth, 
derisively,  into  Mantua. 

The  geese  who  saved  the  Capitol,  were,  as  compared 
with  these.  Pork  to  the  learned  Pig.  What  a  galleiy  it 
was !  I  would  take  their  opinion  on  a  question  of  art,  in 
preference  to  the  discourses  of  Sir  Joshua  Eeynolds, 

Now  that  we  were  standing  in  the  street,  after  beiug 
thus  ignominiously  escorted  thither,  my  little  friend  was 
plainly  reduced  to  the  "piccolo  giro,"  or  little  circuit  of 
the  town,  he  had  formerly  proposed.  But  my  suggestion 
that  we  should  visit  the  Palazzo  T^  (of  which  I  had  heard 
a  great  deal,  as  a  strange  wild  place)  imparted  new  life  to 
him,  and  away  we  went. 

The  secret  of  the  length  of  Midas's  ears,  would  have  been 
more  extensively  known,  if  that  servant  of  his,  who  whis- 
pered it  to  the  reeds,  had  lived  in  Mantua,  where  there 
are  reeds  and  rushes  enough  to  have  published  it  to  all  the 
world.  The  Palazzo  Te  stands  in  a  swamp,  among  this 
sort  of  vegetation ;  and  is,  indeed,  as  singular  a  place  as  I 
ever  saw. 

Not  for  its  dreariness,  though  it  is  very  dreary.  Nor  for 
its  dampness,  though  it  is  very  damp.  Nor  for  its  deso- 
late condition,  though  it  is  as  desolate  and  neglected  as 
house  can  be.  But  chiefly  for  the  unaccountable  night- 
mares with  which  its  interior  has  been  decorated  (among 
other  subjects  of  more  delicate  execution)  by  Giulio  Koman( . 
There  is  a  leering  Giant  over  a  certain  chimney-piece,  and 
there  are  dozens  of  Giants  (Titans  warring  with  Jove)  op 
the  walls  of  another  room,  so  inconceivably  ugly  and  gro- 
tesque, that  it  is  marvellous  how  any  man  can  have  imag- 
ined such  creatures.  In  the  chamber  in  which  they  abound, 
these  monsters,  with  swollen  faces  and  cracked  cheeks,  and 
every  kind  of  distortion  of  look  and  limb,  are  depicted  as 
staggermg  under  the  weight  of  falling  buildings,  and  being 
overwhelmed  in  the  ruins ;  upheaving  masses  of  rock,  and 
burying  themselves  beneath ;  vainly  striving  to  sustain  the 
pillars  of  heavy  roofs  that  topple  down  upon  their  heads  j 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  85 

and,  in  a  word,  undergoing  and  doing  every  kind  of  mad 
and  demoniacal  destruction.  The  figures  are  immensely 
large,  and  exaggerated  to  the  utmost  pitch  of  uncouthness; 
the  colouring  is  harsh  and  disagreeable;  and  the  whole 
effect  more  like  (I  should  imagine)  a  violent  rush  of  blood 
to  the  head  of  the  spectator,  than  any  real  picture  set  be- 
fore him  by  the  hand  of  an  artist.  This  apopletic  perform- 
ance was  shown  by  a  sickly-looking  woman,  whose  appear- 
ance was  referable,  I  dare  say,  to  the  bad  air  of  the  marshes ; 
but  it  was  difficult  to  help  feeling  as  if  she  were  too 
much  haunted  by  the  Giants,  and  they  were  frightening 
her  to  death,  all  alone  in  that  exhausted  cistern  of  a 
Palace,  among  the  reeds  and  rushes,  with  the  mists  hover- 
ing about  outside,  and  stalking  round  and  round  it  con- 
tinually. 

Our  walk  through  Mantua  showed  us,  in  almost  every 
street,  some  suppressed  church :  now  used  for  a  warehouse, 
now  for  nothing  at  all :  all  as  crazy  and  dismantled  as  they 
could  be,  short  of  tumbling  down  bodily.  The  marshy 
town  was  so  intensely  dull  and  flat,  that  the  dirt  upon  it 
seemed  not  to  have  come  there  in  the  ordinary  course,  but 
to  have  settled  and  mantled  on  its  surface  as  on  standing 
water.  And  yet  there  were  some  business-dealings  going 
on,  and  some  profits  realizing;  for  there  were  arcades  full 
of  Jews,  where  those  extraordinary  people  were  sitting  out- 
side their  shops :  contemplating  their  stores  of  stuffs,  and 
woollens,  and  bright  handkerchiefs,  and  trinkets:  and 
looking,  in  all  respects,  as  wary  and  business-like,  as  their 
brethren  in  Houndsditch,  London. 

Having  selected  a  Vetturino  from  among  the  neighbour- 
ing Christians,  who  agreed  to  carry  us  to  Milan  in  two  days 
and  a  half,  and  to  start,  next  morning,  as  soon  as  the  gates 
were  opened,  I  returned  to  the  Golden  Lion,  and  dined 
luxuriously  in  my  own  room,  in  a  narrow  passage  between 
two  bedsteads :  confronted  b}^  a  smoky  fire,  and  backed  up 
by  a  chest  of  drawers.  At  six  o'clock  next  morning,  we 
were  jingling  in  the  dark  through  the  wet  cold  mist  that 
enshrouded  the  town;  and,  before  noon,  the  driver  (a  na- 
tive of  Mantua,  and  sixty  years  of  age  or  thereabouts)  be- 
gan to  ask  the  way  to  Milan. 

It  lay  through  Bozzolo :  formerly  a  little  republic,  and 
now  one  of  the  most  deserted  and  poverty-stricken  of  towns : 
where  the  landlord  of  the  miserable  inn  (God  bless  him !  it 


86  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

was  his  weekly  custom)  was  distributing  infinitesimal  coins 
among  a  clamorous  herd  of  women  and  children,  whose 
rags  were  fluttering  in  the  wind  and  rain  outside  his  door, 
where  they  were  gathered  to  receive  his  .charity.  It  lay 
through  mist,  and  mud,  and  rain,  and  vines  trained  low 
upon  the  ground,  all  that  day  and  the  next;  the  first  sleep- 
ing-place being  Cremona,  memorable  for  its  dark  brick 
churches,  and  immensely  high  tower,  the  Torrazzo — to  say 
nothing  of  its  violins,  of  which  it  certainly  produces  none 
in  these  degenerate  days ;  and  the  second,  Lodi.  Then  we 
went  on,  through  more  mud,  mist,  and  rain,  and  marshy 
ground:  and  through  such  a  fog,  as  Englishmen,  strong 
in  the  faith  of  their  own  grievances,  are  apt  to  believe  is 
nowhere  to  be  found  but  in  their  own  country :  until  we 
entered  the  paved  street  of  Milan. 

The  fog  was  so  dense  here,  that  the  spire  of  the  far- 
famed  Cathedral  might  as  well  have  been  at  Bombay,  for 
anything  that  could  be  seen  of  it  at  that  time.  But  as  we 
halted  to  refresh,  for  a  few  days  then,  and  returned  to 
Milan  again  next  summer,  I  had  ample  opportunities  of 
seeing  the  glorious  structure  in  all  its  majesty  and  beauty. 

All  Christian  homage  to  the  saint  who  lies  within  it! 
There  are  many  good  and  true  saints  in  the  calendar,  but 
San  Carlo  Borromeo  has — if  I  may  quote  Mrs.  Primrose  on 
such  a  subject — "my  warm  heart."  A  charitable  doctor 
to  the  sick,  a  munificent  friend  to  the  poor,  and  this,  not 
in  any  spirit  of  blind  bigotry,  but  as  the  bold  opponent  of 
enormous  abuses  in  the  Romish  church,  I  honour  his  mem- 
ory. I  honour  it  none  the  less,  because  he  was  nearly  slain 
by  a  priest,  suborned,  by  priests,  to  murder  him  at  the 
altar:  in  acknowledgment  of  his  endeavours  to  reform 
a  false  and  hypocritical  brotherhood  of  monks.  Heaven 
shield  all  imitators  of  San  Carlo  Borromeo  as  it  shielded 
him !  A  reforming  Pope  would  need  a  little  shielding,  even 
now. 

The  subterranean  chapel  in  which  the  body  of  San  Carlo 
Borromeo  is  preserved,  presents  as  striking  and  as  ghastly 
a  contrast,  perhaps,  as  any  place  can  show.  The  tapers 
which  are  lighted  down  there,  flash  and  gleam  on  alti-rilievi 
in  gold  and  silver,  delicately  wrought  by  skilful  hands,  and 
representing  the  principal  events  in  the  life  of  the  saint. 
Jewels,  and  precious  metals,  shine  and  sparkle  on  every 
side.     A  windlass  slowly  removes  the  front  of  the  altar; 


HCTURES  FROM  ITALY.  87 

and,  within  it,  in  a  gorgeous  shrine  of  gold  and  silver,  is 
seen,  through  alabaster,  the  shrivelled  mummy  of  a  man : 
the  pontifical  robes  with  which  it  is  adorned,  radiant  with 
diamonds,  emeralds,  rubies :  every  costly  and  magnificent 
gem.  The  shrunken  heap  of  poor  earth  in  the  midst  of 
this  great  glitter,  is  more  pitiful  than  if  it  lay  upon  a  dung- 
hill. There  is  not  a  ray  of  imprisoned  light  in  all  the  flash 
and  fire  of  jewels,  but  seems  to  mock  the  dusty  holes  where 
eyes  were,  once.  Every  thread  of  silk  in  the  rich  vest- 
ments seems  only  a  provision  from  the  worms  that  spin, 
for  the  behoof  of  worms  that  propagate  in  sepulchres. 

In  the  old  refectory  of  the  dilapidated  Convent  of  Santa 
Maria  delle  Grazie,  is  the  work  of  art,  perhaps,  better 
known  than  any  other  in  the  world :  the  Last  Supper,  by 
Leonardo  da  Vinci — with  a  door  cut  through  it  by  the  in- 
telligent Dominican  friars,  to  facilitate  their  operations  at 
dinner  time. 

I  am  not  mechanically  acquainted  with  the  art  of  paint- 
ing, and  have  no  other  means  of  judging  of  a  picture  than 
as  I  see  it  resembling  and  refining  upon  nature,  and  present- 
ing graceful  combinations  of  forms  and  colours.  I  am, 
therefore,  no  authority  whatever,  in  reference  to  the 
"touch  "  of  this  or  that  master;  though  I  know  very  well 
(as  anybody  may,  who  chooses  to  think  about  the  matter) 
that  few  very  great  masters  can  possibly  have  painted,  in 
the  compass  of  their  lives,  one  half  of  the  pictures  that 
bear  their  names,  and  that  are  recognised  by  many  aspir- 
ants to  a  reputation  for  taste,  as  undoubted  originals.  But 
this,  by  the  way.  Of  the  Last  Supper,  I  would  simply 
observe,  that  in  its  beautiful  composition  and  arrangement, 
there  it  is,  at  Milan,  a  wonderful  picture ;  and  that,  in  its 
original  colouring,  or  in  its  original  expression  of  any  single 
face  or  feature,  there  it  is  not.  Apart  from  the  damage  it 
has  sustained  from  damp,  decay,  and  neglect,  it  has  been 
(as  Barry  shows)  so  retouched  upon,  and  repainted,  and 
that  so  clumsily,  that  many  of  the  heads  are,  now,  positive 
deformities,  with  patches  of  paint  and  plaster  sticking  upon 
them  like  wens,  and  utterly  distorting  the  expression. 
"Where  the  original  artist  set  that  impress  of  his  genius  on 
a  face,  which,  almost  in  a  line  or  touch,  separated  him 
from  meaner  painters  and  made  him  what  he  was,  succeed- 
ing bunglers,  filling  up,  or  painting  across  seams  and  cracks, 
have  been  quite  unable  to  imitate  his  hand ;  and  putting  in 


88  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

come  scowls,  or  frowns,  or  wrinkles,  of  their  own,  have 
blotched  and  spoiled  the  work.  This  is  so  well  established 
as  an  historical  fact,  that  I  should  not  repeat  it,  at  the  risk 
of  being  tedious,  but  for  having  observed  an  English  gen- 
tleman before  the  picture,  who  was  at  great  pains  to  fall 
into  what  I  may  describe  as  mild  convulsions,  at  certain 
minute  details  of  expression  which  are  not  left  in  it. 
Whereas,  it  would  be  comfortable  and  rational  for  travel- 
lers and  critics  to  arrive  at  a  general  understanding  that  it 
cannot  fail  to  have  been  a  work  of  extraordinary  merit, 
once :  when,  with  so  few  of  its  original  beauties  remaining, 
the  grandeur  of  the  general  design  is  yet  sufficient  to  sus- 
tain it,  as  a  piece  replete  with  interest  and  dignity. 

We  achieved  the  other  sights  of  Milan,  in  due  course, 
and  a  fine  city  it  is,  though  not  so  unmistakeably  Italian 
as  to  possess  the  characteristic  qualities  of  many  towns  far 
less  important  in  themselves.  The  Corso,  where  the  Milan- 
ese gentry  ride  up  and  down  in  carriages,  and  rather  than 
not  do  which,  they  would  half  starve  themselves  at  home, 
is  a  most  noble  public  promenade,  shaded  by  long  avenues 
of  trees.  In  the  splendid  theatre  of  La  Scala,  there  was  a 
ballet  of  action  performed  after  the  opera,  under  the  title 
of  Prometheus :  in  the  beginning  of  which,  some  hundred 
or  two  of  men  and  women  represented  our  mortal  race  be- 
fore the  refinements  of  the  arts  and  sciences,  and  loves  and 
graces,  came  on  earth  to  soften  them.  I  never  saw  any- 
thing more  effective.  Generally  speaking,  the  pantomimic 
action  of  the  Italians  is  more  remarkable  for  its  sudden  and 
impetuous  character  than  for  its  delicate  expression ;  but, 
in  this  case,  the  drooping  monotony :  the  weary,  miserable, 
listless,  moping  life :  the  sordid  passions  and  desires  of 
human  creatures,  destitute  of  those  elevating  influences  to 
which  we  owe  so  much,  and  to  whose  promoters  we  render 
so  little :  were  expressed  in  a  manner  really  powerful  and 
affecting.  I  should  have  thought  it  almost  impossible  to 
present  such  an  idea  so  strongly  on  the  stage,  without  the 
aid  of  speech. 

Milan  soon  lay  behind  us,  at  five  o'clock  in  the  morning; 
and  before  the  golden  statue  on  the  summit  of  the  cathe- 
dral spire  was  lost  in  the  blue  sky,  the  Alps  stupendously 
confused  in  lofty  peaks  and  ridges,  clouds  and  snow,  were 
towering  in  our  path. 

Still,  we  continued  to  advance  towards  them  until  night- 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  39 

fall;  and,  all  day  long,  tlie  mountain  tops  presented 
strangely  shifting  shapes,  as  the  road  displayed  them  in 
different  points  of  view.  The  beautiful  day  was  just  de- 
clining, when  we  came  upon  the  Lago  Maggiore,  with  its 
lovely  islands.  For  however  fanciful  and  fantastic  the 
Isola  Bella  may  be,  and  is,  it  still  is  beautiful.  Anything 
springing  out  of  that  blue  water,  with  that  scenery  around 
it,  must  be. 

It  was  ten  o'clock  at  night  when  we  got  to  Domo  d'Os- 
sola,  at  the  foot  of  the  Pass  of  the  Simplon.  But  as  the 
moon  was  shining  brightly,  and  there  was  not  a  cloud  in 
the  starlit  sky,  it  was  no  time  for  going  to  bed,  or  going 
anywhere  but  on.  So,  we  got  a  little  carriage,  after  some 
delay,  and  began  the  ascent. 

It  was  late  in  November ;  and  the  snow  lying  four  or  five 
feet  thick  in  the  beaten  road  on  the  summit  (in  other  parts 
the  new  drift  was  already  deep),  the  air  was  piercing  cold. 
But,  the  serenity  of  the  night,  and  the  grandeur  of  the 
road,  with  its  impenetrable  shadows,  and  deep  glooms,  and 
its  sudden  turns  into  the  shining  of  the  moon,  and  its  in- 
cessant roar  of  falling  water,  rendered  the  journey  more 
and  more  sublime  at  every  step. 

Soon  leaving  the  calm  Italian  villages  below  us,  sleeping 
in  the  moonlight,  the  road  began  to  wind  among  dark  trees, 
and  after  a  time  emerged  upon  a  barer  region,  very  steep 
and  toilsome,  where  the  moon  shone  bright  and  high.  By 
degrees,  the  roar  of  water  grew  louder ;  and  the  stupendous 
track,  after  crossing  the  torrent  by  a  bridge,  struck  in  be- 
tween two  massive  perpendicular  walls  of  rock  that  quite 
shut  out  the  moonlight,  and  only  left  a  few  stars  shining 
in  the  narrow  strip  of  sky  above.  Then,  even  this  was  lost, 
in  the  thick  darkness  of  a  cavern  in  the  rock,  through 
which  the  way  was  pierced ;  the  terrible  cataract  thunder- 
ing and  roaring  close  below  it,  and  its  foam  and  spray  hang- 
ing, in  a  mist,  about  the  entrance.  Emerging  from  this 
cave,  and  coming  again  into  the  moonlight,  and  across  a 
dizzy  bridge,  it  crept  and  twisted  upward,  through  the 
Gorge  of  Gondo,  savage  and  grand  beyond  description,  with 
smooth-fronted  precipices,  rising  up  on  either  hand,  and 
almost  meeting  overhead.  Thus  we  went,  climbing  on  our 
rugged  way,  higher  and  higher,  all  night,  without  a  mo- 
ment's weariness :  lost  in  the  contemplation  of  the  black 
rocks,  the  tremendous  heights  and  depths,  the  fields  of 


90  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

smooth  snow  lying  in  the  clefts  and  hollows,  and  the  fierce 
torrents  thundering  headlong  down  the  deep  ah^'ss. 

Tcjuards  daybreak,  we  came  among  the  snow,  Avhere  a 
keen  wind  was  blowing  fiercely.  Having,  with  some 
trouble,  awakened  the  inmates  of  a  wooden  house  in  this 
solitude  :  round  which  the  wind  was  howling  dismally,  catch- 
ing up  the  snow  in  wreaths  and  hurling  it  away :  Ave  got 
some  breakfast  in  a  room  built  of  rough  timbers,  but  well 
warmed  by  a  stove,  and  well  contrived  (as  it  had  need  to 
be)  for  keeping  out  the  bitter  storms.  A  sledge  being  then 
made  ready,  and  four  horses  harnessed  to  it,  we  went, 
ploughing,  through  the  snow.  Still  upward,  but  now  in 
the  cold  light  of  morning,  and  with  the  great  white  desert 
on  Avhich  we  travelled,  plain  and  clear. 

We  were  well  upon  the  summit  of  the  mountain :  and 
had  before  us  the  rude  cross  of  wood,  denoting  its  greatest 
altitude  above  the  sea :  when  the  light  of  the  rising  sun, 
struck,  all  at  once,  upon  the  waste  of  snow,  and  turned  it 
a  deep  red.  The  lonely  grandeur  of  the  scene,  was  then  at 
its  height. 

As  we  went  sledging  on,  there  came  out  of  the  Hospice 
founded  by  Napoleon,  a  group  of  Peasant  travellers,  with 
staves  and  knapsacks,  who  had  rested  there  last  night :  at- 
tended by  a  Monk  or  two,  their  hospitable  entertainers, 
trudging  slowly  forward  with  them,  for  company's  sake. 
It  was  pleasant  to  give  them  good  morning,  and  pretty, 
looking  back  a  long  way  after  them,  to  see  them  looking 
back  at  us,  and  hesitating  presently,  when  one  of  our  horses 
stumbled  and  fell,  whether  or  no  they  should  return  and 
help  us.  But  he  was  soon  up  again,  with  the  assistance  of 
a  rough  waggoner  whose  team  had  stuck  fast  there  too ; 
and  when  we  had  lielj)ed  him  out  of  his  difficulty,  in  return, 
we  left  him  slowly  ploughing  towards  them,  and  went 
softly  and  swiftly  forward,  on  the  brink  of  a  steep  preci- 
pice, among  the  mountain  pines. 

Taking  to  our  wheels  again,  soon  afterwards,  we  began 
rapidly  to  descend;  passing  under  everlasting  glaciers,  by 
means  of  arched  galleries,  hung  with  clusters  of  dripping 
icicles ;  under  and  over  foaming  waterfalls ;  near  places  of 
refuge,  and  galleries  of  shelter  against  sudden  dangers- 
through  caverns  over  whose  arched  roofs  the  avalanches 
slide,  in  spring,  and  bury  themselves  in  the  unknown  gulf 
beneath.     Down,  over  lofty  bridges,  and  through  horrible 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  91 

ravines :  a  little  shifting  speck  in  the  vast  desolation  of  ice 
and  snow,  and  monstrous  granite  rocks :  down  through  the 
deep  Gorge  of  the  Saltine,  and  deafened  by  the  torrent 
plunging  madly  down,  among  the  riven  blocks  of  rock,  into 
the  level  country,  far  below.  Gradually  down,  by  zig-zag 
roads,  lying  between  an  upward  and  a  downward  precipice, 
into  warmer  weather,  calmer  air,  and  softer  scenery,  until 
there  lay  before  us,  glittering  like  gold  or  silver  in  the 
thaw  and  sunshine,  the  metal-covered,  red,  green,  yellow, 
domes  and  church-spires  of  a  Swiss  town. 

The  business  of  these  recollections  being  with  Italy,  and 
my  business,  consequently,  being  to  scamper  back  thither 
as  fast  as  possible,  I  will  not  recall  (though  I  am  sorely 
tempted)  how  the  Swiss  villages,  clustered  at  the  feet  of 
Giant  mountains,  looked  like  playthings ;  or  how  confusedly 
the  houses  were  heaped  and  piled  together ;  or  how  there 
were  very  narrow  streets  to  shut  the  howling  winds  out  in 
the  winter  time ;  and  broken  bridges,  which  the  impetuous 
torrents,  suddenly  released  in  spring,  had  swept  away.  Or 
how  there  were  peasant  women  here,  with  great  round  fur 
caps ;  looking,  when  they  peeped  out  of  casements  and  only 
their  heads  were  seen,  like  a  population  of  Sword-bearers 
to  the  Lord  Mayor  of  London ;  or  how  the  town  of  Vevey, 
lying  on  the  smooth  lake  of  Geneva,  was  beautiful  to  see; 
or  how  the  statue  of  Saint  Peter  in  the  street  at  Fribourg, 
grasps  the  largest  key  that  ever  was  beheld ;  or  how  Fri- 
bourg is  illustrious  for  its  two  suspension  bridges,  and  its 
grand  cathedral  organ. 

Or  how,  between  that  town  and  B§,le,  the  road  meandered 
among  thriving  villages  of  wooden  cottages,  with  overhang- 
ing thatched  roofs,  and  low  protruding  windows,  glazed  with 
small  round  panes  of  glass  like  crown-pieces ;  or  how,  in 
every  little  Swiss  homestead,  with  its  cart  or  waggon  care- 
fully stowed  away  beside  the  house,  its  little  garden,  stock 
of  poultry,  and  groups  of  red-cheeked  children,  there  was 
an  air  of  comfort,  very  new  and  very  pleasant  after  Italy ; 
or  how  the  dresses  of  the  women  changed  again,  and  there 
were  no  more  sword-bearers  to  be  seen;  and  fair  white 
stomachers,  and  great  black,  fan-shaped,  gauzy-looking 
caps,  prevailed  instead. 

Or  how  the  country  by  the  Jura  mountains,  sprinkled 
with  snow,  and  lighted  by  the  moon,  and  musical  with  fall- 
ing water,  was  delightful  j  or  how,  below  the  windows  of  the 


02  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

great  hotel  of  the  Three  Kings  at  B§,le,  the  swollen  Rhine 
ran  fast  and  green ;  or  how,  at  Strasbourg,  it  was  quite  as 
fast  but  not  as  green :  and  was  said  to  be  foggy  lower 
down :  and,  at  that  late  time  of  the  year,  was  a  far  less 
certain  means  of  progress,  than  the  highway  road  to 
Paris. 

Or  how  Strasbourg  itself,  in  its  magnificent  old  Gothic 
Cathedral,  and  its  ancient  houses  with  their  peaked  roofs 
and  gables,  made  a  little  gallery  of  quaint  and  interesting 
views ;  or  how  a  crowd  was  gathered  inside  the  cathedral 
at  noon,  to  see  the  famous  mechanical  clock  in  motion, 
striking  twelve.  How,  when  it  struck  twelve,  a  whole 
army  of  puppets  went  through  many  ingenious  evolutions ; 
and,  among  them,  a  huge  puppet-cock,  perched  on  the  top, 
crowed  twelve  times,  loud  and  clear.  Or  how  it  was  won- 
derful to  see  this  cock  at  great  pains  to  clap  its  wings,  and 
strain  its  throat ;  but  obviously  having  no  connection  what- 
ever with  its  own  voice,  which  was  deep  within  the  clock, 
a  long  way  down. 

Or  how  the  road  to  Pkris,  was  one  sea  of  mud;  and 
thence  to  the  coast,  a  little  better  for  a  hard  frost.  Or 
how  the  cliffs  of  Dover  were  a  pleasant  sight,  and  England 
was  so  wonderfully  neat — though  dark,  and  lacking  colour 
on  a  winter's  day,  it  must  be  conceded. 

Or  how,  a  few  days  afterwards,  it  was  cool,  re-crossing 
the  Channel,  with  ice  upon  the  decks,  and  snow  lying  pretty 
deep  in  France.  Or  how  the  Malle  Poste  scrambled  through 
the  snow,  headlong,  drawn  in  the  hilly  parts  by  any  num- 
ber of  stout  horses  at  a  canter ;  or  how  there  were,  outside 
the  Post-office  Yard  in  Paris,  before  daybreak,  extraordi- 
nary adventurers  in  heaps  of  rags,  groping  in  the  snowy 
streets  with  little  rakes,  in  search  of  odds  and  ends. 

Or  how,  between  Paris  and  Marseilles,  the  snow  being 
then  exceeding  deep,  a  thaw  came  on,  and  the  mail  waded 
rather  than  rolled  for  the  next  three  hundred  miles  or  so ; 
breaking  springs  on  Sunday  nights,  and  putting  out  its  two 
passengers  to  warm  and  refresh  themselves  pending  the  re- 
pairs, in  miserable  billiard-rooms,  where  hairy  company, 
collected  about  stoves,  were  playing  cards ;  the  cards  being 
very  like  themselves — extremely  limp  and  dirty. 

Or  how  there  was  detention  at  Marseilles  from  stress  of 
weather;  and  steamers  were  advertised  to  go,  which  did  not 
go ;  or  how  the  good  Steam-packet  Charlemagne  at  length 


THK    CillKFON'IEU. 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  93 

put  out,  and  met  such  weather  that  now  she  threatened  to 
run  into  Toulon,  and  now  into  Nice,  but,  the  wind  moder- 
ating, did  neither,  but  ran  on  into  Genoa  harbour  instead, 
where  the  familiar  Bells  rang  sweetly  in  my  ear.  Or  how 
there  was  a  travelling  party  on  board,  of  whom  one  mem- 
ber was  very  ill  in  the  cabin  next  to  mine,  and  being  ill 
was  cross,  and  therefore  declined  to  give  up  the  Dictionary, 
which  he  kept  under  his  pillow ;  thereby  obliging  his  com- 
panions to  come  down  to  him,  constantly,  to  ask  what  was 
the  Italian  for  a  lump  of  sugar — a  glass  of  brandy  and 
water — what's  o'clock?  and  so  forth:  which  he  always  in- 
sisted on  looking  out,  with  his  own  sea-sick  eyes,  declining 
to  entrust  the  book  to  any  man  alive. 

Like  Grumio,  I  might  have  told  you,  in  detail,  all  this 
and  something  more — but  to  as  little  purpose — were  I  not 
deterred  by  the  remembrance  that  my  busmess  is  with  Italy. 
Therefore,  like  Gkumio's  story,  it  "shall  die  in  oblivion." 


TO  ROME  BY  PISA  AND  SIENA. 

There  is  nothing  in  Italy,  more  beautiful  to  me,  than 
the  coast-road  between  Genoa  and  Spezzia.  On  one  side : 
sometimes  far  below,  sometimes  nearly  on  a  level  with  the 
road,  and  often  skirted  by  broken  rocks  of  many  shapes : 
there  is  the  free  blue  sea,  with  here  and  there  a  picturesque 
felucca  gliding  slowly  on ;  on  the  other  side  are  lofty  hills, 
ravines  besprinkled  with  white  cottages,  patches  of  dark 
olive  woods,  country  churches  with  their  light  open  towers, 
and  country  houses  gaily  painted.  On  every  bank  and 
knoll  by  the  wayside,  the  wild  cactus  and  aloe  flourish 
in  exuberant  profusion;  and  the  gardens  of  the  bright 
villages  along  the  road,  are  seen,  all  blushing  in  the  sum- 
mer-time with  clusters  of  the  Belladonna,  and  are  fra- 
grant in  the  autumn  and  winter  with  golden  oranges  and 
lemons. 

Some  of  the  villages  are  inhabited,  almost  exclusively, 
by  fishermen ;  and  it  is  pleasant  to  see  their  great  boats 
hauled  up  on  the  beach,  making  little  patches  of  shade, 
where  they  lie  asleep,  or  where  the  women  and  children  sit 
romping  and  looking  out  to  sea,  while  they  mend  their  nets 
upon  the  shore .     There  is  one  town,  Camoglia,  with  its  lit- 


94  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

tie  harbour  on  the  sea,  hundreds  of  feet  below  the  road ; 
where  families  of  mariners  live,  who,  time  oat  of  mind, 
have  owned  coasting-vessels  in  that  place,  and  have  traded 
to  Spain  and  elsewhere.  Seen  from  the  road  above,  it  is 
like  a  tiny  model  on  the  margin  of  the  dimpled  water,  shin- 
ing in  the  sun.  Descended  into,  by  the  winding  mule- 
tracks,  it  is  a  perfect  miniature  of  a  primitive  seafaring 
town ;  the  saltest,  roughest,  most  piratical  little  place  that 
ever  was  seen.  Great  rusty  iron  rings  and  mooring-chains, 
capstans,  and  fragments  of  old  masts  and  spars,  choke  up 
the  way;  hardy  rough- weather  boats,  and  seamen's  cloth- 
ing, flutter  in  the  little  harbour  or  are  drawn  out  on  the 
sunny  stones  to  dry ;  on  the  parapet  of  the  rude  pier,  a  few 
amphibious-looking  fellows  lie  asleep,  with  their  legs  dan- 
gling over  the  wall,  as  though  earth  or  water  were  all  one 
to  them,  and  if  they  slipped  in,  they  would  float  away, 
dozing  comfortably  among  the  fishes ;  the  church  is  bright 
with  trophies  of  the  sea,  and  votive  offerings,  in  commemo- 
ration of  escape  from  storm  and  shipwreck.  The  dwellings 
not  immediately  abutting  on  the  harbour  are  approached 
by  blind  low  archways,  and  by  crooked  steps,  as  if  in  dark- 
ness and  in  difficulty  of  access  they  should  be  like  holds  of 
ships,  or  inconvenient  cabins  under  water;  and  everywhere, 
there  is  a  smell  of  fish,  and  seaweed,  and  old  rope. 

The  coast-road  whence  Camlogia  is  described  so  far 
below,  is  famous,  in  the  warm  season,  especially  in  some 
parts  near  Genoa,  for  fire-flies.  Walking  there,  on  a  dark 
night,  I  have  seen  it  made  one  sparkling  firmament  by 
these  beautiful  insects :  so  that  the  distant  stars  were  pale 
against  the  flash  and  glitter  that  spangled  every  olive  wood 
and  hill-side,  and  pervaded  the  whole  air. 

It  was  not  in  such  a  season,  however,  that  we  traversed 
this  road  on  our  way  to  Rome.  The  middle  of  January 
was  only  just  past,  and  it  was  very  gloomy  and  dark 
weather ;  very  wet  besides.  In  crossing  the  fine  pass  of 
Bracco,  we  encountered  such  a  storm  of  mist  and  rain,  that 
we  travelled  in  a  cloud  the  whole  way.  There  might  have 
been  no  Mediterranean  in  the  world,  for  anything  that  we 
saw  of  it  there,  except  when  a  sudden  gust  of  wind,  clear- 
ing the  mist  before  it,  for  a  moment,  showed  the  agitated 
sea  at  a  great  depth  below,  lashing  the  distant  rocks,  and 
spouting  up  its  foam  furiously.  The  rain  was  incessant; 
every  brook  and  torrent  was  greatly  swollen ;  and  such  a 


PICTUKES  FROM  ITALY,  95 

deafening  leaping,  and  roaring,  and  thundering  of  water, 
I  never  heard  the  like  of  in  my  life. 

Hence,  when  we  came  to  Spezzia,  we  found  that  the 
Magra,  an  unbridged  river  on  the  high-road  to  Pisa,  was 
too  high  to  be  safely  crossed  in  the  Ferry  Boat,  and  were 
fain  to  wait  until  the  afternoon  of  next  day,  when  it  had, 
in  some  degree,  subsided.  Spezzia,  however,  is  a  good 
place  to  tarry  at ;  by  reason,  firstly,  of  its  beautiful  bay ; 
secondly,  of  its  gliostly  Inn ;  thirdly,  of  the  head-dress  of 
the  women,  who  wear,  on  one  side  of  their  head,  a  small 
doll's  straw  hat,  stuck  on  to  the  hair;  which  is  certainly 
the  oddest  and  most  roguish  head-gear  that  ever  was 
invented. 

The  Magra  safely  crossed  in  the  Ferry  Boat — the  pas- 
sage is  not  by  any  means  agreeable,  when  tlie  current  is 
swollen  and  strong — we  arrived  at  Carrara,  Avithin  a  few 
hours.  In  good  time  next  morniug,  we  got  some  ponies, 
and  went  out  to  see  the  marble  quarries. 

They  are  four  or  five  great  glens,  running  up  into  a 
range  of  lofty  hills,  until  they  can  run  no  longer,  and  are 
stopped  by  being  abruptly  strangled  by  Nature.  The  quar- 
ries, or  "  caves,"  as  they  call  them  there,  are  so  many 
openings,  high  up  in  the  hills,  on  either  side  of  these 
passes,  where  they  blast  and  excavate  for  marble:  which 
may  turn  out  good  or  bad :  may  make  a  man's  fortune  very 
quickly,  or  ruin  him  by  the  great  expense  of  working  what 
is  worth  nothing.  Some  of  these  caves  were  opened  by 
tlie  ancient  Romans,  and  remain  as  they  left  them  to  this 
hour.  Many  others  are  being  worked  at  this  moment; 
others  aie  to  be  begun  to-morrow,  next  week,  next  month ; 
others  are  unbought,  unthought  of;  and  marble  enough  for 
more  ages  than  have  passed  since  the  place  was  resorted 
to,  lies  hidden  everywhere :  patiently  awaiting  its  time  of 
discovery. 

As  you  toil  and  clamber  up  one  of  these  steep  gorges 
(having  left  your  pony  soddening  his  girths  in  water,  a 
mile  or  two  lower  down)  you  hear,  every  now  and  then, 
echoing  among  the  hills,  in  a  low  tone,  more  silent  than 
the  previous  silence,  a  melancholy  warning  bugle, — a  signal 
to  the  miners  to  withdraw.  Then,  there  is  a  thundering, 
and  echoing  from  hill  to  hill,  and  perhaps  a  splashing  up 
of  great  fragments  of  rock  into  the  air ;  and  on  you  toil 
S|;ain  until  some  other  bugle  sounds,  in  a  new  direction, 


96  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

and  you  stop  directly,  lest  you  should  come  within  the  range 
of  the  new  explosion. 

There  were  numbers  of  men,  working  high  up  in  these 
hills — on  the  sides — clearing  away,  and  sending  down  the 
broken  masses  of  stone  and  earth,  to  make  way  for  the 
blocks  of  marble  that  had  been  discovered.  As  these  came 
rolling  down  from  unseen  hands  into  the  narrow  valley,  I 
could  not  help  thinking  of  the  deep  glen  (just  the  same  sort 
of  glen)  where  the  Roc  left  Sinbad  the  Sailor ;  and  where 
the  merchants  from  the  heights  above,  flung  down  great 
pieces  of  meat  for  the  diamonds  to  stick  to.  There  were 
no  eagles  here,  to  darken  the  sun  in  their  swoop,  and 
pounce  upon  them ;  but  it  was  as  wild  and  fierce  as  if  there 
had  been  hundreds. 

But  the  road,  the  road  down  which  the  marble  comes, 
however  immense  the  blocks !  The  genius  of  the  country, 
and  the  spirit  of  its  institutions,  pave  that  road :  repair  it, 
watch  it,  keep  it  going!  Conceive  a  channel  of  water  run- 
ning over  a  rocky  bed,  beset  with  great  heaps  of  stone  of 
all  shapes  and  sizes,  winding  down  the  middle  of  this  val- 
ley ;  and  that  being  the  road — because  it  was  the  road  five 
hundred  years  ago !  Imagine  the  clumsy  carts  of  five  hun- 
dred years  ago,  being  used  to  this  hour,  and  drawn,  as  they 
used  to  be,  five  hundred  years  ago,  by  oxen,  whose  ances- 
tors were  worn  to  death  five  hundred  years  ago,  as  their  un- 
happy descendants  are  now,  in  twelve  months,  by  the  suf- 
fering and  agony  of  this  cruel  work !  Two  pair,  four  pair, 
ten  pair,  twenty  pair,  to  one  block,  according  to  its  size; 
down  it  must  come,  this  way.  In  their  struggling  from 
stone  to  stone,  with  their  enormous  loads  behind  them, 
they  die  frequently  upon  the  spot ;  and  not  they  alone ;  for 
their  passionate  drivers,  sometimes  tumbling  doAvn  in  their 
energy,  are  crushed  to  death  beneath  the  wheels.  But  it 
was  good  five  hundred  years  ago,  and  it  must  be  good  now : 
and  a  railroad  down  one  of  these  steeps  (the  easiest  thing 
in  the  world)  would  be  flat  blasphemy. 

When  we  stood  aside,  to  see  one  of  these  cars  drawn  by 
only  a  pair  of  oxen  (for  it  had  but  one  small  block  of  mar- 
ble on  it),  coming  down,  I  hailed,  in  my  heart,  the  man 
who  sat  upon  the  heavy  yoke,  to  keep  it  on  the  neck  of  the 
poor  beasts — and  who  faced  backwards :  not  before  him — 
as  the  very  Devil  of  true  despotism.  He  had  a  great  rod 
in  his  hand,  with  an  iron  point;   and  when  they  coulc 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  97 

pjougii  and  force  their  way  through  the  loose  bed  of  the 
torrent  no  longer,  and  came  to  a  stop,  he  poked  it  into 
their  bodies,  beat  it  on  their  heads,  screwed  it  round  and 
round  in  their  nostrils,  got  them  on  a  yard  or  two,  in  the 
madness  of  intense  pain;  repeated  all  these  persuasions,* 
with  increased  intensity  of  purpose,  when  they  stopped 
again ;  got  them  on,  once  more,  forced  and  goaded  them  to 
an  abrupter  point  of  the  descent ;  and  when  their  writhing 
and  smarting,  and  the  weight  behind  them,  bore  them 
plunging  down  the  precipice  in  a  cloud  of  scattered  water, 
whirled  his  rod  above  his  head,  and  gave  a  great  whoop 
and  hallo,  as  if  he  had  achieved  something,  and  had  no 
idea  that  they  might  shake  him  off,  and  blindly  mash  his 
brains  upon  the  road,  in  the  noontide  of  his  triumph. 

Standing  in  one  of  the  many  studii  of  Carrara,  that  after- 
noon— for  it  is  a  great  workshop,  full  of  beautifully-fin- 
ished copies  in  marble,  of  almost  every  figure,  group,  and 
bust,  we  know — it  seemed,  at  first,  so  strange  to  me  that 
those  exquisite  shapes,  replete  with  grace,  and  thought, 
and  delicate  repose,  should  grow  out  of  all  this  toil,  and 
sweat,  and  torture !  But  I  soon  found  a  parallel  to  it,  and 
an  explanation  of  it,  in  every  virtue  that  springs  up  in 
miserable  ground,  and  every  good  thing  that  has  its  birth 
in  sorrow  and  distress.  And,  looking  out  of  the  sculptor's 
great  window,  upon  the  marble  mountains,  all  red  and 
glowing  in  the  decline  of  day,  but  stern  and  solemn  to  the 
last,  I  thought,  my  God!  how  many  quarries  of  human 
hearts  and  souls,  capable  of  far  more  beautiful  results,  are 
left  shut  up  and  mouldering  away :  while  pleasure-travel- 
lers through  life,  avert  their  faces,  as  they  pass,  and  shud- 
der at  the  gloom  and  ruggedness  that  conceal  them ! 

The  then  reigning  Duke  of  Modena,  to  whom  this  terri- 
tory in  part  belonged,  claimed  the  proud  distinction  of 
being  the  only  sovereign  in  Europe  who  had  not  recognised 
Louis-Philippe  as  King  of  the  French !  He  was  not  a  wag, 
but  quite  in  earnest.  He  was  also  much  opposed  to  rail- 
roads ;  and  if  certain  lines  in  contemplation  by  other  po- 
tentates, on  either  side  of  him,  had  been  executed,  would 
have  probably  enjoyed  the  satisfaction  of  having  an  omni- 
bus plying  to  and  fro,  across  his  not  very  vast  dominions, 
to  forward  travellers  from  one  terminus  to  another.    . 

Carrara,  shut  in  by  great  hills,  is  very  picturesque  and 
bold.     Few  tourists  stay  there ;  and  the  people  are  nearly 
7 


98  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

all  connected,  in  one  way  or  other,  -with  the  working  of 
marble.  There  are  also  villages  among  the  caves,  where 
the  workmen  live.  It  contains  a  beautiful  little  Theatre, 
newly  built ;  and  it  is  an  interesting  custom  there,  to  form 
the  chorus  of  labourers  in  the  marble  quarries,  who  are 
self-taught  and  sing  by  ear.  I  heard  them  in  a  comic 
opera,  and  in  an  act  of  "Norma;"  and  they  acquitted 
themselves  very  well ;  unlike  the  common  people  of  Italy 
generally,  who  (with  some  exceptions  among  the  Neapoli- 
tans) sing  vilely  out  of  tune,  and  have  very  disagreeable 
singing  voices. 

From  the  summit  of  a  lofty  hill  beyond  Carrara,  the  first 
view  of  the  fertile  plain  in  which  the  town  of  Pisa  lies — 
with  Leghorn,  a  purple  spot  in  the  flat  distance — is  en- 
chanting. Nor  is  it  only  distance  that  lends  enchantment 
to  the  view ;  for  the  fruitful  country,  and  rich  woods  of 
olive-trees  through  which  the  road  subsequently  passes, 
render  it  delightful. 

The  moon  was  shinhig  when  we  approached  Pisa,  and 
for  a  long  time  we  could  see,  beliind  the  wall,  the  leaning 
Tower,  all  awry  in  the  uncertain  light ;  the  shadowy  orig- 
inal of  the  old  pictures  in  school-books,  setting  forth  "  The 
Wonders  of  the  World."  Like  most  things  connected  in 
their  first  associations  with  school-books  and  school-times, 
it  was  too  small.  I  felt  it  keenly.  It  was  nothing  like  so 
high  above  the  wall  as  I  had  hoped.  It  was  another  of 
the  many  deceptions  practised  by  Mr.  Harris,  Bookseller,  at 
the  corner  of  St,  Paul's  Churchyard,  London.  His  Tower 
was  a  fiction,  but  this  was  reality — and,  by  comparison,  a 
short  reality.  Still,  it  looked  very  well,  and  very  strange, 
and  was  quite  as  much  out  of  the  perpendicular  as  Harris 
had  represented  it  to  be.  The  quiet  air  of  Pisa  too ;  the 
big  guardhouse  at  the  gate,  with  only  two  little  soldiers  in 
it ;  the  streets,  with  scarcely  any  show  of  people  in  them ; 
and  the  Arno,  flowing  quaintly  through  the  centre  of  the 
town ;  were  excellent.  So,  I  bore  no  malice  in  my  heart 
against  Mr.  Harris  (remembering  his  good  intentions),  but 
forgave  him  before  dinner,  and  went  out,  full  of  confix 
dence,  to  see  the  Tower  next  morning. 

J  might  have  known  better;  but,  somehow,  I  had  ex- 
pected to  see  it,  casting  its  long  shadow  on  a  public  street 
where  people  came  and  went  all  day.  It  was  a  surprise  to 
me  to  find  it  in  a  grave  retired  place,  apart  from  the  gen- 


HCTURES  FROM  ITALY.  99 

eral  resort,  and  carpeted  with  smooth  green  turf.  But,  the 
group  of  buildings,  clustered  on  and  about  this  verdant  car- 
pet :  comprising  the  Tower,  the  Baptistery,  the  Cathedi-al, 
and  the  Church  of  the  Campo  Santo :  is  perhaps  the  most 
remarkable  and  beautiful  in  the  whole  world;  and  from 
being  clustered  there,  together,  away  from  the  ordinary 
transactions  and  details  of  the  town,  they  have  a  singularly 
venerable  and  impressive  character.  It  is  the  architectural 
essence  of  a  rich  old  city,  with  all  its  common  life  and  com- 
mon habitations  pressed  out,  and  filtered  away. 

SiSMONpi  compares  the  Tower  to  the  usual  pictorial  rep- 
resentations in  children's  books,  of  the  Tower  of  Babel.  It 
is  a  happy  simile,  and  conveys  a  better  idea  of  the  building 
than  chapters  of  laboured  description.  Nothing  can  exceed 
the  grace  and  lightness  of  the  structure ;  nothing  can  be 
more  remarkable  than  its  general  appearance.  In  the 
course  of  the  ascent  to  the  top  (which  is  by  an  easy  stair- 
case), the  inclination  is  not  very  apparent;  but,  at  the 
summit,  it  becomes  so,  and  gives  one  the  sensation  of  being 
in  a  ship  that  has  heeled  over,  through  the  action  of  an 
ebb-tide.  The  effect  upon  the  low  side,  so  to  speak — look- 
ing over  from  the  gallery,  and  seeing  the  shaft  recede  to  its 
base — is  very  startling ;  and  I  saw  a  nervous  traveller  hold 
on  to  the  Tower  involuntarily,  after  glancing  down,  as 
if  he  had  some  idea  of  propping  it  up.  The  view  within, 
from  the  ground — looking  up,  as  through  a  slanted  tube-  - 
is  also  very  curious.  It  certainly  inclines  as  much  as  jhe 
most  sanguine  tourist  could  desire.  The  natural  impulse 
of  ninety-nine  people  out  of  a  hundred,  who  were  about  to 
recline  upon  the  grass  below  it,  to  rest,  and  contemplate 
the  adjacent  buildings,  would  probably  be,  not  to  take  up 
their  position  under  the  leaning  side ;  it  is  so  very  much 
aslant. 

The  manifold  beauties  of  the  Cathedral  and  Baptistery 
need  no  recapitulation  from  me;  though  in  this  case,  as  in 
a  hundred  others,  I  find  it  difficult  to  separate  my  own  de- 
light in  recalling  them,  from  your  weariness  in  having  them 
recalled.  There  is  a  picture  of  St.  Agnes,  by  Andrea  del 
Sarto,  in  the  former,  and  there  are  a  variety  of  rich  col- 
umns in  the  latter,  that  tempt  me  strongly. 

It  is,  I  hope,  no  breach  of  my  resolution  not  to  be 
tempted  into  elaborate  descriptions,  to  remember  the  Campo 
Santo ;  where  grass-grown  graves  are  dug  in  earth  brought 


100  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

more  than  six  hundred  years  ago,  from  the  Holy  Land ; 
and  where  there  are,  surrounding  them,  such  cloisters, 
with  such  playing  lights  and  shadows  falling  through  their 
delicate  tracery  on  the  stone  pavement,  as  surely  the  dull- 
est memory  could  never  forget.  On  the  walls  of  this  sol- 
emn and  lovely  place,  are  ancient  frescoes,  very  much  oblit- 
erated and  decayed,  but  very  curious.  As  usually  happens 
in  almost  any  collection  of  paintings,  of  any  sort,  in  Italy, 
where  there  are  many  heads,  there  is,  in  one  of  them,  a 
striking  accidental  likeness  of  Napoleon.  At  one  time,  I 
used  to  please  my  fancy  with  the  speculation  whether  these 
old  painters,  at  their  work,  had  a  foreboding  knowledge  of 
the  man  who  would  one  day  arise  to  wreak  such  destruction 
upon  art:  whose  soldiers  would  make  targets  of  great  pic- 
tures, and  stable  their  horses  among  triumphs  of  architect- 
ure. But  the  same  Corsican  face  is  so  plentiful  in  some 
parts  of  Italy  at  this  day,  that  a  more  commonplace  solu- 
tion of  the  coincidence  is  unavoidable. 

If  Pisa  be  the  seventh  wonder  of  the  world  m  right  of 
its  Tower,  it  may  claim  to  be,  at  least,  the  second  or  third 
in  right  of  its  beggars.  They  waylay  the  unhappy  visitor 
at  every  turn,  escort  him  to  every  door  he  enters  at, 
and  lie  in  wait  for  him,  with  strong  reinforcements,  at  ev- 
ery door  by  which  they  know  he  must  come  out.  The  grat- 
ing of  the  portal  on  its  hinges  is  the  signal  for  a  general 
shout,  and  the  moment  he  appears,  he  is  hemmed  in,  and 
fallen  on,  by  heaps  of  rags  and  personal  distortions.  The 
beggars  seem  to  embody  all  the  trade  and  enterprise  of 
Pisa.  Nothing  else  is  stirring,  but  warm  air.  Going 
through  the  streets,  the  fronts  of  the  sleepy  houses  look  like 
backs.  They  are  all  so  still  and  quiet,  and  unlike  houses 
with  people  in  them,  that  the  greater  part  of  the  city  has 
the  appearance  of  a  city  at  daybreak,  or  during  a  general 
siesta  of  the  population.  Or  it  is  yet  more  like  those  back- 
grounds of  houses  in  common  prints,  or  old  engravings, 
where  windows  and  doors  are  squarely  indicated,  and  one 
figure  (a  beggar  of  course)  is  seen  walking  off  by  itself  into 
illimitable  perspective. 

Not  so  Leghorn  (made  illustrious  by  Smollett's  grave), 
which  is  a  thriving,  business-like,  matter-of-fact  place, 
where  idleness  is  shouldered  out  of  the  way  by  commerce. 
The  regulations  observed  there,  in  reference  to  trade  and 
merchants,  are  very  liberal  and  free;   and  the  town,  of 


PICTURES  FROM  ITAL^  101 

course,  benefits  by  them.  Leghorn  has  a  bad  name  in  con- 
nection with  stabbers,  and  with  some  justice  it  must  be  al- 
lowed ;  for,  not  many  years  ago,  there  was  an  assassination 
club  there,  the  members  of  which  bore  no  ill-will  to  any- 
body in  particular,  but  stabbed  people  (quite  strangers  to 
them)  in  the  streets  at  night,  for  the  pleasure  and  excite- 
ment of  the  recreation,  I  think  the  president  of  this  ami- 
able society,  was  a  shoemaker.  He  was  taken,  however, 
and  the  club  was  broken  up.  It  would,  probably,  have  dis- 
appeared in  the  natural  course  of  events,  before  the  rail- 
road between  Leghorn  and  Pisa,  which  is  a  good  one,  and 
has  already  begun  to  astonish  Italy  with  a  precedent  of 
punctuality,  order,  plain  dealing,  and  improvement — the 
most  dangerous  and  heretical  astonisher  of  all.  There 
must  have  been  a  slight  sensation,  as  of  earthquake,  surely, 
in  the  Vatican,  when  the  first  Italian  railroad  was  thrown 
open. 

Returning  to  Pisa,  and  hiring  a  good-tempered  Vettu- 
rino,  and  his  four  horses,  to  take  us  on  to  Rome,  we  trav- 
elled through  pleasant  Tuscan  villages  and  cheerful  scenery 
all  day.  The  roadside  crosses  in  this  part  of  Italy  are  nu- 
merous and  curious.  There  is  seldom  a  figure  on  the  cross, 
though  there  is  sometimes  a  face ;  but  they  are  remarkable 
for  being  garnished  with  little  models  in  wood,  of  every  pos- 
sible object  that  can  be  connected  with  the  Saviour's  death. 
The  cock  that  crowed  when  Peter  had  denied  his  Master 
thrice,  is  usually  perched  on  the  tip-top ;  and  an  ornitho- 
logical phenomenon  he  generally  is.  Under  him,  is  the  in- 
scription. Then,  hung  on  to  the  cross-beam,  are  the  spear, 
the  reed  with  the  sponge  of  vinegar  and  water  at  the  end, 
the  coat  without  seam  for  which  the  soldiers  cast  lots,  the 
dice-box  with  which  they  threw  for  it,  the  hammer  that 
drove  in  the  nails,  the  pincers  that  pulled  them  out,  the 
ladder  which  was  set  against  the  cross,  the  crown  of  thorns, 
the  instrument  of  flagellation,  the  lantern  with  which  Mary 
went  to  the  tomb  (I  suppose),  and  the  sword  with  which 
Peter  smote  the  servant  of  the  high  priest, — a  perfect  toy- 
shop of  little  objects,  repeated  at  every  four  or  five  miles, 
all  along  the  highway. 

On  the  evening  of  the  second  day  from  Pisa,  we  reached 
the  beautiful  old  city  of  Siena.  There  was  what  they 
called  a  Carnival,  in  progress ;  but,  as  its  secret  lay  in  a 
score  or  two  of  melancholy  people  walking  up  and  down 


102  PICTimES  FROM  ITALY. 

the  principal  street  in  common  toy-shop  masks,  and  beiug 
more  melancholy,  if  possible,  than  the  same  sort  of  people 
in  England,  I  say  no  more  of  it.  We  went  off,  betimes 
next  morning,  to  see  the  Cathedral,  which  is  wonderfully 
picturesque  inside  and  out^  especially  the  latter — also  the 
market-place,  or  great  Piazza,  which  is  a  large  square,  with 
a  great  broken-nosed  fountain  in  it :  some  quaint  Gothic 
houses:  and  a  high  square  brick  tower;  outside  the  top  of 
which — a  curious  feature  in  such  views  in  Italy — hangs  an 
enormous  bell.  It  is  like  a  bit  of  Venice,  without  the  wa- 
ter. There  are  some  curious  old  Palazzi  in  the  town,  which 
is  very  ancient;  and  without  having  (for  me)  the  interest 
of  Verona,  or  G-enoa,  it  is  very  dreamy  and  fantastic,  and 
most  interesting. 

We  went  on  again,  as  soon  as  we  had  seen  these  things, 
and  going  over  a  rather  bleak  country  (there  had  been 
nothing  but  vines  until  now :  mere  walking-sticks  at  that 
season  of  the  year),  stopped,  as  usual,  between  one  and 
two  hours  in  the  middle  of  the  day,  to  rest  the  horses ; 
that  being  a  part  of  every  Vetturino  contract.  We  then 
went  on  again,  through  a  region  gradually  becoming  bleaker 
and  wilder,  until  it  became  as  bare  and  desolate  as  any 
Scottish  moors.  Soon  after  dark,  we  halted  for  the  night, 
at  the  osteria  of  La  Scala :  a  perfectly  lone  house,  where 
the  family  were  sitting  round  a  great  fire  in  the  kitchen, 
raised  on  a  stone  platform  three  or  four  feet  high,  and  big 
enough  for  the  roasting  of  an  ox.  On  the  upper,  and  only 
other  floor  of  this  hotel,  there  was  a  great  wild  rambling 
s^la,  with  one  very  little  window  in  a  by-corner,  and  four 
black  doors  opening  into  four  black  bedrooms  in  various 
directions.  To  sa}''  nothing  of  another  large  black  door, 
opening  into  another  large  black  sala,  with  tlie  staircase 
coming  abruptly  through  a  kind  of  trap-door  in  the  floor, 
and  the  rafteis  of  the  roof  looming  above :  a  suspicious  lit- 
tle press  skulking  in  one  obscure  corner :  and  all  the  knives 
in  the  house  lying  about  in  various  directions.  The  fire- 
place was  of  the  purest  Italian  architecture,  so  that  it  was 
perfectly  impossible,  to  see  it  for  the  smoke.  The  waitress 
was  like  a  dramatic  brigand's  wife,  and  wore  the  same 
style  of  dress  upon  her  head.  The  dogs  barked  like  mad ; 
the  echoes  returned  the  compliments  bestowed  upon  them ; 
there  was  not  another  house  within  twelve  miles;  and 
things  had  a  dreary,  and  rather  a  cut-throat,  appearance. 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  103 

They  were  not  improved  by  rumours  of  robbers  having 
come  out,  strong  and  boldly,  within  a  few  nights ;  and  of 
their  having  stopped  the  mail  very  near  that  place.  They 
were  known  to  have  waylaid  some  travellers  not  long  be- 
fore, on  Mount  Vesuvius  itself,  and  were  the  talk  at  all  the 
roadside  inns.  As  they  were  no  business  of  ours,  however 
(for  we  had  very  little  with  us  to  lose),  we  made  ourselves 
merry  on  the  subject,  and  were  very  soon  as  comfortable  as 
need  be.  We  had  the  usual  dinner  in  this  solitary  house ; 
and  a  very  good  dinner  it  is,  when  you  are  used  to  it. 
There  is  something  with  a  vegetable  or  some  rice  in  it, 
which  is  a  sort  of  shorthand  or  arbitrary  character  for  soup, 
and  which  tastes  very  well,  when  you  have  flavoured  it 
with  plenty  of  grated  cheese,  lots  of  salt,  and  abundance  of 
pepper.  There  is  the  half  fowl  of  which  this  soup  has 
been  made.  There  is  a  stewed  pigeon,  with  the  gizzards 
and  livers  of  himself  and  other  birds  stuck  all  round  him. 
There  is  a  bit  of  roast  beef,  the  size  of  a  small  French  roll. 
There  are  a  scrap  of  Parmesan  cheese,  and  five  little  with- 
ered apples,  all  huddled  together  on  a  small  plate,  and 
crowding  one  upon  the  other,  as  if  each  were  trying  to  save 
itself  from  the  chance  of  being  eaten.  Then  there  is  coffee ; 
and  then  there  is  bed.  You  don't  mind  brick  floors;  you 
don't  mind  yawning  doors,  nor  banging  windows ;  you  don't 
mind  your  own  horses  being  stabled  under  the  bed :  and  so 
close,  that  every  time  a  horse  coughs  or  sneezes,  he  wakes 
you.  If  you  are  good-humoured  to  the  people  about  you, 
and  speak  pleasantly,  and  look  cheerful,  take  my  word  for 
it  you  may  be  well  entertained  in  the  very  worst  Italian  inn, 
and  always  in  the  most  obliging  manner,  and  may  go  from 
one  end  of  the  country  to  the  other  (despite  all  stories  to 
the  contrary)  without  any  great  trial  of  your  patience  any- 
where. Especially,  when  you  get  such  wine  in  flasks,  as 
the  Orvieto,  and  the  Monte  Pulciano. 

It  was  a  bad  morning  when  we  left  this  place ;  and  we 
went,  for  twelve  miles,  over  a  country  as  barren,  as  stony, 
and  as  wild,  as  Cornwall  in  England,  until  we  came  to 
Radicofani,  where  there  is  a  ghostly,  goblin  inn:  once  a 
hunting-seat,  belonging  to  the  Dukes  of  Tuscany.  It  is 
full  of  such  rambling  corridors,  and  gaunt  rooms,  that  all 
the  murdering  and  phantom  tales  that  ever  were  written 
might  have  originated  in  that  one  house.  There  are  some 
horrible  old  Palazzi  in  Genoa :  one  in  particular,  not  un 


104  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

like  it,  outside :  but  there  is  a  windy,  ci*eaking,  wormy, 
rustling,  door-opening,  foot-on-staircase-falling  character 
about  this  Radicof ani  Hotel,  such  as  I  never  saw,  anywhere 
else.  The  town,  such  as  it  is,  hangs  on  a  hill-side  above 
the  house,  and  in  front  of  it.  The  inhabitants  are  all 
beggars ;  and  as  soon  as  they  see  a  carriage  coming,  they 
swoop  down  upon  it,  like  so  many  birds  of  prey. 

When  we  got  on  the  mountain  pass,  which  lies  beyond 
this  place,  the  wind  (as  they  had  forewarned  us  at  the  um) 
was  so  terrific,  that  we  were  obliged  to  take  my  other  half 
out  of  the  carriage,  lest  slie  should  be  blown  over,  carriage 
and  all,  and  to  hang  to  it,  on  the  windy  side  (as  well  as  we 
could  for  laughing),  to  prevent  its  going,  Heaven  knows 
where.  For  mere  force  of  wind,  this  land-storm  might 
have  competed  with  an  Atlantic  gale,  and  had  a  reasonable 
chance  of  coming  off  victorious.  The  blast  came  sweeping 
down  great  gullies  in  a  range  of  mountains  on  the  right : 
so  that  we  looked  with  positive  awe  at  a  great  morass  on 
the  left,  and  saw  that  there  was  not  a  bush  or  twig  to  hold 
by.  It  seemed  as  if,  once  blown  from  our  feet,  we  must  be 
swept  out  to  sea,  or  away  into  space.  There  was  snow, 
and  hail,  and  rain,  and  lightning,  and  thunder;  and  there 
were  rolling  mists,  travelling  with  incredible  velocity.  It 
was  dark,  awful,  and  solitary  to  the  last  degree;  there 
were  mountains  above  mountains,  veiled  in  angry  clouds ; 
and  there  was  such  a  wrathful,  rapid,  violent,  tumultuous 
hurry,  everywhere,  as  rendered  the  scene  unspeakably 
exciting  and  grand. 

It  was  a  relief  to  get  out  of  it,  notwithstanding ;  and  to 
cross  even  the  dismal  dirty  Papal  Frontier.  After  passing 
through  two  little  towns;  in  one  of  which,  Acquapen- 
dente,  there  was  also  a  "  Carnival "  in  progress :  consisting 
of  one  man  dressed  and  masked  as  a  woman,  and  one 
woman  dressed  and  masked  as  a  man^  walking  ankle-deep, 
through  the  muddy  streets,  in  a  very  melancholy  manner : 
we  came,  at  dusk,  within  sight  of  the  Lake  of  Bolsena,  on 
whose  bank  there  is  a  little  town  of  the  same  name,  much 
celebrated  for  malaria.  With  the  exception  of  this  poor 
place,  there  is  not  a  cottage  on  the  banks  of  the  lake,  or 
near  it  (for  nobody  dare  sleep  there) ;  not  a  boat  upon  its 
waters ;  not  a  stick  or  stake  to  break  the  dismal  monotony 
of  seven-and-twenty  watery  miles.  We  were  late  in  get- 
ting in,  the  roads  being  very  bad  from  heavy  rains ;  and, 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  105 

after  dark,  the  dulness  of  the  scene  was  quite  mtoler- 
able. 

We  entered  on  a  very  different,  and  a  finer  scene  of  deso- 
lation, next  night,  at  sunset.  We  had  passed  through 
Montefiaschone  (famous  for  its  wine)  and  Viterbo  (for  its 
fountains)  :  and  after  climbing  up  a  long  hill  of  eight  or 
ten  miles'  extent,  came  suddenly  upon  the  margin  of  a  soli- 
tary lake:  in  one  part  very  beautiful,  with  a  luxuriant 
wood ;  in  another,  very  barren,  and  shut  in  by  bleak  vol- 
canic hills.  Where  this  lake  flows,  there  stood,  of  old,  a 
city.  It  was  swallowed  up  one  day ;  and  in  its  stead,  this 
water  rose.  There  are  ancient  traditions  (common  to  many 
parts  of  the  world)  of  the  ruined  city  having  been  seen  be- 
low, when  the  water  was  clear;  but  however  that  may  be, 
from  this  spot  of  earth  it  vanished.  The  ground  came 
bubbling  up  above  it;  and  the  water  too;  and  here  they 
stand,  like  ghosts  on  whom  the  other  world  closed  sud- 
denly, and  who  have  no  means  of  getting  back  again. 
They  seem  to  be  waiting  the  course  of  ages,  for  the  next 
earthquake  in  that  place;  when  they  will  plunge  below 
the  ground,  at  its  first  yawning,  and  be  seen  no  more.  The 
unhapi^y  city  below,  is  not  more  lost  and  dreary,  than  these 
fire-charred  hills  and  the  stagnant  water,  above.  The  red 
sun  looked  strangely  on  them,  as  with  the  knowledge  that 
they  were  made  for  caverns  and  darkness ;  and  the  melan- 
choly water  oozed  and  sucked  the  mud,  and  crept  quietly 
among  the  marshy  grass  and  reeds,  as  if  the  overthrow  of 
all  the  ancient  towers  and  house-tops,  and  the  death  of  all 
the  ancient  people  bom  and  bred  there,  were  yet  heavy  on 
its  conscience. 

A  short  ride  from  this  lake,  brought  us  to  Ronciglione ; 
a  little  town  like  a  large  pigstye,  where  we  passed  the 
night.  Next  morning  at  seven  o'clock,  we  started  for 
Rome. 

As  soon  as  we  were  out  of  the  pigstye,  we  entered  on 
the  Campagna  Romana;  an  undulating  flat  (as  you  know), 
where  few  people  can  live ;  and  where,  for  miles  and  miles, 
there  is  nothing  to  relieve  the  terrible  monotony  and  gloom. 
Of  all  kinds  of  country  that  could,  by  possibility,  lie  out- 
side the  gates  of  Rome,  this  is  the  aptest  and  fittest  burial- 
ground  for  the  Dead  City.  So  sad,  so  quiet,  so  sullen ;  so 
secret  in  its  covering  up  of  great  masses  of  ruin,  and  hiding 
them ;  so  like  the  waste  places  into  which  the  men  pos- 


106  PICTURES  PROM  ITALY. 

sessed  with  devils  used  to  go  and  howl,  and  rend  them- 
selves, ill  the  old  days  of  Jerusalem.  We  had  to  traverse 
thirty  miles  of  this  Campagna;  aud  for  two-and-twenty 
we  went  on  and  on,  seeing  nothing  but  now  and  then  a 
lonely  house,  or  a  villainous-looking  shepherd :  with  matted 
hair  all  over  his  face,  and  himself  wrapped  to  the  chin  in 
a  frowsy  brown  mantle,  tending  his  sheep.  At  the  end  of 
that  distance,  we  stopped  to  refresh  the  horses,  and  to  get 
some  lunch,  in  a  common  malaria-shaken,  despondent  little 
public-house,  whose  every  inch  of  wall  and  beam,  inside, 
was  (according  to  custom)  painted  and  decorated  in  a  way 
so  miserable  that  every  room  looked  like  the  wrong  side 
of  another  room,  and,  with  its  wretched  imitation  of  dra- 
pery, and  lop-sided  little  daubs  of  lyres,  seemed  to  have 
been  plundered  from  behind  the  scenes  of  some  travelling 
circus. 

When  we  were  fairly  going  off  again,  we  began,  in  a  per- 
fect fever,  to  strain  our  eyes  for  Rome;  and  when,  after 
another  mile  or  two,  the  Eternal  City  appeared,  at  length, 
in  the  distance ;  it  looked  like — I  am  half  afraid  to  write 
the  word— like  LONDON!!!  There  it  lay,  under  a  thick 
cloud,  with  innumerable  towers,  and  steeples,  and  roofs  of 
houses,  rising  up  into  the  sky,  and  high  above  them  all, 
one  Dome.  I  swear,  that  keenly  as  I  felt  the  seeming 
absurdity  of  the  comparison,  it  was  so  like  London,  at  that 
distance,  that  if  you  could  have  shown  it  me,  in  a  glass,  I 
should  have  taken  it  for  nothing  else. 


ROME. 

We  entered  the  Eternal  City,  at  about  four  o'clock  in  the 
afternoon,  on  the  thirtieth  of  January,  by  the  Porta  del 
Popolo,  and  came  immediately — it  was  a  dark  muddy  day, 
and  there  had  been  heavy  rain — on  the  skirts  of  the  Carni- 
val. We  did  not,  then,  know  that  we  were  only  looking 
at  the  fag  end  of  the  masks,  who  were  driving  slowly  round 
and  round  the  Piazza,  until  they  could  find  a  promising  op- 
portunity for  falling  into  the  stream  of  carriages,  and  get- 
ting in  good  time,  into  the  thick  of  the  festivity ;  and  com- 
ing among  them  so  abruptly,  all  travel-stained  and  weary, 
uras  not  coming  very  well  prepared  to  enjoy  the  scene. 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  107 

We  had  crossed  the  Tiber  by  the  Ponte  MoUe,  two  or 
three  miles  before.  It  had  looked  as  yellow  as  it  ought  to 
look,  and  hurrying  on  between  its  worn-away  and  miry 
banks,  had  a  promising  aspect  of  desolation  and  ruin.  The 
masquerade  dresses  on  the  fringe  of  the  Carnival,  did  great 
violence  to  this  promise.  There  were  no  great  ruins,  no 
solemn  tokens  of  antiquity,  to  be  seen ; — they  all  lie  on  the 
other  side  of  the  city.  There  seemed  to  be  long  streets  of 
commonplace  shops  and  houses,  such  as  are  to  be  found  in 
any  European  town;  there  were  busy  people,  equipages, 
ordinary  walkers  to  and  fro;  a  multitude  of  chattering 
strangers.  It  was  no  more  my  Rome :  the  Rome  of  any- 
body's fancy,  man  or  boy:  degraded  and  fallen  and  lying 
asleep  in  the  sun  among  a  heap  of  ruins:  than  the  Place 
de  la  Concorde  in  Paris  is.  A  cloudy  sky,  a  dull  cold 
rain,  and  muddy  streets,  I  was  prepared  for,  but  not  for 
this :  and  I  confess  to  having  gone  to  bed,  that  night,  in  a 
very  indifferent  humour,  and  with  a  very  considerably 
quenched  enthusiasm. 

Immediately  on  going  out  next  day,  we  hurried  off  to  St. 
Peter's.  It  looked  immense  in  the  distance,  but  distinctly 
and  decidedly  small,  by  comparison,  on  a  near  approach. 
The  beauty  of  the  Piazza,  on  which  it  stands,  with  its  clus- 
ters of  exquisite  columns,  and  its  gushing  fountains — so 
fresh,  so  broad,  and  free,  and  beautiful — nothing  can  exag- 
gerate. The  first  burst  of  the  interior,  in  all  its  expansive 
majesty  and  glory:  and,  most  of  all,  the  looking  up  into 
the  Dome :  is  a  sensation  never  to  be  forgotten.  But, 
there  were  preparations  for  a  Festa;  the  pillars  of  stately 
marble  were  swathed  in  some  impertinent  frippery  of  red 
and  yellow;  the  altar,  and  entrance  to  the  subterranean 
chapel :  which  is  before  it :  in  the  centre  of  the  church : 
were  like  a  goldsmith's  shop,  or  one  of  the  opening  scenes 
in  a  very  lavish  pantomime.  And  though  I  had  as  high  a 
sense  of  the  beauty  of  the  building  (I  hope)  as  it  is  possi- 
ble to  entertain,  I  felt  no  very  strong  emotion.  I  have  been 
infinitely  more  affected  in  many  English  cathedrals  when 
the  organ  has  been  playing,  and  in  many  English  country 
churches  when  the  congregation  have  been  singing.  I  had 
a  much  greater  sense  of  mystery  and  wonder,  in  the  Cathe- 
dral of  San  Marco  at  Venice. 

When  we  came  out  of  the  church  again  (we  stood  nearly 
an  hour  staring  up  into  the  dome ;  and  would  not  have 


108  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

"gone  over"  the  Cathedral  then,  for  any  money),  we 
said  to  the  coachman,  "Go  to  the  Coliseum."  In  a 
quarter  of  an  hour  or  so,  he  stopped  at  the  gate,  and  we 
went  in. 

It  is  no  fiction,  but  plain,  sober,  honest  Truth,  to  say: 
so  suggestive  and  distinct  is  it  at  this  hour :  that,  for  a 
moment — actually  in  passing  in — they  who  will,  may  have 
the  whole  great  pile  before  them,  as  it  used  to  be,  with 
thousands  of  eager  faces  staring  down  into  the  arena,  and 
such  a  whirl  of  strife,  and  blood,  and  dust  going  on  there, 
as  no  language  can  describe.  Its  solitude,  its  awful  beauty, 
and  its  utter  desolation,  strike  upon  the  stranger  the  next 
moment,  like  a  softened  sorrow ;  and  never  in  his  life,  per- 
haps, will  he  be  so  moved  and  overcome  by  any  sight,  not 
immediately  connected  with  his  own  alfections  and  afflic- 
tions. 

To  see  it  crumbling  there,  an  inch  a  year;  its  walls 
and  arches  overgrown  with  green;  its  corridors  open  to 
the  day;  the  long  grass  growing  in  its  porches ;  young  trees 
of  yesterday,  springing  up  on  its  ragged  parapets,  and 
bearing  fruit :  chance  produce  of  the  seeds  dropped  there 
by  the  birds  who  build  their  nests  within  its  chinks  and 
crannies ;  to  see  its  Pit  of  Fight  tilled  up  with  earth,  and 
the  peaceful  Cross  planted  in  the  centre ;  to  climb  into  its 
upper  halls,  and  look  down  on  ruin,  ruin,  ruin,  all  about 
it ;  the  triumphal  arches  of  Constantine,  Septimus  Severus, 
and  Titus ;  the  Eoman  Forum ;  the  Palace  of  the  Csesars ; 
the  temples  of  the  old  religion,  fallen  down  and  gone ;  is 
to  see  the  ghost  of  old  Rome,  wicked  wonderful  old  city, 
haunting  the  very  ground  on  which  its  people  trod.  It  is 
the  most  impressive,  the  most  stately,  the  most  solemn, 
grand,  majestic,  mournful  sight,  conceivable.  Never,  in  its 
bloodiest  prime,  can  the  sight  of  the  gigantic  Coliseum, 
full  and  running  over  with  the  lustiest  life,  have  moved 
one  heart,  as  it  must  move  all  who  look  upon  it  now,  a 
ruin.     God  be  thanked :  a  ruin ! 

As  it  tops  the  other  ruins :  standing  there,  a  mountain 
among  graves :  so  do  its  ancient  influences  outlive  all  other 
remnants  of  the  old  mythology  and  old  butchery  of  Rome, 
in  the  nature  of  the  tierce  and  cruel  Roman  people.  The 
Italian  face  changes  as  the  visitor  approaches  the  city;  its 
beauty  becomes  devilish ;  and  there  is  scarcely  one  coun- 
tenance in  a  hundred,  among  the  common  people  in  the 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALt.  •    109 

streets,  that  would  not  be  at  home  and  happy  in  a  reno- 
vated Coliseum  to-morrow. 

Here  was  Rome  indeed  at  last ;  and  such  a  Rome  as  no 
one  can  imagine  in  its  full  and  awful  grandeur !  We  wan- 
dered out  upon  the  Appian  Way,  and  then  went  on,  through 
miles  of  ruined  tombs  aud  broken  walls,  with  here  and 
there  a  desolate  and  uninhabited  house :  past  the  Circus  of 
Romulus,  where  the  courst  of  the  chariots,  the  stations  of 
the  judges,  competitois,  and  spectators,  are  yet  as  plainly 
to  be  seen  as  in  old  time :  past  the  tomb  of  Cecilia  Metella : 
past  all  inclosure,  hedge,  or  stake,  wall  or  fence :  away 
upon  the  open  Campagua,  where  on  that  side  of  Rome, 
nothing  is  to  be  beheld  but  Ruin.  Except  where  the  dis- 
tant Apennines  bound  the  view  upon  the  left,  the  whole 
wide  prospect  is  one  field  of  ruin.  Broken  aqueducts,  left 
in  the  most  picturesque  and  beautiful  clusters  of  arches ; 
broken  temples ;  broken  tombs.  A  desert  of  decay,  sombre 
and  desolate  beyond  all  expression ;  and  with  a  history  in 
every  stone  that  strews  the  ground. 

On  Sunday,  the  Pope  assisted  in  the  performance  of 
High  Mass  at  St.  Peter's.  The  effect  of  the  Cathedral  on 
my  mind,  on  that  second  visit,  was  exactly  what  it  was  at 
first,  and  what  it  remains  after  many  visits.  It  is  not  relig- 
iously impressive  or  affecting.  It  is  an  immense  edifice, 
with  no  one  point  for  the  mind  to  rest  upon ;  and  it  tires 
itself  with  wandering  round  and  round.  The  very  pur- 
pose of  the  place,  is  not  expressed  in  anything  you  see 
there,  unless  you  examine  its  details — and  all  examination 
of  details  is  incompatible  with  the  place  itself.  It  might 
be  a  Pantheon,  or  a  Senate  House,  or  a  great  architectural 
trophy,  having  no  other  object  than  an  architectural  tri- 
umph. There  is  a  black  statue  of  St.  Peter,  to  be  sure, 
under  a  red  canopy ;  which  is  larger  than  life,  and  which 
is  constantly  having  its  great  toe  kissed  by  good  Catholics. 
You  cannot  help  seeing  that :  it  is  so  very  prominent  and 
popular.  But  it  does  not  heighten  the  effect  of  the  tem- 
ple, as  a  work  of  art ;  and  it  is  not  expressive — to  me  at 
least — of  its  high  purpose. 

A  large  space  behind  the  altar,  was  fitted  up  with  boxes, 
shaped  like  those  at  the  Italian  Opera  in  England,  but  in 
their  decoration  much  more  gaudy.  In  the  centre  of  the 
kind  of  theatre  thus  railed  off,  was  a  canopied  dais  with 


110  HCTURES  PROM  ITALY. 

the  Pope's  chair  upon  it.  The  pavement  was  covered  with 
a  carpet  of  the  brightest  green;  and  what  with  this  green, 
and  the  intolerable  reds  and  crimsons,  and  gold  borders  of 
the  hangings,  the  whole  concern  looked  like  a  stupendous 
Bonbon.  On  either  side  of  the  altar,  was  a  large  box  for 
lady  strangers.  These  were  filled  with  ladies  in  black 
dresses  and  black  veils.  The  gentlemen  of  the  Pope's 
guard,  in  red  coats,  leather  breeches,  and  jack-boots,  guarded 
all  this  reserved  space,  with  drawn  swords  that  were  very 
flashy  in  every  sense ;  and  from  the  altar  all  down  the  nave, 
a  broad  lane  was  kept  clear  by  the  Pope's  Swiss  guard,  who 
wear  a  quaint  striped  surcoat,  and  striped  tight  legs,  and 
carry  halberds  like  those  which  are  usually  shouldered  by 
those  theatrical  supernumeraries,  who  never  can  get  oif  the 
stage  fast  enough,  and  who  may  be  generally  observed  to 
linger  in  the  enemy's  camp  after  the  open  country,  held  by 
the  opposite  forces,  has  been  split  up  the  middle  by  a  con- 
vulsion of  Nature. 

I  got  upon  the  border  of  the  green  carpet,  in  company 
with  a  great  many  other  gentlemen,  attired  in  black  (no 
other  passport  is  necessary),  and  stood  there  at  my  ease, 
during  the  performance  of  mass.  The  singers  were  in  a 
crib  of  wire-work  (like  a  large  meat-safe  or  bird-cage)  in 
one  corner;  and  sang  most  atrociously.  All  about  the 
green  carpet,  there  was  a  slowly  moving  crowd  of  people : 
talking  to  each  other :  staring  at  the  Pope  through  eye- 
glasses: defrauding  one  another,  in  moments  of  partial 
curiosity,  out  of  precarious  seats  on  the  bases  of  pillars : 
and  grinning  hideously  at  the  ladies.  Dotted  here  and 
there,  were  little  knots  of  friars  (Francescani,  or  Cappuc- 
cini,  in  their  coarse  brown  dresses  and  peaked  hoods)  mak- 
ing a  strange  contrast  to  the  gaudy  ecclesiastics  of  higher 
degree,  and  having  their  humility  gratified  to  the  utmost,  by 
being  shouldered  about,  and  elbowed  right  and  left,  on  all 
sides.  Some  of  these  had  muddy  sandals  and  umbrellas, 
and  stained  garments:  having  trudged  in  from  the  coun- 
try. The  faces  of  the  greater  part  were  as  coarse  and 
heavy  as  their  dress;  their  dogged,  stupid,  monotonous 
stare  at  all  the  glory  and  splendour,  having  something  in 
it,  half  miserable,  and  half  ridiculous. 

Upon  the  green  carpet  itself,  and  gathered  round  the 
altar,  was  a  perfect  army  of  cardinals  and  priests,  in 
red,  gold,  purple,  violet,  white,  and  fine  linen.     Stragglers 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  Ill 

from  these,  went  to  and  fro  among  the  crowd,  conversing 
two  and  two,  or  giving  and  receiving  introductions,  and 
exchanging  salutations ;  other  functionaries  in  black  gowns, 
and  other  functionaries  in  court-dresses,  were  similarly 
engaged.  In  the  midst  of  all  these,  and  stealthy  Jesuits 
creeping  in  and  out,  and  the  extreme  restlessness  of  the 
Youth  of  England,  who  were  perpetually  wandering  about, 
some  few  steady  persons  in  black  cassocks,  who  had  knelt 
down  with  their  faces  to  the  wall,  and  were  poring  over 
their  missals,  became,  unintentionally,  a  sort  of  humane 
man-traps,  and  with  their  own  devout  legs  tripped  up  other 
people's  by  the  dozen. 

There  was  a  great  pile  of  candles  lying  down  on  the 
floor  near  lue,  which  a  very  old  man  in  a  rusty  black  gown 
with  an  open-work  tippet,  like  a  summer  ornament  for  a 
hreplace  in  tissue-paper,  made  himself  very  busy  in  dispens- 
ing to  all  the  ecclesiastics :  one  apiece.  They  loitered  about 
with  these  for  some  time,  under  their  arms  like  walking- 
sticks,  or  in  their  hands  like  truncheons.  At  a  certain 
period  of  the  ceremony,  however,  each  carried  his  caudle 
up  to  the  Pope,  laid  it  across  his  two  knees  to  be  blessed, 
took  it  back  again,  and  filed  oif.  This  was  done  in  a  very 
attenuated  procession,  as  you  may  suppose,  and  occupied  a 
long  time.  Not  because  it  takes  long  to  bless  a  candle 
through  and  through,  but  because  there  were  so  many 
candles  to  be  blessed.  At  last  they  were  all  blessed ;  and 
then  they  were  all  lighted ;  and  then  the  Pope  was  taken 
u}),  chair  and  all,  and  carried  round  the  church. 

I  must  say,  that  I  never  saw  anything,  out  of  November, 
so  like  the  popular  English  commemoration  of  the  fifth  of 
that  month.  A  bundle  of  matches  and  a  lantern,  would 
have  made  it  perfect.  Nor  did  the  Pope,  himself,  at  all 
mar  the  resemblance,  though  he  has  a  pleasant  and  vener- 
able face;  for,  as  this  part  of  the  ceremony  makes  him 
giddy  and  sick,  he  shuts  his  eyes  when  it  is  performed: 
and  having  his  eyes  shut  and  a  great  mitre  on  his  head, 
and  his  head  itself  wagging  to  and  fro  as  they  shook  him 
in  carrying,  he  looked  as  if  his  mask  were  going  to  tumble 
off.  The  two  immense  fans  which  are  always  borne,  one 
on  either  side  of  him,  accompanied  him,  of  course,  on  this 
occasion.  As  they  carried  him  along,  he  blessed  the  peo- 
ple with  the  mystic  sign;  and  as  he  passed  them,  they 
kneeled  down.     When  he  had  made  the  round  of  the  churchs 


J13  PICTURES  FRO:\r  ITALY, 

he  was  brought  back  again,  and  if  I  am  not  mistaken,  this 
perfonnauce  was  repeated,  in  the  whole,  three  times. 
There  was,  certainly,  nothing  solemn  or  effective  in  it ;  and 
certainly  very  much  that  was  droll  and  tawdry.  But  this 
remark  applies  to  the  whole  ceremony,  except  the  raising 
of  the  Host,  when  every  man  in  the  guard  dropped  on  one 
knee  instantly,  and  dashed  his  naked  sword  on  the  ground; 
which  had  a  fine  effect. 

The  next  time  I  saw  the  cathedral,  was  some  two  or 
three  weeks  afterwards,  when  I  climbed  up  into  the  ball ; 
and  then,  the  hangings  being  taken  down,  and  the  carpet 
taken  up,  but  all  the  framework  left,  the  remnants  of  these 
decorations  looked  like  an  exploded  cracker. 

The  Friday  and  Saturday  having  been  solemn  Festa 
days,  and  Sunday  being  always  a  dies  non  in  Carnival  pro- 
ceedings, we  had  looked  forward,  with  some  impatience 
and  curiosity,  to  the  beginning  of  the  new  week :  Monday 
and  Tuesday  being  the  two  last  and  best  days  of  the 
Carnival. 

On  the  Monday  afternoon  at  one  or  two  o'clock,  there 
began  to  be  a  great  rattling  of  carriages  into  the  courtyard 
of  the  hotel ;  a  hurrying  to  and  fro  of  all  the  servants  in 
it;  and,  now  and  then,  a  swift  shooting  across  some  door- 
way or  balcony,  of  a  straggling  stranger  in  a  fancy  dress: 
not  yet  sufficiently  well  used  to  the  same,  to  wear  it  with 
confidence,  and  defy  public  opinion.  All  the  carriages  were 
open,  and  had  the  linings  carefully  covered  with  white  cot- 
ton or  calico,  to  prevent  their  proper  decorations  from  being 
spoiled  by  the  incessant  pelting  of  sugar-plums ;  and  peo- 
ple were  packing  and  cramming  into  every  vehicle  as  it 
waited  for  its  occupants,  enormous  sacks  and  baskets  full 
of  these  confetti,  together  with  such  heaps  of  flowers,  tied 
up  in  little  nosegays,  that  some  carriages  were  not  only 
brimful  of  flowers,  but  literally  running  over :  scattering, 
at  every  shake  and  jerk  of  the  springs,  some  of  their  abun- 
dance on  the  ground.  Not  to  be  behindhand  m  these  essen- 
tial particulars,  we  caused  two  very  respectable  sacks  of 
sugar-plums  (each  about  three  feet  high)  and  a  large  clothes- 
basket  full  of  flowers  to  be  conveyed  into  our  hired  barouche, 
with  all  speed.  And  from  our  place  of  observation,  in  one 
of  the  upper  balconies  of  the  hotel,  we  contemplated  these 
arrangements  with  the  liveliest  satisfaction.     The  carriages 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  113 

now  beginning  to  take  up  their  company,  and  move  away, 
we  got  into  ours,  and  drove  off  too,  armed  with  little  wire 
masks  for  our  faces;  the  sugar-plums,  like  Falstaff's  adul- 
terated sack,  having  lime  in  their  composition. 

The  Corso  is  a  street  a  mile  long ;  a  street  of  shops,  and 
palaces,  and  private  houses,  sometimes  opening  into  a 
broad  piazza.  There  are  verandahs  and  balconies,  of  all 
shapes  and  sizes,  to  almost  every  house — not  on  one  story 
alone,  but  often  to  one  room  or  another  on  every  story — 
put  there  in  general  with  so  little  order  or  regularity,  that 
if,  year  after  year,  and  season  after  season,  it  had  rained 
balconies,  hailed  balconies,  snowed  balconies,  blown  bal- 
conies, they  could  scarcely  have  come  into  existence  in  a 
more  disorderly  manner. 

This  is  the  great  fountain-head  and  focus  of  the  Carnival. 
But  all  the  streets  in  which  the  Carnival  is  held,  being 
vigilantly  kept  by  dragoons,  it  is  necessary  for  carriages, 
in  the  first  instance,  to  pass,  in  line,  down  another  thor- 
oughfare, and  so  come  into  the  Corso  at  the  end  remote 
from  the  Piazza  del  Popolo ;  which  is  one  of  its  termina- 
tions. Accordingly,  we  fell  into  the  string  of  coaches, 
and,  for  some  time,  jogged  on  quietly  enough ;  now  crawl- 
ing on  at  a  very  slow  walk;  now  trotting  half-a-dozen 
yards ;  now  backing  fifty ;  and  now  stopping  altogether : 
as  the  pressure  in  front  obliged  us.  If  any  impetuous  car- 
riage dashed  out  of  the  rank  and  clattered  forward,  with 
the  wild  idea  of  getting  on  faster,  it  was  suddenly  met,  or 
overtaken,  by  a  trooper  on  horseback,  who,  deaf  as  his  own 
drawn  sword  to  all  remonstrances,  immediately  escorted  it 
back  to  the  very  end  of  the  row,  and  made  it  a  dim  speck 
in  the  remotest  perspective.  Occasionally,  we  interchanged 
a  volley  of  confetti  with  the  carriage  next  in  front,  or  the 
carriage  next  behind ;  but,  as  yet,  this  capturing  of  stray 
and  errant  coaches  by  the  military,  was  the  chief  amuse- 
ment. 

Presently,  we  came  into  a  narrow  street,  where,  besides 
one  line  of  carriages  going,  there  was  another  line  of  car- 
riages returning.  Here  the  sugar-plums  and  the  nosegays 
began  to  fly  about,  pretty  smartly ;  and  I  was  fortunate 
enough  to  observe  one  gentleman  attired  as  a  Greek  war- 
rior, catch  a  light-whiskered  brigand  on  the  nose  (he  was 
in  the  very  act  of  tossing  up  a  bouquet  to  a  young  lady  in 
a  first-floor  window)  with  a  precision  that  was  much  ap- 


114  PICTTJT^ES  FROM  ITALY. 

plauded  by  the  bystanders.  As  this  victorious  Greek  was 
exchanging  a  facetious  remark  with  a  stout  gentleman  in  a 
door- way — one-half  black  and  one-half  white,  as  if  he  had 
been  peeled  up  the  middle — who  had  offered  him  his  con- 
gratulations on  this  achievement,  he  received  an  orange 
from  a  house-top,  full  on  his  left  ear,  and  was  much  sur- 
prised, not  to  say  discomfited.  Especially,  as  he  was 
standing  up  at  the  time ;  and  in  consequence  of  the  car- 
riage moving  on  suddenly,  at  the  same  moment,  staggered 
ignominiously,  and  buried  himself  among  his  flowers. 

Some  quarter  of  an  hour  of  this  sort  of  progress,  brought 
us  to  the  Corso ;  and  anj'^thing  so  gay,  so  bright,  and  lively 
as  the  whole  scene  there,  it  would  be  difficult  to  imagine. 
From  all  the  innumerable  balconies:  from  the  remotest 
and  highest,  no  less  than  from  the  lowest  and  nearest: 
hangings  of  bright  red,  bright  green,  bright  blue,  white 
and  gold,  were  fluttering  in  the  brilliant  sunlight.  From 
windows,  and  from  parapets,  and  tops  of  houses,  streamers 
of  the  richest  colours,  and  draperies  of  the  gaudiest  and 
most  sparkling  hues,  were  floating  out  upon  the  street. 
The  buildings  seemed  to  have  been  literally  turned  inside 
out,  and  to  have  all  their  gaiety  towards  the  highway. 
Shop-fronts  were  taken  down,  and  the  windows  filled  with 
company,  like  boxes  at  a  shining  theatre ;  doors  were  car- 
ried off  their  hinges,  and  long  tapestried  groves,  hung 
with  garlands  of  flowers  and  evergreens,  displayed  within; 
builders'  scaffoldings  were  gorgeous  temples,  radiant  in  sil- 
ver, gold,  and  crimson ;  and  in  every  nook  and  corner,  from 
the  pavement  to  the  chimney-tops,  where  women's  eyes 
could  glisten,  there  they  danced,  and  laughed,  and  sparkled, 
like  the  light  in  water.  Every  sort  of  bewitching  madness 
of  dress  was  there.  Little  preposterous  scarlet  jackets ; 
quaint  old  stomachers,  more  wicked  than  the  smartest 
bodices ;  Polish  pelisses,  strained  and  tight  as  ripe  goose- 
berries; tiny  Greeks  caps,  all  awry,  and  clinging  to  the 
dark  hair.  Heaven  knows  how;  every  wild,  quaint,  bold, 
shy,  pettish,  madcap  fancy  had  its  illustration  in  a  dress; 
and  every  fancy  was  as  dead  forgotten  by  its  owner,  in  the 
tumult  of  merriment,  as  if  the  three  old  aqueducts  that 
still  remain  entire  had  brought  Lethe  into  Rome,  upon  their 
sturdy  arches,  that  morning. 

The  carriages  were  now  three  abreast;  in  broader  places 
four ;  often  stationary  for  a  long  time  together ;  always  one 


PICTURES  PROM  ITALY  116 

close  mass  of  variegated  brightness;  showing,  the  whole 
street-full,  through  the  storm  of  flowers,  like  flowers  of  a 
larger  growth  themselves.  In  some,  the  horses  were  richly 
caparisoned,  in  magnificent  trappings ;  in  others  they  were 
decked  from  head  to  tail,  with  flowing  ribbons.  Some 
were  driven  by  coachmen  with  enormous  double  faces :  one 
face  leering  at  the  horses:  the  other  cocking  its  extraordi- 
nary eyes  into  the  carriage :  and  both  rattling  again,  under 
the  hail  of  sugar-plums.  Other  drivers  were  attired  as 
women,  wearing  long  ringlets  and  no  bonnets,  and  looking 
more  ridiculous  in  any  real  difficulty  with  the  horses  (of 
which,  in  such  a  concourse,  there  were  a  great  many)  than 
tongue  can  tell,  or  pen  describe.  Instead  of  sitting  in  the 
carriages,  upon  the  seats,  the  handsome  Roman  women, 
to  see  and  to  be  seen  the  better,  sit  in  the  heads  of  the 
barouches,  at  this  time  of  general  license,  with  their  feet 
upon  the  cushions — and  oh  the  flowing  skirts  and  dainty 
waists,  the  blessed  shapes  and  laughing  faces,  the  free, 
good-humoured,  gallant  figures  that  they  make!  There 
were  great  vans,  too,  full  of  handsome  girls — thirty,  or 
more  together,  perhaps — and  the  broadsides  that  were 
poured  into,  and  poured  out  of,  these  fairy  fire-ships, 
splashed  the  air  with  flowers  and  bonbons  for  ten  minutes 
at  a  time.  Carriages,  delayed  long  in  one  place,  would 
begin  a  deliberate  engagement  with  other  carriages,  or  with 
people  at  the  lower  windows ;  and  the  spectators  at  some 
upper  balcony  or  window,  joining  in  the  fray,  and  attacking 
both  parties,  would  empty  down  great  bags  of  confetti, 
that  descended  like  a  cloud,  and  in  an  instant  made  them 
white  as  millers.  Still,  carriages  on  carriages,  dresses  on 
dresses,  colours  on  colours,  crowds  upon  crowds,  without 
end.  Men  and  boys  clinging  to  the  wheels  of  coaches,  and 
holding  on  behind,  and  following  in  their  wake,  and  diving 
in  among  the  horses'  feet  to  pick  up  scattered  flowers  to 
sell  again ;  maskers  on  foot  (the  drollest,  generally)  in  fan- 
tastic exaggerations  of  court-dresses,  surveying  the  throng 
through  enormous  eye-glasses,  and  always  transported  with 
an  ecstasy  of  love,  on  the  discovery  of  any  particularly  old 
lady  at  a  window ;  long  strings  of  Policinelli,  laying  about 
them  with  blown  bladders  at  the  ends  of  sticks ;  a  waggon- 
full  of  madmen,  screaming  and  tearing  to  the  life ;  a  coach- 
full  of  grave  Mamelukes,  with  their  horse-tail  standard  set 
up  in  the  midst  j  a  pai-ty  of  gipsy-women  engaged  in  terrific 


116  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

conflict  with  a  shipful  of  sailors ;  a  man-monkey  on  a  pole, 
surrounded  by  strange  animals  with  pigs'  faces,  and  lions' 
tails,  carried  under  their  arms,  or  worn  gracefully  over 
their  shoulders ;  carriages  on  carriages,  dresses  on  dresses, 
colours  on  colours,  crowds  upon  crowds,  without  end.  Not 
many  actual  characters  sustained,  or  represented,  perhaps, 
considering  the  number  dressed,  but  the  main  pleasure 
of  the  scene  consisting  in  its  perfect  good  temper ;  in  its 
bright,  and  infinite,  and  flashing  variety ;  and  in  its  entire 
abandonment  to  the  mad  humour  of  the  time — an  abandon- 
ment so  perfect,  so  contagious,  so  irresistible,  that  the 
steadiest  foreigner  fights  up  to  his  middle  in  flowers  and 
sugar-plums,  like  the  wildest  Roman  of  them  all,  and 
thinks  of  nothing  else  till  half -past  four  o'clock,  when  he 
is  suddenly  reminded  (to  his  great  regret)  that  this  is  not 
the  whole  business  of  his  existence,  by  hearing  the  trum- 
pets sound,  and  seeing  the  dragoons  begin  to  clear  the 
street. 

How  it  ever  is  cleared  for  the  race  that  takes  place  at 
five,  or  how  the  horses  ever  go  through  the  race,  without 
going  over  the  people,  is  more  than  I  can  say.  But  the 
carriages  get  out  into  the  by-streets,  or  up  into  the  Piazza 
del  Popolo,  and  some  people  sit  in  temporary  galleries  in 
the  latter  place,  and  tens  of  thousands  line  the  Corso  on 
both  sides,  when  the  horses  are  brought  out  into  the  Piazza 
— to  the  foot  of  that  same  column  which,  for  centuries, 
looked  down  upon  the  games  and  chariot-races  in  the 
Circus  Maximus. 

At  a  given  signal  they  are  started  off.  Down  the  live 
lane,  the  whole  length  of  the  Corso,  they  fly  like  the  wind : 
riderless,  as  all  the  world  knows :  with  shining  ornaments 
upon  their  backs,  and  twisted  in  their  plaited  manes :  and 
with  heavy  little  balls  stuck  full  of  spikes,  dangling  at 
their  sides,  to  goad  them  on.  The  jingling  of  these  trap- 
pings, and  the  rattling  of  their  hoofs  upon  the  hard  stones ; 
the  dash  and  fury  of  their  speed  along  the  echoing  street ; 
nay,  the  very  cannon  that  are  fired — these  noises  are  noth- 
ing to  the  roaring  of  the  multitude :  their  shouts :  the  clap- 
ping of  their  hands.  But  it  is  soon  over — almost  instanta- 
neously. More  cannon  shake  the  town.  The  horses  have 
plunged  into  the  carpets  put  across  the  street  to  stop  them ; 
the  goal  is  reached ;  the  prizes  are  won  (they  are  given,  in 
part,  by  the  poor  Jews,  as  a  compromise  for  not  running 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  117 

foot-races  themselves) ;  and  there  is  an  end  to  that  day's 
sport. 

But  if  the  scene  be  bright,  and  gay,  and  crowded,  on  the 
last  day  but  one,  it  attains,  on  the  concluding  day,  to  such 
a  height  of  glittering  colour,  swarming  life,  and  frolicsome 
uproar,  that  the  bare  recollection  of  it  makes  me  giddy  at 
this  moment.  The  same  diversions,  greatly  heightened 
and  intensified  in  the  ardour  with  which  they  are  pursued, 
go  on  until  the  same  hour.  The  race  is  repeated ;  the  can- 
non are  fired;  the  shouting  and  clapping  of  hands  are 
renewed;  the  cannon  are  fired  again;  the  race  is  over;  and 
the  prizes  are  won.  But  the  carriages :  ankle-deep  with 
sugar-plums  within,  and  so  be-flowered  and  dusty  without, 
as  to  be  hardly  recognisable  for  the  same  vehicles  that 
they  were,  three  hours  ago :  instead  of  scampering  off  in 
all  directions,  throng  into  the  Corso,  where  they  are  soon 
wedged  together  in  a  scarcely  moving  mass.  For  the 
diversion  of  the  Moccoletti,  the  last  gay  madness  of  the 
Carnival,  is  now  at  hand;  and  sellers  of  little  tapers  like 
what  are  called  CJiristmas  candles  in  England,  are  shout- 
ing lustily  on  every  side,  "  Moccoli,  Moccoli !  Ecco  Moc- 
coli!" — a  new  item  in  the  tumult;  quite  abolishing  that 
other  item  of  "  Ecco  Fidri !  Ecco  Fior — r — r !  "  which  has 
been  making  itself  audible  over  all  the  rest,  at  intervals, 
the  whole  day  through. 

As  the  bright  hangings  and  dresses  are  all  fading  into 
one  dull,  heavy,  uniform  colour  in  the  decline  of  the  day, 
lights  begin  flasliing,  here  and  there:  in  the  windows,  on 
the  house-tops,  in  the  balconies,  in  the  carriages,  in  the 
hands  of  the  foot-passengers :  little  by  little :  gradually, 
gradually:  more  and  more:  until  the  whole  long  street  is 
one  great  glare  and  blaze  of  fire.  Then,  everybody  present 
has  but  one  engrossing  object;  that  is,  to  extinguish  other 
people's  candles,  and  to  keep  his  own  alight;  and  every- 
body :  man,  woman,  or  child,  gentleman  or  lady,  prince  or 
peasant,  native  or  foreigner :  yells  and  screams,  and  roars 
incessantly,  as  a  taunt  to  the  subdued,  "  Senza  Moccolo, 
Senza  Moccolo!"  (Without  a  light!  Without  a  light!) 
until  nothing  is  heard  but  a  gigantic  chorus  of  those  two 
words,  mingled  with  peals  of  laughter. 

The  spectacle,  at  this  time,  is  one  of  the  most  extraordi- 
nary that  can  be  imagined.  Carriages  coming  slowly  by, 
with  everybody  standing  on  the  seats  or  on  the  box,  hold- 


118  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

ing  up  their  lights  at  arms'  length,  for  greater  safety; 
some  in  paper  shades ;  some  with  a  bunch  of  undefended 
little  tapers,  kindled  altogether ;  some  with  blazing  torches ; 
some  with  feeble  little  candles ;  men  on  foot,  creeping  along, 
among  the  wheels,  watching  their  opportunity,  to  make  a 
spring  at  some  particular  light,  and  dash  it  out ;  other  peo- 
ple climbing  up  into  carriages,  to  get  hold  of  them  by  main 
force ;  others,  chasing  some  unlucky  wanderer,  round  and 
round  his  own  coach,  to  blow  out  the  light  he  has  begged 
or  stolen  somewhere,  before  he  can  ascend  to  his  own  com- 
pany, and  enable  them  to  light  their  extinguished  tapers ; 
others,  with  their  hats  off,  at  a  carriage-door,  humbly  be- 
seeching some  kind-hearted  lady  to  oblige  them  with  a 
light  for  a  cigar,  and  when  she  is  in  the  fulness  of  doubt 
whether  to  comply  or  no,  blowing  out  the  candle  she  is 
guarding  so  tenderly  with  her  little  hand;  other  people  at 
the  wmdows,  fishing  for  candles  with  lines  and  hooks,  or 
letting  down  long  willow-wands  with  handkerchiefs  at  the 
end,  and  flapping  them  out,  dexterously,  when  the  bearer 
is  at  the  height  of  his  triumph ;  others,  biding  their  time 
in  corners,  with  immense  extinguishers  like  halberds,  and 
•suddenly  coming  down  upon  glorious  torches;  others, 
gathered  round  one  coach,  and  sticking  to  it ;  others,  rain- 
ing oranges  and  nosegays  at  an  obdurate  little  lantern,  or 
regularly  storming  a  pyramid  of  men,  holding  up  one  man 
among  them,  who  carries  one  feeble  little  wick  above  his 
head,  with  which  he  defies  them  all!  Senza  Moccolo! 
Senza  Moccolo!  Beautiful  women,  standing  up  in  coaches, 
pointing  in  derision  at  extinguished  lights,  and  clapping 
their  hands,  as  they  pass  on,  crying,  "Senza  Moccolo! 
Senza  Moccolo ! " ;  low  balconies  full  of  lovely  faces  and 
gay  dresses,  struggling  with  assailants  in  the  streets ;  some 
repressing  .them  as  they  climb  up,  some  bending  down, 
some  leaning  over,  some  shrinking  back — delicate  arms 
and  bosoms — graceful  figures — glowing  lights,  fluttering 
dresses,  Senza  Moccolo,  Senza  Moccolo,  Senza  Moc-co-lo- 
o-o-o ! — when  in  the  wildest  enthusiasm  of  the  cry,  and  full- 
est ecstasy  of  the  sport,  the  Ave  Maria  rings  from  the 
church  steeples,  and  the  Carnival  is  over  in  an  instant — put 
out  like  a  taper,  with  a  breath ! 

There  was  a  masquerade  at  the  theatre  at  night,  as  dull 
and  senseless  as  a  London  one,  and  only  remarkable  for 
the  summary  way  in  which  the  house  was  cleared  at  eleven 


PICTURES   FROM  ITALY.  119 

o'clock:  which  was  done  by  a  line  of  soldiers  forming 
along  the  wall,  at  the  back  of  the  stage,  and  sweeping  the 
whole  company  out  before  them,  like  a  broad  broom.  The 
game  of  the  Moccoletti  (the  word,  in  the  singular,  Mocco- 
letto,  is  the  diminutive  of  Moccolo,  and  means  a  little  lamp 
or  candle-snuff)  is  supposed  by  some  to  be  a  ceremony  of 
burlesque  mourning  for  the  death  of  the  Carnival :  candles 
being  indispensable  to  Catholic  grief.  But  whether  it  be 
so,  or  be  a  remnant  of  the  ancient  Saturnalia,  or  an  incor- 
poration of  both,  or  have  its  origin  in  anything  else,  I 
shall  always  remember  it,  and  the  frolic,  as  a  brilliant 
and  most  captivating  sight:  no  less  remarkable  for  the 
unbroken  good-humour  of  all  concerned,  down  to  the  very 
lowest  (and  among  those  who  scaled  the  carriages,  were 
many  of  the  commonest  men  and  boys),  than  for  its  inno- 
cent vivacity.  For,  odd  as  it  may  seem  to  say  so,  of  a 
sport  so  full  of  thoughtlessness  and  personal  display,  it  is 
as  free  from  any  taint  of  immodesty  as  any  general  mingling 
of  the  two  sexes  can  possibly  be ;  and  there  seems  to  pre- 
vail, during  its  progress,  a  feeling  of  general,  almost  child- 
ish, simplicity  and  confidence,  which  one  thinks  of  with  a 
pang,  when  the  Ave  Maria  has  rung  it  away,  for  a  whole 
year. 

Availing  ourselves  of  a  part  of  the  quiet  interval  between 
the  termination  of  the  Carnival  and  the  beginning  of  the 
Holy  Week:  when  everybody  had  run  away  from  the  one, 
and  few  people  had  yet  begun  to  run  back  again  for  the 
other:  we  went  conscientiously  to  work,  to  see  Rome. 
And,  by  dint  of  going  out  early  every  morning,  and  coming 
back  late  every  evening,  and  labouring  hard  all  day,  I  be- 
lieve we  made  acquaintance  Avith  every  post  and  pillar  in 
the  city,  and  the  country  round;  and,  in  particular,  ex- 
plored so  many  churches,  that  I  abandoned  that  part  of  the 
enterprise  at  last,  before  it  was  half  finished,  lest  I  should 
never,  of  my  own  accord,  go  to  church  again,  as  long  as  I 
lived.  But,  I  managed,  almost  every  day,  at  one  time  or 
other,  to  get  back  to  the  Coliseum,  and  out  upon  the  open 
Campagna,  beyond  the  Tomb  of  Cecilia  Metella. 

We  often  encountered,  in  these  expeditions,  a  company 
of  English  Tourists,  with  whom  I  had  an  ardent,  but  un- 
gratified  longing,  to  establish  a  speaking  acquaintance. 
They  were  one  Mr.  Davis,  and  a  small  circle  of  friends. 


120  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

It  was  impossible  not  to  know  Mrs.  Davis's  name,  from 
her  being  always  in  great  request  among  her  party,  and 
her  party  being  everywhere.  During  the  Holy  Week, 
they  were  in  every  part  of  every  scene  of  every  ceremony. 
For  a  fortnight  or  three  weeks  before  it,  they  were  in  every 
tomb,  and  every  church,  and  every  ruin,  and  every  Picture 
Gallery;  and  I  hardly  ever  observed  Mrs.  Davis  to  be 
silent  for  a  moment.  Deep  underground,  high  up  in  St. 
Peter's,  out  on  the  Campagna,  and  stifling  in  the  Jews'  quar- 
ter, Mrs.  Davis  turned  up,  all  the  same.  I  don't  think  she 
ever  saw  anything,  or  ever  looked  at  anything;  and  she 
had  always  lost  something  out  of  a  straw  hand-basket,  and 
was  trying  to  find  it,  with  all  her  might  and  main,  among 
an  immense  quantity  of  English  halfpence,  which  lay,  like 
sands  upon  the  sea-shore,  at  the  bottom  of  it.  There  was 
a  professional  Cicerone  always  attached  to  the  party  (which 
had  been  brought  over  from  London,  fifteen  or  twenty 
strong,  by  contract),  and  if  he  so  much  as  looked  at  Mrs. 
Davis,  she  invariably  cut  him  short  by  saying,  "There, 
God  bless  the  man,  don't  worrit  me!  I  don't  understand 
a  word  you  say,  and  shouldn't  if  you  was  to  talk  till  you 
was  black  in  the  face !  "  Mr.  Davis  always  had  a  snuff- 
coloured  great-coat  on,  and  carried  a  great  green  umbrella 
in  his  hand,  and  had  a  slow  curiosity  constantly  devouring 
him,  which  prompted  him  to  do  extraordinary  things,  such 
as  taking  the  covers  oif  urns  in  tombs,  and  looking  in  at 
the  ashes  as  if  they  were  pickles — and  tracing  out  inscrip- 
tions with  the  ferrule  of  his  umbrella,  and  saying,  with  in- 
tense thoughtfulness,  "Here's  a  B  you  see,  and  there's  a 
R,  and  this  is  the  way  we  goes  on  in ;  is  it !  "  His  anti- 
quarian habits  occasioned  his  being  frequently  in  the  rear 
of  the  rest;  and  one  of  the  agonies  of  Mrs.  Davis,  and  the 
party  in  general,  was  an  ever-present  fear  that  Davis  would 
be  lost.  This  caused  them  to  scream  for  him,  in  the  stran- 
gest places,  and  at  the  most  improper  seasons.  And  when 
he  came,  slowly  emerging  out  of  some  sepulchre  or  other, 
like  a  peaceful  Ghoule,  saying  "  Here  I  am !  "  Mrs.  Davis 
invariably  replied,  "You'll  be  biivied  aiive  in  a  foreign 
country,  Davis,  and  it's  no  use  trying  to  prevent  you!  " 

Mr.  and  Mrs.  Davis,  and  their  party,  had,  probably, 
been  brought  from  London  in  about  nine  or  ten  days. 
Eighteen  hundred  years  ago,  the  Roman  legions  under 
Claudius,  protested  against  being  led  into  Mr»  and  Mrs 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  121 

Davis's  country,  urging  that  it  lay  beyond  the  limits  of  the 
world. 

Among  what  may  be  called  the  Cubs  or  minor  Lions  of 
Rome,  there  was  one  that  amused  me  mightily.  It  is  al- 
ways to  be  found  there ;  and  its  den  is  on  the  great  flight 
of  steps  that  lead  from  the  Piazza  di  Spagna,  to  the  church 
of  Trinifa  del  Monte.  In  plainer  words,  these  steps 
are  the  great  place  of  resort  for  the  artists'  "  Models,"  and 
there  they  are  constantly  waiting  to  be  hired.  The  first 
time  I  went  up  there,  I  could  not  conceive  why  the  faces 
seemed  familiar  to  me ;  why  they  appeared  to  have  beset 
me,  for  years,  in  every  possible  variety  of  action  and  cos- 
tume ;  and  how  it  came  to  pass  that  they  started  up  before 
me,  in  Rome,  in  the  broad  day,  like  so  many  saddled 
and  bridled  nightmares.  I  soon  found  tliat  we  had  made 
acquaintance,  and  improved  it,  for  several  years,  on  the 
walls  of  various  Exhibition  Galleries.  There  is  one  old 
gentleman,  with  long  white  hair  and  an  immense  beard, 
who,  to  my  knowledge,  has  gone  half  through  the  catalogue 
of  the  Royal  Academy.  This  is  the  venerable,  or  patri- 
archal model.  He  carries  a  long  staff;  and  every  knot 
and  twist  in  that  staff  I  have  seen,  faithfully  delineated, 
innumerable  times.  There  is  another  man  in  a  blue  cloak, 
who  always  pretends  to  be  asleep  in  the  sun  (when  there  is 
any),  and  who,  I  need  not  say,  is  always  very  wide  awake, 
and  very  attentive  to  the  disposition  of  his  legs.  This 
is  the  dolce  far  niente  model.  There  is  another  man  in  a 
brown  cloak,  who  leans  against  a  wall,  with  his  arms  folded 
in  his  mantle,  and  looks  out  of  the  corners  of  his  eyes : 
which  are  just  visible  beneath  his  broad  slouched  hat. 
This  is  the  assassin  model.  There  is  another  man,  who 
constantly  looks  over  his  own  shoulder,  and  is  always  going 
away,  but  never  goes.  This  is  the  haughty,  or  scornful 
model.  As  to  Domestic  Happiness,  and  Holy  Families, 
they  should  come  very  cheap,  for  there  are  lumps  of  them, 
all  up  the  steps ;  and  the  cream  of  the  thing  is,  that  they 
are  all  the  falsest  vagabonds  in  the  world,  especially  made 
up  for  the  purpose,  and  having  no  counterparts  in  Rome 
or  any  other  part  of  the  habitable  globe. 

My  recent  mention  of  the  Carnival,  reminds  me  of  its 
being  said  to  be  a  mock  mourning  (in  the  ceremony  with 
which  it  closes),  for  the  gaieties  and  merry-makings  before 
Lent ;  and  this  again  reminds  me  of  the  real  funerals  and 


122  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

mourning  processions  of  Rome,  which,  like  those  in  most 
other  parts  of  Italy,  are  rendered  chiefly  remarkable  to  a 
Foreigner,  by  the  indifference  with  wliich  the  mere  clay  is 
universally  regarded,  after  life  has  left  it.  And  this  is  not 
from  the  survivors  having  had  time  to  dissociate  the  mem- 
ory of  tlie  dead  from  their  well-remembered  appearance 
and  form  on  earth ;  for  the  interment  follows  too  speedily 
after  death,  for  that :  almost  always  taking  place  within 
four-and-twenty  hours,  and,  sometimes,  within  twelve. 

At  Rome,  there  is  the  same  arrangement  of  Pits  in  a 
great,  bleak,  open,  dreary  space,  that  I  have  already  de- 
scribed as  existing  in  Genoa.  When  I  visited  it,  at  noon- 
day, I  saw  a  solitary  coffin  of  plain  deal :  uncovered  by  any 
shroud  or  pall,  and  so  slightly  made,  that  the  hoof  of  any 
wandering  mule  would  have  crushed  it  in :  carelessly  tum- 
bled down,  all  on  one  side,  on  the  door  of  one  of  the  pits — 
and  there  left,  by  itself,  in  the  wind  and  sunshine.  "How 
does  it  come  to  be  left  here? "  I  asked  the  man  who 
showed  me  the  place.  "  It  was  brought  here  half  an  hour 
ago,  Signor,"  he  said.  I  remembered  to  have  met  the  pro- 
cession, on  its  return:  straggling  away  at  a  good  round 
pace.  "  When  will  it  be  put  in  the  pit?  "  I  asked  him. 
"  When  the  cart  comes,  and  it  is  opened  to-night,"  he  said. 
"  How  much  does  it  cost  to  be  brought  here  in  this  way, 
instead  of  coming  in  the  cart?  "  I  asked  him.  "  Ten  scudi," 
he  said  (about  two  pounds,  two-and-sixpence,  English). 
"  The  other  bodies,  for  whom  nothing  is  paid,  are  taken  to 
the  church  of  the  Santa  Maria  della  Consolazione,"  he  con- 
tinued, "and  brought  here  altogether,  in  the  cart  at  night." 
I  stood,  a  moment,  looking  at  the  coffin,  which  had  two 
initial  letters  scrawled  upon  the  top;  and  turned  away, 
with  an  expression  in  my  face,  I  suppose,  of  not  much  lik- 
ing its  exposure  in  that  manner :  for  he  said,  shrugging  his 
shoulders  with  great  vivacity,  and  giving  a  pleasant  smile, 
"But  he's  dead,  Signore,  he's  dead.     Why  not?" 

Among  the  innumerable  churches,  there  is  one  I  must 
select  for  separate  mention.  It  is  the  church  of  the  Ara 
Coeli,  supposed  to  be  built  on  the  site  of  the  old  Temple  of 
Jupiter  Feretrius ;  and  approached,  on  one  side,  by  a  long 
steep  flight  of  steps,  which  seem  incomplete  without  some 
group  of  bearded  soothsayers  on  the  top.  It  is  remarkable 
for  the  possession  of  a  miraculous  liaiubino,  or  wooden 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  123 

doll,  representing  the  Infant  Saviour ;  and  I  first  saw  this 
miraculous  Bambino,  in  legal  phrase,  in  manner  following, 
that  is  to  say  : 

We  had  strolled  into  the  church  one  afternoon,  and  were 
looking  down  its  long  vista  of  gloomy  pillars  (for  all  these 
ancient  churches  built  upon  the  ruins  of  old  temples,  are 
dark  and  sad),  when  the  Brave  came  running  in,  with  a 
grin  upon  his  face  that  stretched  it  from  ear  to  ear,  and 
implored  us  to  follow  him,  without  a  moment's  delay,  as 
they  were  going  to  show  the  Bambino  to  a  select  party. 
We  accordingly  hurried  off  to  a  sort  of  chapel,  or  sacristy, 
hard  by  the  chief  altar,  but  not  in  the  church  itself,  where 
the  select  party,  consisting  of  two  or  three  Catholic  gentle- 
men and  ladies  (not  Italians),  were  already  assembled: 
and  where  one  hollow-cheeked  young  monk  was  lighting 
up  divers  candles,  while  another  was  putting  on  some 
clerical  robes  over  his  coarse  brown  habit.  The  candles 
were  on  a  kind  of  altar,  and  above  it  were  two  delectable 
figures,  such  as  you  would  see  at  any  English  fair,  repre- 
senting the  Holy  Virgin,  and  Saint  Joseph,  as  I  suppose, 
bending  in  devotion  over  a  wooden  box,  or  coffer;  which 
was  shut. 

The  hollow-cheeked  monk,  number  One,  having  finished 
lighting  the  candles,  went  down  on  his  knees,  in  a  corner; 
before  this  set-piece ;  and  the  monk  number  Two,  having 
put  on  a  pair  of  highly  ornamented  and  gold-bespattered 
gloves,  lifted  down  the  coffer,  with  great  reverence,  and 
set  it  on  the  altar.  Then,  with  many  genuflexions,  and 
muttering  certain  prayers,  he  opened  it,  and  let  down  the 
front,  and  took  off  sundry  coverings  of  satin  and  lace  from 
the  inside.  The  ladies  had  been  on  their  knees  from  the 
commencement;  and  the  gentlemen  now  dropped  down 
devoutly,  as  he  exposed  to  view  a  little  wooden  doll,  in 
face  very  like  General  Tom  Thumb,  the  American  Dwarf : 
gorgeously  dressed  in  satin  and  gold  lace,  and  actually 
blazing  with  rich  jewels.  There  was  scarcely  a  spot  upon 
its  little  breast,  or  neck,  or  stomach,  but  was  sparkling 
with  the  costly  offerings  of  the  Faithful.  Presently,  he 
lifted  it  out  of  the  box,  and  carrying  it  round  among  the 
kneelers,  set  its  face  against  the  forehead  of  every  one,  and 
tendered  its  clumsy  foot  to  them  to  kiss — a  ceremony  which 
they  all  performed  down  to  a  dirty  little  ragamuffin  of  a  boy 
who  had  walked  in  from  the  street.     When  this  was  done, 


124  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

he  laid  it  in  the  box  again :  and  the  company,  rising,  drew 
near,  and  commended  the  jewels  in  whispers.  In  good 
time,  he  replaced  the  coverings,  shut  up  the  box,  put  it 
back  in  its  place,  locked  up  the  whole  concern  (  Holy  Family 
and  all)  behind  a  pair  of  folding-doors ;  took  off  his  priestly 
vestments;  and  received  the  customary  "small  charge," 
while  his  companion,  by  means  of  an  extinguisher  fastened 
to  the  end  of  a  long  stick,  put  out  the  lights,  one  after 
another.  The  candles  being  all  extinguished,  and  the 
money  all  collected,  they  retired,  and  so  did  the  spectators. 

I  met  this  same  Bambino,  in  the  street  a  short  time 
afterwards,  going,  in  great  state,  to  the  house  of  some  sick 
person.  It  is  taken  to  all  parts  of  Eome  for  this  purpose, 
constantly ;  but,  I  understand  .that  it  is  not  always  as  suc- 
cessful as  could  be  wished ;  for,  making  its  appearance  at 
the  bedside  of  weak  and  nervous  people  in  extremity'-,  ac- 
companied by  a  numerous  escort,  it  not  unfrequently  fright- 
ens them  to  death.  It  is  most  popular  in  cases  of  child- 
birth, where  it  has  done  such  wonders,  that  if  a  lady  be 
longer  than  usual  in  getting  through  her  difficulties,  a  mes- 
senger is  despatched,  with  all  speed,  to  solicit  the  imme- 
diate attendance  of  the  Bambino.  It  is  a  very  valuable 
property,  and  much  confided  in — especially  by  the  religious 
body  to  whom  it  belongs. 

I  am  happy  to  know  that  it  is  not  considered  immacu- 
late, by  some  wlio  are  good  Catholics,  and  who  are  behind 
the  scenes,  from  what  was  told  me  by  the  near  relation  of 
a  Priest,  himself  a  Catholic,  and  a  gentleman  of  learning 
and  intelligence.  This  Priest  made  my  informant  promise 
that  he  ^.•ould,  on  no  account,  allow  the  Bambino  to  be 
borne  into  the  bedroom  of  a  sick  lady,  in  whom  they  were 
both  interested.  "For,"  said  he,  "if  they  (the  monks) 
trouble  her  with  it,  and  intrude  themselves  into  her  room, 
it  will  certainly  kill  her. "  My  informant  accordingly  looked 
out  of  the  window  when  it  came ;  and,  with  many  thanks, 
declined  to  open  the  door.  He  endeavoured,  in  another 
ease  of  which  he  had  no  other  knowledge  than  such  as  he 
gained  as  a  passer-by  at  the  moment,  to  prevent  its  being 
carried  into  a  small  unwholesome  chamber,  where  a  poor 
givl  was  dying.  But,  he  strove  against  it  unsuccessfully, 
and  she  expired  while  the  crowd  were  pressing  round  her 
bed. 

Among  the  people  who  drop  into  St.  Peter's  at  their 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  126 

leisure,  to  kneel  on  the  pavement,  and  say  a  quiet  prayer, 
there  are  certain  schools  and  seminaries,  priestly  and  other- 
wise, that  come  in,  twenty  or  thirty  strong.  These  boys 
always  kneel  down  in  single  file,  one  behind  the  other,  with 
a  tall  grim  master  in  a  black  gown,  bringing  up  the  rear : 
like  a  pack  of  cards  arranged  to  be  tumbled  down  at  a 
touch,  with  a  disproportionately  large  Knave  of  clubs  at 
the  end.  When  they  have  had  a  minute  or  so  at  the  chief 
altar,  they  scramble  up,  and  tiling  off  to  the  chapel  of  the 
Madonna,  or  the  sacrament,  flop  down  again  in  the  same 
order ;  so  that  if  anybody  did  stumble  against  the  master, 
a  general  and  sudden  overthrow  of  the  whole  line  must  in- 
evitably ensue. 

The  Scene  in  all  the  churches  is  the  strangest  possible. 
The  same  monotonous,  heartless,  drowsy  chanting,  always 
going  on ;  the  same  dark  building,  darker  from  the  bright' 
ness  of  the  street  without;  the  same  lamps  dimly  burning 5 
the  self-same  people  kneeling  here  and  there ;  turned  tow 
ards  you,  from  one  altar  or  other,  the  same  priest's  back, 
with  the  same  large  cross  embroidered  on  it;  however 
different  in  size,  in  shape,  in  wealth,  in  architecture,  this 
church  is  from  that,  it  is  the  same  thing  still.  There  are 
the  same  dirty  beggars  stopping  in  their  muttered  prayerS 
to  beg ;  the  same  miserable  cripples  exhibiting  their  de- 
formity at  the  doors ;  the  same  blind  men,  rattling  little 
pots  like  kitchen  pepper-castors:  their  depositories  for 
alms ;  the  same  preposterous  crowns  of  silver  stuck  upon 
the  painted  heads  of  single  saints  and  Virgins  in  crowded 
pictures,  so  that  a  little  figure  on  a  mountain  has  a  head- 
dress bigger  than  the  temple  in  the  foreground,  or  adjacent 
miles  of  landscape;  the  same  favourite  shrine  or  figure, 
smothered  with  little  silver  hearts  and  ciosses,  and  the  like : 
the  staple  trade  and  show  of  all  the  jewellers ;  the  same 
odd  mixture  of  respect  and  indecorum,  faith  and  phlegm : 
kneeling  on  the  stones,  and  spitting  on  them,  loudly;  get- 
ting up  from  prayers  to  beg  a  little,  or  to  pursue  some  other 
"worldly  matter :  and  then  kneeling  down  again,  to  resume 
the  contrite  supplication  at  the  point  where  it  was  inter- 
rupted. In  one  church,  a  kneeling  lady  got  up  from  her 
prayers,  for  a  moment,  to  offer  us  her  card,  as  a  teacher  of 
Music ;  and  in  another,  a  sedate  gentleman  with  a  very  thick 
walking-staff,  arose  from  his  devotions  to  belabour  his  dog, 
who  was  growling  at  another  dog :  and  whose  yelps  and 


126  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

howls  resounded  through  the  church,  as  his  master  quietly 
relapsed  into  his  former  train  of  meditation — keeping  his 
eye  upon  the  dog,  at  the  same  time,  nevertheless. 

Above  all,  there  is  always  a  receptacle  for  the  contribu- 
tions of  the  Faithful,  in  some  form  or  other.  Sometimes, 
it  is  a  money-box,  set  up  between  the  worshipper,  and  the 
wooden  life-size  figure  of  the  Redeemer ;  sometimes,  it  is  a 
little  chest  for  the  maintenance  of  the  Virgin ;  sometimes, 
an  appeal  on  behalf  of  a  popular  Bambino;  sometimes,  a 
bag  at  the  end  of  a  long  stick,  thrust  among  the  people 
here  and  there,  and  vigilantly  jingled  by  an  active  Sacris- 
tan ;  but  there  it  always  is,  and,  very  often,  in  many  shapes 
in  the  same  church,  and  doing  pretty- well  in  all.  Nor,  is 
it  wanting  in  the  open  air — the  streets  and  roads — for, 
often  as  you  are  walking  along,  thinking  about  anything 
rather  than  a  tin  canister,  that  object  pounces  upon  you 
from  a  little  house  by  the  wayside;  and  on  its  top  is 
painted,  "  For  the  Souls  in  Purgatory ; "  an  appeal  wliich 
the  bearer  repeats  a  great  many  times,  as  he  rattles  it  be- 
fore you,  much  as  Punch  rattles  the  cracked  bell  which  his 
sanguine  disposition  makes  an  organ  of. 

And  this  reminds  me  that  some  Roman  altars  of  peculiar 
sanctity,  bear  the  inscription,  "Every  mass  performed  at 
this  altar  frees  a  soul  from  Purgatory."  I  have  never  been 
able  to  find  out  the  charge  for  one  of  these  services,  but 
they  should  needs  be  expensive.  There  are  several  Crosses 
in  Rome  too,  the  kissing  of  which,  confers  indulgences  for 
varying  terms.  That  in  the  centre  of  the  Coliseum,  is 
worth  a  hundred  days ;  and  people  may  be  seen  kissing  it 
from  morning  to  night.  It  is  curious  that  some  of  these 
crosses  seem  to  acquire  an  arbitrary  popularity :  this  very 
one  among  them.  In  another  part  of  the  Coliseum  there 
is  a  cross  iipon  a  marble  slab,  with  the  inscription,  "  Who 
kisses  this  cross  shall  be  entitled  to  Two  hundred  and 
forty  days'  indulgence."  But  I  saw  no  one  person  kiss 
it,  though,  day  after  day,  I  sat  in  the  arena',  and  saw  scores 
upon  scores  of  peasants  pass  it,  on  their  way  to  kiss  the 
other. 

To  single  out  details  from  the  great  dream  of  Roman 
Churches,  would  be  the  wildest  occupation  in  the  world. 
But  St.  Stefano  Rotondo,  a  damp,  mildewed  vault  of  an  old 
church  in  the  outskirts  of  Rome,  will  alwaj's  struggle  up- 
permost in  my  mind,  by  reason  of  the  hideous  paintings 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  127 

with  which  its  walls  are  covered.  These  represent  the 
martyrdom  of  saiuts  and  early  Christians ;  and  such  a  pano- 
rajna  of  horror  and  butchery  no  man  could  imagine  in  his 
sleep,  though  he  were  to  eat  a  whole  pig  raw,  for  supper. 
Grey-bearded  men  being  boiled,  fried,  grilled,  crimped, 
singed,  eaten  by  wild  beasts,  worried  by  dogs,  buried  alive, 
torn  asunder  by  horses,  chopped  up  small  with  hatchets : 
women  having  their  breasts  torn  with  iron  pincers,  their 
tongues  cut  out,  their  ears  screwed  off,  their  jaws  broken, 
their  bodies  stretched  upon  the  rack,  or  skinned  upon  the 
stake,  or  crackled  up  and  melted  in  the  fire :  these  are 
among  the  mildest  subjects.  So  insisted  on,  and  laboured 
at,  besides,  that  every  sufferer  gives  you  the  same  occasion 
for  wonder  as  poor  old  Duncan  awoke,  in  Lady  Macbeth, 
when  she  marvelled  at  his  having  so  much  blood  in  him. 

There  is  an  upper  chamber  in  the  Mamertine  prisons, 
over  what  is  said  to  have  been — and  very  possibly  may 
have  been — the  dungeon  of  St.  Peter.  This  chamber  is 
now  fitted  up  as  an  oratory,  dedicated  to  that  saint ;  and  it 
lives,  as  a  distinct  and  separate  place,  in  my  recollection, 
too.  It  is  very  small  and  low-roofed ;  and  the  dread  and 
gloom  of  the  ponderous,  obdurate  old  prison  are  on  it,  as  if 
they  had  come  up  in  a  dark  mist  through  the  floor.  Hang- 
ing on  the  walls,  among  the  clustered  votive  offerings,  are 
objects,  at  once  strangely  in  keeping,  and  strangely  at  vari- 
ance, with  the  place — rusty  daggers,  knives,  pistols,  clubs, 
divers  instruments  of  violence  and  murder,  brought  here, 
fresh  from  use,  and  hung  up  to  propitiate  offended  Heaven : 
as  if  the  blood  upon  them  would  drain  off  in  consecrated 
air,  and  have  no  voice  to  cry  with.  It  is  all  so  silent  and 
so  close,  and  tomb-like ;  and  the  dimgeons  below  are  so 
black  and  stealthy,  and  stagnant,  and  naked;  that  this  lit- 
tle dark  spot  becomes  a  dream  within  a  dream :  and  in  the 
vision  of  great  churches  which  come  rolling  past  me  like 
a  sea,  it  is  a  small  wave  by  itself,  that  melts  into  no  other 
wave,  and  does  not  flow  on  with  the  rest. 

It  is  an  awful  thing  to  think  of  the  enormous  caverns 
that  are  entered  from  some  Roman  churches,  and  under- 
mine the  city.  Many  churches  have  crypts  and  subterra- 
nean chapels  of  great  size,  which,  in  the  ancient  time,  were 
baths,  and  secret  chambers  of  temples,  and  what  not ;  but 
I  do  not  speak  of  them.  Beneath  the  church  of  St.  Gio~ 
vanni  and  St.  Paolo,  there  are  the  jaws  of  a  terrific  range 


128  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

.of  caverns,  hewn  out  of  the  rock,  and  said  to  have  another 
outlet  underneath  the  Coliseum — tremendous  darknesses 
of  vast  extent,  half-buried  in  the  earth  and  unexplorable, 
where  the  dull  torches,  flashed  by  the  attendants,  glimmer 
down  long  ranges  of  distant  vaults  branching  to  the  right 
and  left,  like  streets  in  a  city  of  the  dead ;  and  show  the 
cold  damp  stealing  down  the  walls,  drip-drop,  drip-drop, 
to  join  the  pools  of  water  that  lie  here  and  there,  and  never 
saw,  and  never  will  see,  one  ray  of  the  sun.  Some  accounts 
make  these  the  prisons  of  the  wild  beasts  destined  for  the 
amphitheatre ;  some,  the  prisons  of  the  condemned  gladia- 
tors; some,  both.  But  the  legend  most  appalling  to  the 
fancy  is,  that  in  the  upper  range  (for  there  are  two  stories 
of  these  caves)  the  Early  Christians  destined  to  be  eaten  at 
the  Coliseum  Shows,  heard  the  wild  beasts,  hungry  for  them, 
roaring  down  below ;  until,  upon  the  night  and  solitude  of 
their  captivity,  there  burst  the  sudden  noon  and  life  of  the 
vast  theatre  crowded  to  the  parapet,  and  of  these,  their 
dreaded  neighbours,  bounding  in ! 

Below  the  church  of  San  Sebastiano,  two  miles  beyond 
the  gate  of  San  Sebastiano,  on  the  Appian  Way,  is  the  en- 
trance to  the  catacombs  of  Rome — quarries  in  the  old  time, 
but  afterwards  the  hiding-places  of  the  Christians.  These 
ghastly  passages  have  been  explored  for  twenty  miles ;  and 
form  a  chain  of  labyrinths,  sixty  miles  in  circumference. 

A  gaunt  Franciscan  friar,  with  a  wild  bright  eye,  was  our 
only  guide,  down  into  this  profound  and  dreadful  place. 
The  narrow  ways  and  openings  hither  and  thither,  coupled 
with  the  dead  and  heavy  air,  soon  blotted  out,  in  all  of  us, 
any  recollection  of  the  track  by  which  we  had  come ;  and  I 
could  not  help  thinking,  "  Good  Heaven,  if,  in  a  sudden  fit 
of  madness,  he  should  dash  the  torches  out,  or  if  he  should 
be  seized  with  a  fit,  what  would  become  of  us !  "  On  we 
wandered,  among  martyrs'  graves :  passing  great  subterra- 
nean vaulted  roads,  diverging  in  all  directions,  and  choked 
up  with  heaps  of  stones,  that  thieves  and  murderers  may 
not  take  refuge  there,  and  form  a  population  under  Rome, 
even  worse  than  that  which  lives  between  it  and  the  sun. 
Graves,  graves,  graves :  Graves  of  men,  of  women,  of  their 
little  children,  who  ran  crying  to  the  persecutors,  "  We  are 
Christians !  We  are  Christians !  "  that  they  might  be  mur- 
dered with  their  parents ;  Graves  with  the  palm  of  mart3rr- 
dom  roughly  cut  into  their  stone   boundaries,  and  little 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  129 

niches,  made  to  hold  a  vessel  of  the  martyrs'  blood ;  Graves 
of  some  who  lived  down  here,  for  years  together,  ministering 
to  the  rest,  and  preaching  truth,  and  hope,  and  comfort, 
from  the  rude  altars,  that  bear  witness  to  their  fortitude  at 
this  hour ;  more  roomy  graves,  but  far  more  terrible,  where 
hundreds,  being  surprised,  were  hemmed  in  and  walled  up : 
buried  before  Death,  and  killed  by  slow  starvation. 

"  The  Triumphs  of  the  Faith  are  not  above  ground  in  our 
splendid  churches,"  said  the  friar,  looking  round  upon 
us,  as  we  stopped  to  rest  in  one  of  the  low  passages,  with 
bones  and  dust  surrounding  us  on  every  side.  "  They  are 
here !  Among  the  Martyrs'  Graves !  "  He  was  a  gentle, 
earnest  man,  and  said  it  from  his  heart ;  but  when  I  thought 
how  Christian  men  have  dealt  with  one  another;  how,  per- 
verting our  most  merciful  religion,  they  have  hunted  down 
and  tortured,  burnt  and  beheaded,  strangled,  slaughtered, 
and  oppressed  each  other;  I  pictured  to  myself  an  agony 
surpassing  any  that  this  Dust  had  suffered  with  the  breath 
of  life  yet  lingering  in  it,  and  how  these  great  and  constant 
hearts  would  have  been  shaken — how  they  would  have 
quailed  and  drooped — if  a  fore-knowledge  of  the  deeds  that 
professing  Christians  would  commit  in  the  Great  Name  for 
which  they  died,  could  have  rent  them  with  its  own  unut- 
terable anguish,  on  the  cruel  wheel,  and  bitter  cross,  and 
in  the  fearful  fire. 

Such  are  the  spots  and  patches  in  my  dream  of  churches, 
that  remain  apart,  and  keep  their  separate  identity.  I 
have  a  fainter  recollection,  sometimes,  of  the  relics;  of  the 
fragment  of  the  pillar  of  the  Temple  that  was  rent  in  twain ; 
of  the  portion  of  the  table  that  was  spread  for  the  Last 
Supper ;  of  the  well  at  which  the  woman  of  Samaria  gave 
water  to  Our  Saviour ;  of  two  columns  from  the  house  of 
Pontius  Pilate;  of  the  stone  to  which  the  Sacred  hands 
were  bound,  when  the  scourging  was  performed;  of  the 
gridiron  of  Saint  Lawrence,  and  the  stone  below  it,  marked 
with  the  frying  of  his  fat  and  blood ;  these  set  a  shadowy 
mark  on  some  cathedrals,  as  an  old  story,  or  a  fable  might, 
and  stop  them  for  an  instant,  as  they  flit  before  me.  The 
rest  is  a  vast  wilderness  of  consecrated  buildings  of  all 
shapes  and  fancies,  blending  one  with  another ;  of  battered 
pillars  of  old  Pagan  temples,  dug  up  from  the  ground,  and 
forced,  like  giant  captives,  to  support  the  roofs  of  Christian 
churches;  of  pictures,  bad,  and  wonderful,  and  impious, 
9 


J  30  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

and  ridiculous ;  of  kneeling  people,  curling  incense,  tink- 
ling bells,  and  sometimes  (but  not  often)  of  a  swelling 
organ :  of  Madonne,  with  their  breasts  stuck  full  of  swords, 
arranged  in  a  half-circle  like  a  modern  fan ;  of  actual  skele- 
tons of  dead  saints,  hideously  attired  in  gaudy  satins,  silks, 
and  velvets  trimmed  with  gold :  their  withered  crust  of 
skull  adorned  with  precious  jewels,  or  with  chaplets  of 
crushed  flowers ;  sometimes,  of  people  gathered  round  the 
pulpit,  and  a  monk  within  it  stretching  out  the  crucifix, 
and  preaching  fiercely :  the  sun  just  streaming  down  through 
some  high  window  on  the  sail-cloth  stretched  above  him 
and  across  the  church,  to  keep  his  high-pitched  voice  from 
being  lost  among  the  echoes  of  the  roof.  Then  my  tired 
memory  comes  out  upon  a  flight  of  steps,  where  knots  of 
people  are  asleep,  or  basking  in  the  light ;  and  strolls  away, 
among  the  rags,  and  smells,  and  palaces,  and  hovels,  of  an 
old  Italian  street. 

On  one  Saturday  morning  (the  eighth  of  March)  a  man 
was  beheaded  here.  Nine  or  ten  months  before,  he  had 
waylaid  a  Bavarian  countess,  travelling  as  a  pilgrim  to 
Rome — alone  and  on  foot,  of  course — and  performing,  it  is 
said,  that  act  of  piety  for  the  fourth  time.  He  saw  her 
change  a  piece  of  gold  at  Viterbo,  where  he  lived ;  followed 
her;  bore  her  company  on  her  journey  for  some  forty  miles 
or  more,  on  the  treacherous  pretext  of  protecting  her; 
attacked  her,  in  the  fulfilment  of  his  unrelenting  purpose, 
on  the  Campagna,  within  a  very  short  distance  of  Rome,  near 
to  what  is  called  (but  what  is  not)  the  Tomb  of  Nero ;  robbed 
her ;  and  beat  her  to  death  with  her  own  pilgrim's  staff.  He 
was  newly  married,  and  gave  some  of  her  apparel  to  his 
wife :  saying  that  he  had  bought  it  at  a  fair.  She,  however, 
who  had  seen  the  pilgrim-countess  passing  through  their 
town,  recognised  some  trifle  as  having  belonged  to  her. 
Her  husband  then  told  her  what  he  had  done.  She,  in  con- 
fession, told  a  priest;  and  the  man  was  taken,  within  four 
days  after  the  commission  of  the  murder. 

There  are  no  fixed  times  for  the  aduainistration  of  justice, 
or  its  execution,  in  this  unaccountable  country ;  and  he  had 
been  in  prison  ever  since.  On  the  Friday,  as  he  was  din- 
ing with  the  other  prisoners,  they  came  and  told  him  he 
was  to  be  beheaded  next  morning,  and  took  him  away.  It 
is  very  unusual  to  execute  in  Lent ;  but  his  crime  being  a 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  131 

very  bad  one,  it  was  deemed  advisable  to  make  an  example 
of  liim  at  that  time,  when  great  numbers  of  pilgrims  were 
coming  towards  Rome,  from  all  parts,  for  the  Holy  Week. 
I  heard  of  this  on  the  Friday  evening,  and  saw  the  bills  up 
at  the  churches,  calling  on  the  people  to  pray  for  the  crimi- 
nal's soul.     So,  I  determined  to  go,  and  see  him  executed. 

The  beheading  was  appointed  for  fourteen  and  a-half 
o'clock,  Roman  time:  or  a  quarter  before  nine  in  the  fore- 
noon. I  had  two  friends  with  me ;  and  as  we  did  not  know 
but  that  the  crowd  might  be  very  great,  we  were  on  the 
spot  by  half-past  seven.  The  place  of  execution  was  near 
the  church  of  San  Giovanni  decollato  (a  doubtful  compli- 
ment to  Saint  Jolin  the  Baptist)  in  one  of  the  impassable 
back  streets  without  any  footway,  of  which  a  great  part  of 
Rome  is  composed — a  street  of  rotten  houses,  which  do  not 
seem  to  belong  to  anybody,  and  do  not  seem  to  have  ever 
been  inhabited,  and  certainly  were  never  built  on  any  plan, 
or  for  any  particular  purpose,  and  have  no  window-sashes, 
and  are  a  little  like  deserted  breweries,  and  might  be  ware- 
houses but  for  having  nothing  in  them.  Opposite  to  one  of 
these,  a  white  house,  the  scalfold  was  built.  An  untidy, 
unpainted,  uncouth,  crazy-looking  thing,  of  course :  some 
seven  feet  high,  perhaps:  with  a  tall,  gallows-shaped  frame 
rising  above  it,  in  which  was  the  knife,  charged  with  a  pon- 
derous mass  of  iron,  all  ready  to  descend,  and  glittering 
brightly  in  the  morning  sun,  whenever  it  looked  out,  now 
and  then,  from  behind  a  cloud. 

There  were  not  many  people  lingering  about;  and  these 
were  kept  at  a  considerable  distance  from  the  scaffold, 
by  parties  of  the  Pope's  dragoons.  Two  or  three  hundred 
foot-soldiers  were  vunler  arms,  standing  at  ease  in  clusters 
here  and  there;  and  the  officers  were  walking  up  and 
down  in  twos  and  threes,  chatting  together,  and  smoking 
cigars. 

At  the  end  of  the  street,  was  an  open  space,  where  there 
would  be  a  dust-heap,  and  piles  of  broken  crockery,  and 
mounds  of  vegetable  refuse,  but  for  such  things  being 
thrown  anywhere  and  everywhere  in  Rome,  and  favouring 
no  particular  sort  of  locality.  We  got  into  a  kind  of  wash- 
house,  belonging  to  a  dwelling-house  on  this  spot;  and 
standing  there  in  an  old  cart,  and  on  a  heap  of  cart-wheels 
piled  against  the  wall,  looked,  through  a  large  grated  win- 
dow, at  the  scaffold,  and  straight  down  the  street  beyond 


132  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

it,  until,  in  consequence  of  its  turning  off  abruptly  to  the 
left,  our  perspective  was  brought  to  a  sudden  termination, 
and  had  a  corpulent  officer,  in  a  cocked  hat,  for  its  crown- 
ing feature. 

Nine  o'clock  struck,  and  ten  o'clock  struck,  and  nothing 
happened.  All  the  bells  of  all  the  churches  rang  as  usual. 
A  little  parliament  of  dogs  assembled  in  the  open  space, 
and  chased  each  other,  in  and  out  among  the  soldiers. 
Fierce-looking  Romans  of  the  lowest  class,  in  blue  cloaks, 
russet  cloaks,  and  rags  uncloaked,  came  and  went,  and 
talked  together.  Women  and  children  fluttered,  on  the 
skirts  of  the  scanty  crowd.  One  large  muddy  spot  was  left 
quite  bare,  like  a  bald  place  on  a  man's  head.  A  cigar- 
merchant,  with  an  earthen  pot  of  charcoal  ashes  in  one  hand, 
went  up  and  down,  crying  his  wares.  A  pastry-merchant 
divided  his  attention  between  the  scaffold  and  his  custom- 
ers. Boys  tried  to  climb  up  walls,  and  tumbled  down 
again.  Priests  and  monks  elbowed  a  passage  for  them- 
selves among  the  people,  and  stood  on  tiptoe  for  a  sight  of 
the  knife:  then  went  away.  Artists,  in  inconceivable  hats 
of  the  middle-ages,  and  beards  (thank  Heaven !)  of  no  age 
at  all,  flashed  picturesque  scowls  about  them  from  their 
stations  in  the  throng.  One  gentleman  (connected  with 
the  fine  arts,  I  presume)  went  up  and  down  in  a  pair  of 
Hessian  boots,  with  a  red  beard  hanging  down  on  his  breast, 
and  his  long  and  bright  red  hair,  plaited  into  two  tails, 
one  on  either  side  of  his  head,  which  fell  over  his  shoul- 
ders in  front  of  him,  very  nearly  to  his  waist,  and  were 
carefully  entwined  and  braided ! 

Eleven  o'clock  struck;  and  still  nothing  happened.  A 
rumour  got  about,  among  the  crowd,  that  the  criminal 
would  not  confess ;  in  which  case,  the  priest  would  keep 
him  until  the  Ave  Maria  (sunset) ;  for  it  is  their  merciful 
custom  never  finally  to  turn  the  crucifix  away  from  a  man 
at  that  pass,  as  one  refusing  to  be  shriven,  and  consequently 
a  sinner  abandoned  of  the  Saviour,  until  then.  People 
began  to  drop  off.  The  officers  shrugged  their  shoulders 
and  looked  doubtful.  The  dragoons,  who  came  riding  up 
below  our  window,  every  now  and  then,  to  order  an  unlucky 
hackney-coach  or  cart  away,  as  soon  as  it  had  comfortably 
established  itself,  and  was  covered  with  exulting  people 
(but  never  before),  became  imperious,  and  quick-tempered. 
The  bald  place  hadn't  a  straggling  hair  upon  itj  and  the 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  133 

corpulent  officer,  crowning  the  perspective,  took  a  world  of 
snuff. 

Suddenly,  there  was  a  noise  of  trumpets.  "  Attention !  " 
was  auiong  the  foot-soldiers  instantly.  They  were  marched 
up  to  the  scaffold  and  formed  round  it.  The  dragoons  gal- 
loped to  their  nearer  stations  too.  The  guillotine  became 
the  centre  of  a  wood  of  bristling  bayonets  and  shining  sa- 
bres. The  people  closed  round  nearer,  on  the  flank  of  the 
soldiery.  A  long  straggling  stream  of  men  and  boys, 
who  had  accompanied  the  procession  from  the  prison,  came 
pouring  into  the  open  space.  The  bald  spot  was  scarcely 
distinguishable  from  the  rest.  The  cigar  and  pastry-mer- 
chants resigned  all  thoughts  of  business,  for  the  moment, 
and  abandoning  themselves  wholly  to  pleasure,  got  good 
situations  in  the  crowd.  The  perspective  ended,  now,  in  a 
troop  of  dragoons.  And  the  corpulent  officer,  sword  in 
hand,  looked  hard  at  a  church  close  to  him,  which  he  could 
see,  but  we,  the  crowd,  could  not. 

After  a  short  delay,  some  monks  were  seen  approaching 
to  the  scaffold  from  this  church ;  and  above  their  heads, 
coming  on  slowly  and  gloomily,  the  effigy  of  Christ  upon 
the  cross,  canopied  with  black.  This  was  carried  round 
the  foot  of  the  scaffold,  to  the  front,  and  turned  towards 
the  crimhial,  that  he  might  see  it  to  the  last.  It  was 
hardly  in  its  place,  when  he  appeared  on  the  platform,  bare- 
footed; his  hands  bound;  and  with  the  collar  and  neck 
of  his  shirt  cut  away,  almost  to  the  shoulder.  A  young 
man — six-and-tweuty — vigorously  made,  and  well-shaped. 
Face  pale;  small  dark  moustache;  and  dark  brown  hair. 

He  had  refused  to  confess,  it  seemed,  without  first  hav- 
ing his  wife  brought  to  see  him ;  and  they  had  sent  an  es- 
cort for  her,  which  had  occasioned  the  delay. 

He  immediately  kneeled  down,  below  the  knife.  His 
neck  fitting  into  a  hole,  made  for  the  purpose,  in  a  cross 
plank,  was  shut  down,  by  another  plank  above;  exactly 
like  the  pillory.  Immediately  below  him  was  a  leathern 
bag      And  into  it  his  head  rolled  instantly. 

The  executioner  was  holding  it  by  the  hair,  and  walking 
with  it  round  the  scaffold,  showing  it  to  the  people,  before 
one  quite  knew  that  the  knife  had  fallen  heavily,  and  with 
a  rattling  sound. 

When  it  had  travelled  round  the  four  sides  of  the  scaf- 
fold, it  was  set  upon  a  pole  in  front — a  little  patch  of  black 


134  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

and  white,  for  the  long  street  to  stare  at,  and  the  flies  to 
settle  on.  The  eyes  were  turned  upward,  as  if  he  had 
avoided  the  sight  of  the  leathern  bag,  and  looked  to  the 
crucifix.  Every  tinge  and  hue  of  life  had  left  it  in  that 
instant.     It  was  dull,  cold,  livid,  wax      The  body  also 

There  was  a  great  deal  of  blood.  When  we  left  the 
window,  and  went  close  up  to  the  scaffold,  it  was  very  dirty ; 
one  of  the  two  men  who  were  throwing  water  over  it,  turn- 
ing to  help  the  other  lift  the  body  into  a  shell,  picked  his 
way  as  through  mire.  A  strange  appearance  was  the 
apparent  annihilation  of  the  neck.  The  head  was  taken 
off  so  close,  that  it  seemed  as  if  the  knife  had  narrowly 
escaped  crushing  the  jaw,  or  shaving  off  the  ear;  and 
the  body  looked  as  if  there  were  nothing  left  above  the 
shoulder 

Nobody  cared,  or  was  at  all  affected.  There  was  no 
manifestation  of  disgust,  or  pity,  or  indignation,  or  sorrow. 
My  empty  pockets  were  tried,  several  times,  in  the  crowd 
immediately  below  the  scaffold,  as  the  corpse  was  being 
put  into  its  coffin.  It  was  an  ugly,  filthy,  careless,  sicken- 
ing spectacle;  meaning  nothing  but  butchery  beyond  the 
momentary  interest,  to  the  one  wretched  '  actor  Yes ! 
Such  a  sight  has  one  meaning  and  one  warning  Let  me 
not  forget  it.  The  speculators  in  the  lottery,  station  them- 
selves at  favourable  points  for  counting  the  gouts  of  blood 
that  spirt  out,  here  or  there ;  and  buy  that  number.  It  is 
pretty  sure  to  have  a  run  upon  it. 

The  body  was  carted  away  in  due  time,  the  knife 
cleansed,  the  scaffold  taken  down,  and  all  the  hideous  ap. 
paratus  removed.  The  executioner:  an  outlaw  ex  officio 
(what  a  satire  on  the  Punishment!)  who  dare  not,  for  his 
life,  cross  the  Bridge  of  St.  Angelo  but  to  do  his  work;  re- 
treated to  his  lair,  and  the  show  was  over. 

At  the  head  of  the  collections  in  the  palaces  of  Rome, 
the  Vatican,  of  course,  with  its  treasures  of  art,  its  enor- 
mous galleries,  and  staircases,  and  suites  upon  suites  of 
immense  chambers,  ranks  highest  and  stands  foremost. 
Many  most  noble  statues,  and  wonderful  pictures,  are  there ; 
nor  is  it  heresy  to  say  that  there  is  a  considerable  amount 
of  rubbish  there,  too.  When  any  old  piece  of  sculpture 
dug  out  of  the  ground,  finds  a  place  in  a  gallery  because  it 
is  old,  and  without  any  reference  to  its  intrinsic  merits: 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  135 

and  finds  admirers  by  the  hundred,  because  it  is  there,  and 
for  no  other  reason  on  earth :  there  will  be  no  lack  of  ob- 
jects, very  indifferent  in  the  plain  eyesight  of  any  one  who 
employs  so  vulgar  a  property,  when  he  may  wear  the  spec- 
tacles of  Cant  for  less  than  nothing,  and  establish  himself 
as  a  man  of  taste  for  the  mere  trouble  of  putting  them  on. 

I  unreservedly  confess,  for  myself,  that  I  cannot  leave 
my  natural  perception  of  what  is  natural  and  true,  at  a 
palace-door,  in  Italy  or  elsewhere,  as  I  should  leave  my 
shoes  if  I  were  travelling  in  the  East.  I  cannot  forget  that 
there  are  certain  expressions  of  face,  natural  to  certain  pas- 
sions, and  as  unchangeable  in  their  nature  as  the  gait  of  a 
lion,  or  the  flight  of  an  eagle.  I  cannot  dismiss  from  my 
certain  knowledge,  such  common-place  facts  as  the  ordinary 
proportion  of  men's  arms,  and  legs,  and  heads;  and  when 
I  meet  with  performances  that  do  violence  to  these  experi- 
ences and  recollections,  no  matter  where  they  may  be,  I 
cannot  honestly  admire  them,  and  think  it  best  to  say  so; 
in  spite  of  high  critical  advice  that  we  should  sometimes 
feign  an  admiration,  though  we  have  it  not. 

Therefore,  I  freely  acknowledge  that  when  I  see  a  Jolly 
young  Waterman  representing  a  cherubim,  or  a  Barclay 
and  Perkins's  Drayman  depicted  as  an  Evangelist,  I  see 
nothing  to  commend  or  admire  in  the  performance,  how- 
ever great  its  reputed  Painter.  Neither  am  I  partial  to 
libellous  Angels,  who  play  on  fiddles  and  bassoons,  for  the 
edification  of  sprawling  monks  apparently  in  liquor.  Nor 
to  those  Monsieur  Tonsons  of  galleries.  Saint  Francis  and 
Saint  Sebastian ;  both  of  whom  I  submit  should  have  very 
uncommon  and  rare  merits,  as  works  of  art,  to  justify  their 
compound  multiplication  by  Italian  Painters. 

It  seems  to  me,  too,  that  the  indiscriminate  and  deter- 
mined raptures  in  which  some  critics  indulge,  is  incompat- 
ible with  the  true  appreciation  of  the  really  great  and  tran- 
scendent works.  I  cannot  imagine,  for  example,  how  the 
resolute  champion  of  undeserving  pictures  can  soar  to  the 
amazing  beauty  of  Titian's  great  picture  of  the  Assump- 
tion of  the  Virgin  at  Venice ;  or  how  the  man  who  is  truly 
affected  by  the  sublimity  of  that  exquisite  production,  or 
who  is  truly  sensible  of  the  beauty  of  Tintoretto's  great 
picture  of  the  Assembly  of  the  Blessed  in  the  sanie  place, 
can  discern  in  Michael  Angelo'sLast  Judgment,  in  the  Sis- 
tine  chapel,  any  general  idea,  or  one  pervading  thought,  in 


136  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

harmony  with  the  stupendous  subject.  He  who  will  con- 
template Kaphael's  masterpiece,  the  Transfiguration,  and 
will  go  away  into  another  chamber  of  that  same  Vatican, 
and  contemplate  another  design  of  Kaphael,  representing 
(in  incredible  caricature)  the  miraculous  stopping  of  a  great 
fire  by  Leo  the  Fourth — and  who  will  say  that  he  admires 
them  both,  as  works  of  extraordinary  genius — must,  as  I 
think,  be  wanting  in  his  powers  of  perception  in  one  of 
the  two  instances,  and,  probably,  in  the  high  and  lofty 
one. 

It  is  easy  to  suggest  a  doubt,  but  I  have  a  great  doubt 
whether,  sometimes,  the  rules  of  art  are  not  too  strictly 
observed,  and  whether  it  is  quite  well  or  agreeable  that  we 
should  know  beforehand,  where  this  figure  will  be  turning 
round,  and  where  that  figure  will  be  lying  down,  and 
where  there  will  be  drapery  in  folds,  and  so  forth.  "\Vhen 
I  observe  heads  inferior  to  the  subject,  in  pictures  of  merit, 
in  Italian  galleries,  I  do  not  attach  that  reproach  to  the 
Painter,  for  I  have  a  suspicion  that  these  great  men,  who 
were,  of  necessity,  very  much  in  the  hands  of  monks  and 
priests,  painted  monks  and  priests  a  great  deal  too  often. 
I  frequently  see,  in  pictures  of  real  power,  heads  quite  be- 
low the  story  and  the  painter :  and  I  invariably  observe 
that  those  heads  are  of  the  Convent  stamp,  and  have  their 
counterparts  among  the  Convent  inmates  of  this  hour;  so, 
I  have  settled  with  myself  that,  in  such  cases,  the  lame- 
ness was  not  with  the  painter,  but  with  the  vanity  and  ig- 
norance of  certain  of  his  employers,  who  would  be  Apostles 
— on  canvas,  at  all  events. 

The  exquisite  grace  and  beauty  of  Canova's  statues ;  the 
wondering  gravity  and  repose  of  many  of  the  ancfent  works 
in  sculpture,  both  in  the  Capitol  and  the  Vatican ;  and  the 
strength  and  fire  of  many  others ;  are,  in  their  different 
ways,  beyond  all  reach  of  words.  They  are  especially 
impressive  and  delightful,  after  the  works  of  Bernini  and 
his  disciples,  in  which  the  churches  of  Rome,  from  St. 
Peter's  downward,  abound;  and  which  are,  I  verily  be- 
lieve, the  most  detestable  class  of  productions  in  the  wide 
world.  I  would  infinitely  rather  (as  mere  works  of  art) 
look  upon  the  three  deities  of  the  Past,  the  Present,  and 
the  Future,  in  the  Chinese  Collection,  than  upon  the  best  of 
these  breezy  maniacs ;  whose  every  fold  of  drapery  is  blown 
inside-out;  whose  smallest  vein,  or  artery,  is  as  big  as  an 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  137 

ordinary  forefinger;  whose  hair  is  like  a  nest  of  lively 
snakes ;  and  whose  attitudes  put  all  other  extravagance  to 
shame.  Insomuch  that  I  do  honestly  believe,  there  can  be 
no  place  in  the  world,  where  such  intolerable  abortions, 
begotten  of  the  sculptor's  chisel,  are  to  be  found  in  such 
profusion,  as  in  Rome. 

There  is  a  fine  collection  of  Egyptian  antiquities,  in  the 
Vatican ;  and  the  ceilings  of  the  rooms  in  which  they  are 
arranged,  are  painted  to  represent  a  starlight  sky  in  the 
Desert.  It  may  seem  an  odd  idea,  but  it  is  very  effective. 
The  grim,  half-human  monsters  from^  the  temples,  look 
more  grim  and  monstrous  underneath  the  deep  dark  blue ; 
it  sheds  a  strange  uncertain  gloomy  air  on  everything — a 
mystery  adapte'd  to  the  objects;  and  you  leave  them,  as 
you  find  them,  shrouded  in  a  solemn  night. 

In  the  private  palaces,  pictures  are  seen  to  the  best  ad- 
vantage. There  are  seldom  so  many  in  one  place  that  the 
attention  need  become  distracted,  or  the  eye  confused.  You 
see  them  very  leisurely ;  and  are  rarely  interrupted  by  a 
crowd  of  people.  There  are  portraits  innumerable,  by  Ti- 
tian, and  Rembrandt,  and  Vandyke;  heads  by  Guido,  and 
Domenichino,  and  Carlo  Dolci;  various  subjects  byCorreg- 
gio,  and  Murillo,  and  Raphael,  and  Salvator  Rosa,  and 
Spagnoletto — many  of  which  it  would  be  difficult,  indeed, 
to  praise  too  highly,  or  to  praise  enough ;  such  is  their 
tenderness  and  grace;  their  noble  elevation,  purity,  and 
beauty. 

The  portrait  of  Beatrice  di  Cenci,  in  the  Palazzo  Barbe- 
rini,  is  a  picture  almost  impossible  to  be  forgotten.  Through 
the  transcendent  sweetness  and  beauty  of  the  face,  there  is 
a  something  shining  out,  that  haunts  me.  I  see  it  now,  as  I 
see  this  paper,  or  my  pen.  The  head  is  loosely  draped  in 
white ;  the  light  hair  falling  down  below  the  linen  folds. 
She  has  turned  suddenly  towards  you ;  and  there  is  an  ex- 
pression in  tlie  eyes — although  they  are  very  tender  and 
gentle — as  if  the  wildness  of  a  momentary  terror,  or  distrac- 
tion, had  been  struggled  with  and  overcome,  that  instant; 
and  nothing  but  a  celestial  hope,  and  a  beautiful  sorrow,  and 
a  desolate  earthly  helplessness  remained.  Some  stories  say 
that  Guido  painted  it,  the  night  before  her  execution ;  some 
other  stories,  that  he  painted  it  from  memory,  after  having 
seen  her,  on  her  way  to  the  scaffold.  I  am  willmg  to  be- 
lieve that,  as  you  see  her  on  his  canvas,  so  she  turned  tow- 


138  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

ards  him,  in  the  crowd,  from  the  first  sight  of  the  axe,  and 
stamped  upon  his  mind  a  look  which  he  has  stamped  on 
mine  as  though  I  had  stood  beside  him  in  the  concourse. 
The  guilty  palace  of  the  Cenci :  blighting  a  whole  quarter 
of  the  town,  as  it  stands  withering  away  by  grains :  had 
that  face,  to  my  fancy,  in  its  dismal  porch,  and  at  its  black 
blind  windows,  and  flitting  up  and  down  its  dreary  stairs, 
and  growing  out  of  the  darkness  of  its  ghostly  galleries. 
The  History  is  written  in  the  Painting;  written,  in  the  dy- 
ing girl's  face,  by  Nature's  own  hand.  And  oh!  how  in 
that  one  touch  she  puts  to  flight  (instead  of  making  kin) 
the  puny  world  that  claim  to  be  related  to  her,  in  right  of 
poor  conventional  forgeries ! 

I  saw  in  the  Palazzo  Spada,  the  statue  of  Pompey ;  the 
statue  at  whose  base  Caesar  fell.  A  stern,  tremendous 
figure !  I  imagined  one  of  greater  finish :  of  the  last  re- 
finement :  full  of  delicate  touches :  losing  its  distinctness, 
in  the  giddy  eyes  of  one  whose  blood  was  ebbing  before  it, 
and  settling  into  some  such  rigid  majesty  as  this,  as  Death 
came  creeping  over  the  upturned  face. 

The  excursions  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Rome  are 
charming,  and  would  be  full  of  interest  were  it  only  for  the 
changing  views  they  afford,  of  the  wild  Campagna.  But, 
every  inch  of  ground,  in  every  direction,  is  rich  in.  associa- 
tions, and  in  natural  beauties.  There  is  Albano,  with  its 
lovely  lake  and  wooded  shore,  and  with  its  wine,  that  cer- 
tainly has  not  improved  since  the  days  of  Horace,  and  in 
these  times  hardly  justifies  his  panegyric.  There  is  squalid 
Tivoli,  with  the  river  Anio,  diverted  from  its  course,  and 
plunging  down,  headlong,  some  eighty  feet  in  search  of  it. 
With  its  picturesque  Temple  of  the  Sibyl,  perched  high  on 
a  crag ;  its  minor  waterfalls  glancing  and  sparkling  in  the 
sun ;  and  one  good  cavern  yawniiig  darkly,  where  the  river 
takes  a  fearful  plunge  and  shoots  on,  low  down  under  beet- 
ling rocks.  There,  too,  is  the  Villa  d'Este,  deserted  and 
decaying  among  groves  of  melancholy  pine  and  cypress- 
trees,  where  it  seems  to  lie  in  state.  Then,  there  is  Fra- 
scati,  and,  on  the  steep  above  it,  the  ruins  of  Tusculum, 
where  Cicero  lived,  and  wrote,  and  adorned  his  favourite 
house  (some  fi-agments  of  it  may  yet  be  seen  there),  and 
where  Cato  was  born.  We  saw  its  ruined  amphitheatre  on 
a  grey  dull  day,  when  a  shrill  March  wind  was  blowing, 
and  when  the  scattered  stones  of  the  old  city  lay  strewn 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  139 

about  the  lonely  einineiice,  as  desolate  and  dead  as  the 
ashes  of  a  long  extinguished  fire. 

One  day  we  walked  out,  a  little  party  of  three,  to  Albano, 
fourteen  miles  distant;  possessed  by  a  great  desire  to  go 
there  hy  the  ancient  Appian  Way,  long  since  ruined  and 
overgrown.  We  started  at  half-past  seven  in  the  morning, 
and  within  an  hour  or  so  were  out  upon  the  open  Campagna. 
For  twelve  miles  we  went  climbing  on,  over  an  unbroken 
succession  of  mounds,  and  heaps,  and  hills,  of  ruin. 
Tombs  and  temples,  overthrown  and  prostrate ;  small  frag- 
ments of  columns,  friezes,  pediments;  great  blocks  of 
granite  and  marble ;  mouldering  arches,  grass-grown  and 
decayed ;  ruin  enough  to  build  a  spacious  city  from ;  lay 
strewn  about  us.  Sometimes,  loose  walls,  built  up  from 
these  fragments  by  the  shepherds,  came  across  our  path ; 
sometimes,  a  ditch  between  two  mounds  of  broken  stones, 
obstructed  our  progress;  sometimes,  the  fragments  them- 
selves, rolling  from  beneath  our  feet,  made  it  a  toilsome 
matter  to  advance;  but  it  was  always  ruin.  Now,  we 
tracked  a  piece  of  the  old  road,  above  the  ground;  now 
traced  it,  underneath  a  grassy  covering,  as  if  that  were  its 
grave ;  but  all  the  way  was  ruin.  In  the  distance,  ruined 
aqueducts  went  stalking  on  their  giant  course  along  the 
plain ;  and  every  breath  of  wind  that  swept  towards  us, 
stirred  early  flowers  and  grasses,  springing  up,  spontane- 
ously, on  miles  of  ruin.  The  unseen'  larks  above  us,  who 
alone  disturbed  the  awful  silence,  had  their  nests  in  ruin ; 
and  the  fierce  herdsmen,  clad  in  sheepskins,  who  now  and 
then  scowled  out  upon  us  from  their  sleeping  nooks,  were 
housed  in  ruin.  The  aspect  of  the  desolate  Campagna  in 
one  direction,  where  it  was  most  level,  reminded  me  of  an 
American  prairie;  but  what  is  the  solitude  of  a  region 
where  men  have  never  dwelt,  to  that  of  a  Desert,  where  a 
mighty  race  have  left  their  foot-prints  in  the  earth  from 
which  they  have  vanished ;  where  the  resting-places  of  their 
Dead,  have  fallen  like  their  Dead;  and  the  broken  hour- 
glass of  Time  is  but  a  heap  of  idle  dust !  Returning,  by 
the  road,  at  sunset;  and  looking,  from  the  distance,  on  the 
course  we  had  taken  in  the  morning,  I  almost  felt  (as  I 
had  felt  when  I  first  saw  it,  at  that  hour)  as  if  the  sun 
would  never  rise  again,  but  looked  its  last,  that  night, 
upon  a  ruined  world. 

To  come  again  on  Rome,  by  moonlight,  after  such  an  ex- 


140  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

pedition,  is  a  fitting  close  to  such  a  day.  The  narrow 
streets,  devoid  of  footways,  and  choked,  in  every  obscure 
corner,  by  heaps  of  dunghill-rubbish,  contrast  so  strongly, 
in  their  cramped  dimensions,  and  their  tilth,  and  darkness, 
with  the  broad  square  before  some  haughty  church :  in  the 
centre  of  which,  a  hieroglyphic-covered  obelisk,  brought 
from  Egypt  in  the  days  of  tlie  Emperors,  looks  strangely 
on  the  foreign  scene  about  it;  or  perhaps  an  ancient  pillar, 
■with  its  honoured  statue  overthrown,  supports  a  Christian 
saint :  Marcus  Aurelius  giving  place  to  Paul,  and  Trajan  to 
St  Peter.  Then,  there  are  the  ponderous  buildings  reared 
from  the  spoliation  of  the  Coliseum,  shutting  out  the  moon, 
like  mountains :  while  here  and  there,  are  broken  arches 
and  rent  walls,  through  which  it  gushes  freely,  as  the  life 
comes  pouring  from  a  wound.  The  little  town  of  miserable 
houses,  walled,  and  shut  in  by  barred  gates,  is  the  quarter 
where  the  Jews  are  locked  up  nightly,  when  the  clock 
strikes  eight — a  miserable  place,  densely  populated,  and 
reeking  with  bad  odours,  but  where  the  people  are  indus- 
trious and  money-getting.  In  the  day-time,  as  you  make 
your  way  along  the  narrow  streets,  you  see  them  all  at 
work :  upon  the  pavement,  oftener  than  in  their  dark  and 
frowsy  shops :  furbishing  old  clothes,  and  driving  bargains 

Crossing  from  these  patches  of  thick  darkness,  out  into 
the  moon  once  more,  the  fountain  of  Trevi,  welling  from  a 
hundred  jets,  and  rolling  over  mimic  rocks,  is  silvery  to 
the  eye  and  ear.  In  the  narrow  little  throat  of  street,  be- 
yond, a  booth,  dressed  out  with  flaring  lamps,  and  boughs 
of  trees,  attracts  a  group  of  sulky  Romans  round  its  smoky 
coppers  of  hot  broth,  and  cauliflower  stew;  its  trays  of 
fried  fish,  and  its  flasks  of  wine.  As  you  rattle  round  the 
sharply-twisting  corner,  a  lumbering  sound  is  heard.  The 
coachman  stops  abruptly,  and  uncovers,  as  a  van  comes 
slowly  by,  preceded  by  a  man  who  bears  a  large  cross;  by 
a  torch-bearer ;  and  a  priest :  the  latter  cliaunting  as  he  goes. 
It  is  the  Dead  Cart,  with  the  bodies  of  the  poor,  on  their 
way  to  burial  in  the  Sacred  Field  outside  the  walls,  where 
they  will  be  thrown  into  the  pit  that  will  be  covered  with  a 
stone  to-night,  and  sealed  up  for  a  year. 

But  whether,  in  this  ride,  you  pass  by  obelisks,  or  col- 
umns :  ancient  temples,  theatres,  houses,  porticoes,  or  fo- 
rums :  it  is  strange  to  see,  how  every  fragment,  whenever  it 
is  possible,  has  been  blended  into  some  modern  structure, 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  141 

and  made  to  serve  some  modern  purpose — a  wall,  a  dwell- 
ing-place, a  granary,  a  stable — some  use  for  which  it  never 
was  designed,  and  associated  with  which  it  cannot  other- 
wise than  lamely  assort.  It  is  stranger  still,  to  see  how- 
many  ruins  of  the  old  mythology :  how  many  fragments  of 
obsolete  legend  and  observance:  have  been  incoiporated 
into  the  worship  of  Christian  altars  here ;  and  liow,  in 
numberless  respects,  the  false  faith  and  the  true  are  fused 
into  a  monstrous  union. 

From  one  part  of  the  city,  looking  out  beyond  the  walls, 
a  squat  and  stunted  pyramid  (the  burial-place  of  Cains 
Cestius)  makes  an  opaque  triangle  in  the  moonlight.  But, 
to  an  English  traveller,  it  serves  to  mark  the  grave  of  Shel- 
ley too,  whose  ashes  lie  beneath  a  little  garden  near  it. 
Nearer  still,  almost  within  its  shadow,  lie  the  bones  of 
Keats,  "whose  name  is  writ  in  water,"  that  shines  brightly 
in  the  landscape  of  a  calm  Italian  night. 

The  Holy  Week  in  Rome  is  supposed  to  offer  great  at- 
tractions to  all  visitors ;  but,  saving  for  the  siglits  of  Easter 
Sunday,  I  would  counsel  those  who  go  to  Eome  for  its  own 
interest,  to  avoid  it  at  that  time.  The  ceremonies,  in  gen- 
eral, are  of  the  most  tedious  and  wearisome  kind;  the  heat 
and  crowd  at  every  one  of  them,  painfully  oppressive;  the 
noise,  hubbub,  and  confvision,  quite  distracting.  We 
abandoned  the  pursuit  of  these  shoAvs,  very  early  in  the 
proceedings,  and  betook  ourselves  to  the  Ruins  again. 
But  we  plunged  into  the  croAvd  for  a  share  of  the  best  of 
the  sights;  and  what  we  saw,  I  will  describe  to  you. 

A.t  the  Sistine  chapel,  on  the  Wednesday,  we  saw  very 
little,  for  by  the  time  we  reached  it  (though  we  were  early) 
the  besieging  crowd  had  tilled  it  to  tlie  door,  and  over- 
flowed into  the  adjoining  hall,  where  they  were  strug- 
gling, and  squeezing,  and  mutually  expostulating,  and 
making  great  rushes  every  time  a  lady  was  brought  out  faint, 
as  if  at  least  fifty  people  could  be  accommodated  in  her 
vacant  standing-room.  Hanging  in  the  doorway  of  the 
chapel,  was  a  heavy  curtain,  and  this  curtain,  some  twenty 
people  nearest  to  it,  in  their  anxiety  to  hear  the  cliaunting 
of  the  Miserere,  were  continually  plucking  at,  v.\  opposition 
to  each  other,  that  it  might  not  fall  down  and  stifle  tlie 
sound  of  the  voices.  The  consequence  was,  that  it  occa- 
sioned the  most  extraordinary  confusion,  and  seemed  to 
wind  itself  about  the  unwary,  like  a  Serpent.     Now,  a  lady 


143  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

was  wrapped  up  in  it,  aad  couldn't  be  unwound.  Now, 
the  voice  of  a  stifling  gentleman  was  heard  inside  it,  be- 
seeching to  be  let  out.  Now,  two  muffled  arms,  no  man 
could  say  of  which  sex,  struggled  in  it  as  in  a  sack.  Now, 
it  was  carried  by  a  rush,  bodily  overhead  into  the  chapel, 
like  an  awning.  Now,  it  came  out  the  other  way,  and 
blinded  one  of  the  Pope's  Swiss  Guard  who  had  arrived, 
that  moment,  to  set  things  to  rights. 

Being  seated  at  a  little  distance,  among  two  or  three  of 
tlie  Pope's  gentlemen,  who  were  very  weary  and  counting 
the  minutes — as  perhaps  his  Holiness  was  too — we  had 
better  opportunities  of  observing  this  eccentric  entertain- 
ment, than  of  hearing  the  Miserere.  Sometimes,  there  was 
a  swell  of  mournful  voices  that  sounded  very  pathetic  and 
sad,  and  died  away,  into  a  low  strain  again ;  but  that  was  all 
we  heard. 

At  another  time,  there  was  the  Exhibition  of  the  Relics 
in  Saint  Peter's,  which  took  place  at  between  six  and  seven 
o'clock  in  the  evening,  and  was  striking  from  the  cathedral 
being  dark  and  gloomy,  and  having  a  great  many  people  in 
it.  The  place  into  which  the  relics  were  brought,  one  by 
one,  by  a  pai-ty  of  three  priests,  was  a  high  balcony  near  the 
chief  altar.  This  was  the  only  lighted  part  of  the  church. 
There  are  always  a  hundred  and  twelve  lamps  burning 
near  the  altar,  and  there  were  two  tall  tapers,  besides,  near 
the  black  statue  of  St.  Peter;  but  these  were  nothing  in 
such  an  immense  edifice.  The  gloom,  and  the  general  up- 
turning of  faces  to  the  balcony,  and  the  prostration  of  true 
believers  on  the  pavement,  as  shining  objects,  like  pictures 
or  looking-glasses,  were  brought  out  and  shown,  had  soixie- 
thing  effective  in  it,  despite  the  very  preposterous  manner 
in  which  they  were  held  up  for  the  general  edification,  and 
the  great  elevation  at  which  they  were  displayed ;  which 
one  would  think  rather  calculated  to  diminish  the  comfort 
derivable  from  a  full  conviction  of  their  being  genuine. 

On  the  Thursday,  we  went  to  see  the  Pope  convey  the 
Sacrament  from  the  Sistine  chapel,  to  deposit  it  hi  the 
Capella  Paolina,  another  chapel  in  the  Vatican ; — a  cere- 
mony emblematical  of  the  entombment  of  tlie  Saviour  before 
His  Resurrection,  We  waited  in  a  great  gallery  with  a 
great  crowd  of  people  (three-fourths  of  them  English)  for 
an  hour  or  so,  while  they  were  chaunting  the  Miserere,  in 
the  Sistine  chapel  again.     Both  chapels  opened  out  of  the 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  143 

gallery ;  and  the  general  attention  was  concentrated  on  the 
occasional  opening  and  shutting  of  the  door  of  the  one  for 
which  the  Pope  was  ultimately  bound.  None  of  these 
openings  disclosed  anything  more  tremendous  than  a  man 
on  a  ladder,  lighting  a  great  quantity  of  candles ;  but  at 
each  and  every  opening,  there  was  a  terrific  rush  made  at 
this  ladder  and  this  man,  something  like  (I  should  think) 
a  charge  of  the  heavy  British  cavalry  at  Waterloo.  The 
man  was  never  brought  down,  however,  nor  the  ladder ;  for 
it  performed  the  strangest  antics  in  the  world  among  the 
crowd — where  it  was  carried  by  the  man,  when  the  candles 
were  all  lighted ;  and  finally  it  was  stuck  up  against  the 
gallery  wall,  in  a  vei'y  disorderly  manner,  just  before  the 
opening  of  the  other  chapel,  and  the  commencement  of  a 
new  chaunt,  announced  the  approach  of  his  Holiness.  At 
this  crisis,  the  soldiers  of  the  guard,  who  had  been  poking 
tlie  crowd  into  all  sorts  of  shapes,  formed  down  the  gallery : 
and  the  procession  came  up,  between  the  two  lines  they 
made. 

There  were  a  few  choristers,  and  then  a  great  many 
priests,  walking  two  and  two,  and  carrying — the  good- 
looking  priests  at  least — their  liglited  tapers,  so  as  to 
throw  the  light  with  a  good  effect  upon  their  faces :  for  the 
room  was  darkened.  Those  who  were  not  handsome,  or 
who  had  not  long  beards,  carried  their  tapers  anyhow,  and 
abandoned  themselves  to  spiritual  contemplation.  Mean- 
while, the  chaunting  was  very  monotonous  and  dreary. 
The  procession  passed  on,  slowly,  into  the  chapel,  and  the 
drone  of  voices  went  on,  and  came  on,  with  it,  until  the 
Pope  himself  appeared,  walking  under  a  white  satin  canopy, 
and  bearing  the  covered  Sacrament  in  both  hands ;  cardi- 
nals and  canons  clustered  round  him,  making  a  brilliant 
show.  The  soldiers  of  the  guard  knelt  down  as  he  ])assed; 
all  the  bystanders  bowed ;  and  so  he  passed  on  into  the 
chapel :  the  white  satin  canopy  being  removed  from  over 
him  at  the  door,  and  a  white  satin  parasol  hoisted  over  his 
poor  old  head,  in  place  of  it.  A  few  more  couples  brought 
up  the  rear,  and  passed  into  the  chapel  also.  Then,  the 
chapel  door  was  sliut ;  and  it  was  all  over ;  and  everybody 
hurried  off  headlong,  as  for  life  or  death,  to  see  something 
else,  and  say  it  wasn't  worth  the  trouble. 

I  think  the  most  popular  and  most  crowded  sight  (except- 
ing those  of  Easter  Sunday  and  Monday,  which  are  open  to 


144  11CTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

all  classes  of  people)  was  the  Pope  washing  the  feet  of 
Thirteen  men,  representing  the  twelve  apostles,  and  Judas 
Iscariot.  The  place  in  which  this  pious  office  is  performed, 
is  one  of  the  chapels  of  St.  Peter's,  which  is  gailj  deco- 
rated for  the  occasion;  the  thirteen  sitting,  "all  of  a  row," 
on  a  very  high  bench,  and  looking  particularly  uncomfort- 
able, with  the  eyes  of  Heaven  knows  how  many  English, 
French,  Americans,  Swiss,  Germans,  Russians,  Swedes. 
Norwegians,  and  other  foreigners,  nailed  to  their  faces  ali 
the  time.  They  are  robed  in  white ;  and  on  their  heads 
they  wear  a  stiff  white  cap,  like  a  large  English  porter-pot, 
without  a  handle.  Each  carries  in  his  hand,  a  nosegay, 
of  the  size  of  a  fine  cauliflower;  and  two  of  them,  on  this 
occasion,  wore  spectacles :  which,  remembering  the  charac- 
ters they  sustained,  I  thought  a  droll  appendage  to  the 
costume.  There  was  a  great  eye  to  character.  St.  John 
was  represented  by  a  good-looking  young  man.  St.  Peter, 
by  a  grave-looking  old  gentleman,  with  a  flowing  brown 
beard ;  and  Judas  Iscariot  by  such  an  enormous  hypocrite 
(I  could  not  make  out,  though,  whether  the  expression 
of  his  face  was  real  or  assumed)  that  if  he  had  acted  the 
part  to  the  death  and  had  gone  away  and  hanged  himself, 
he  would  have  left  nothing  to  be  desired. 

As  the  two  large  boxes,  appropriated  to  ladies  at  this 
sight,  were  full  to  the  throat,  and  getting  near  was  hope- 
less, we  posted  off,  along  with  a  great  crowd,  to  be  in  time 
at  the  Table,  where  the  Pope,  in  person,  waits  on  these 
Thirteen ;  and  after  a  prodigious  struggle  at  the  Vatican 
staircase,  and  several  personal  conflicts  with  the  Swiss 
guard,  the  whole  crowd  swept  into  the  room.  It  was  a 
long  gallery  hung  with  drapery  of  white  and  red,  with  an- 
other great  box  for  ladies  (who  are  obliged  to  dress  in 
black  at  these  ceremonies,  and  to  wear  black  veils),  a  royal 
box  for  the  King  of  Naples,  and  his  party ;  and  the  table 
itself,  which,  set  out  like  a  ball  supper,  and  ornamented 
with  golden  figures  of  the  real  apostles,  was  arranged  on  an 
elevated  platform  on  one  side  of  the  gallery.  The  counter- 
feit apostles'  knives  and  forks  were  laid  out  on  that  side  of 
the  table  which  was  nearest  to  the  wall,  so  that  they  might 
be  stared  at  again,  without  let  or  hindrance. 

The  body  of  the  room  was  full  of  male  strangers ;  the 
crowd  immense;  the  heat  very  great;  and  the  pressure 
sometimes  frightful.     It  was  at  its  height  when  the  stream 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  145 

came  pouring  in,  from  the  feet-washing ;  and  then  there 
were  such  shrieks  and  outcries,  that  a  party  of  Piedmont- 
ese  dragoons  went  to  the  rescue  of  the  Swiss  guard,  and 
helped  them  to  calm  the  tumult. 

The  ladies  were  particularly  ferocious,  in  their  struggles 
for  places.  One  lady  of  my  acquaintance  was  seized  round 
the  waist,  in  the  ladies'  box,  by  a  strong  matron,  and 
hoisted  out  of  her  place ;  and  there  was  another  lady  (in  a 
back  row  in  the  same  box)  who  improved  her  position  by 
sticking  a  large  pin  into  the  ladies  before  her. 

The  gentlemen  about  me  were  remarkably  anxious  to  see 
what  was  on  the  table;  and  one  Englishman  seemed  to 
have  embarked  the  whole  energy  of  his  nature  in  the  deter- 
mination to  discover  whether  there  was  any  mustard.  "  By 
Jupiter  there's  vinegar!  "  I  heard  him  say  to  his  friend, 
after  he  had  stood  on  tiptoe  an  immense  time,  and  had  been 
crushed  and  beaten  on  all  sides.  "And  there's  oil!!  I 
saw  them  distinctly,  in  cruets!  Can  any  gentleman,  in 
front  there,  see  mustard  on  the  table?  Sir,  will  you  oblige 
me !     Do  you  see  a  Mustard-Pot?  " 

The  apostles  and  Judas  appearing  on  the  platform,  after 
much  expectation,  were  marshalled,  in  line,  in  front  of  the 
table,  with  Peter  at  the  top;  and  a  good  long  stare  was 
taken  at  them  by  the  company,  while  twelve  of  them  took 
a  long  smell  at  their  nosegays,  and  Judas — moving  his  lips 
very  obtrusively — engaged  in  inward  prayer.  Then,  the 
Pope,  clad  in  a  scarlet  robe,  and  wearing  on  his  head  a 
skull-cap  of  white  satin,  appeared  in  the  midst  of  a  crowd 
of  Cardinals  and  other  dignitaries,  and  took  in  his  hand  a 
little  golden  ewer,  from  which  he  poured  a  little  water  over 
one  of  Peter's  hands,  while  one  attendant  held  a  golden 
basin;  a  second,  a  fine  cloth;  a  third,  Peter's  nosegay, 
which  was  taken  from  him  during  the  operation.  This  his 
Holiness  performed,  with  considerable  expedition,  on  every 
man  in  the  line  (Judas,  I  observed,  to  be  particularly  over- 
come by  his  condescension)  ;  and  then  the  whole  Thirteen 
sat  down  to  dinner.  Grace  said  by  the  Pope.  Peter  in 
the  chair. 

There  was  white  wine,  and  red  wine :  and  the  dinner 
looked  very  good.  The  courses  appeared  in  portions,  one 
for  each  apostle ;  and  these  being  presented  to  the  Pope, 
by  Cardinals  upon  their  knees,  were  by  him  handed  to  the 
Thirteen.  The  manner  in  which  Judas  grew  more  white- 
10 


140  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

livered  over  his  victuals,  aud  languished,  with  his  head  on 
one  side,  as  if  he  had  no  appetite,  defies  all  description. 
Peter  was  a  good,  sound,  old  man,  and  went  in,  as  the  say- 
ing is,  "  to  win ; "  eating  everything  that  was  given  to  him 
(he  got  the  best:  being  first  in  the  row)  and  saying  nothing 
to  anybody.  The  dishes  appeared  to  be  chiefly  composed 
of  fish  and  vegetables.  The  Pope  helped  the  Thirteen  to 
wine  also ;  and,  during  the  whole  dinner,  somebody  read 
something  aloud,  out  of  a  large  book — the  Bible,  I  presume 
— which  nobody  could  hear,  and  to  which  nobody  paid  the 
least  attention.  The  Cardinals,  and  other  attendants, 
smiled  to  each  other,  from  time  to  time,  as  if  the  thing 
were  a  great  farce ;  and  if  they  thought  so,  there  is  little 
doubt  they  were  perfectly  right.  His  Holiness  did  what 
he  had  to  do,  as  a  sensible  man  gets  through  a  trouble- 
some ceremony,  aud  seemed  very  glad  when  it  was  all 
over. 

The  Pilgrims'  Suppers :  where  lords  and  ladies  waited  on 
the  Pilgrims,  in  token  of  humility,  and  dried  their  feet 
when  they  had  been  well  washed  by  deputy :  were  very 
attractive.  But,  of  all  the  many  spectacles  of  dangerous 
reliance  on  outward  observances,  in  themselves  mere  empty 
forms,  none  struck  me  half  so  much  as  the  Scala  Santa, 
or  Holy  Staircase,  which  I  saw  several  times,  but  to  the 
greatest  advantage,  or  disadvantage,  on  Good  Friday. 

This  holy  staircase  is  composed  of  eight-and-twenty 
steps,  said  to  have  belonged  to  Pontius  Pilate's  house,  and 
to  be  the  identical  stairs  on  which  our  Saviour  trod,  in 
coming  down  from  the  judgment-seat.  Pilgrims  ascend  it, 
only  on  their  knees.  It  is  steep ;  and,  at  the  summit,  is  a 
chapel,  reported  to  be  full  of  relics ;  into  which  they  peep 
through  some  iron  bars,  and  then  come  down  again,  by  one 
of  two  side  staircases,  which  are  not  sacred,  and  may  be 
walked  on. 

On  Good  Friday,  there  were,  on  a  moderate  computation, 
a  hundred  people,  slowly  shuffling  up  these  stairs,  on 
their  knees,  at  one  time ;  while  others,  who  were  going  up, 
or  had  come  down —  and  a  few  who  had  done  both,  and  were 
going  up  again  for  the  second  time — stood  loitering  in  the 
porch  below,  where  an  old  gentleman  in  a  sort  of  watch-box, 
rattled  a  tin  canister,  with  a  slit  in  the  top,  incessantly, 
to  remind  them  that  he  took  the  money.  The  majority 
were  country-people,  male  and  female.     There  were  four 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  147 

or  five  Jesuit  priests,  however,  and  some  half-dozen  well- 
dressed  women,  A  whole  school  of  boys,  twenty  at  least, 
were  about  half-way  up — evidently  enjoying  it  very  much. 
They  were  all  wedged  together,  pretty  closely ;  but  the  rest 
of  the  company  gave  the  boys  as  wide  a  berth  as  possible, 
in  consequence  of  their  betraying  some  recklessness  in  the 
management  of  their  boots. 

I  never,  in  my  life,  saw  anything  at  once  so  ridiculous, 
and  so  unpleasant,  as  this  sight — ridiculous  in  the  absurd  in- 
cidents inseparable  from  it;  and  unpleasant  in  its  senseless 
and  unmeaning  degradation.  There  are  two  steps  to  begin 
with,  and  then  a  rather  broad  landing.  The  more  rigid 
climbers  went  along  this  landing  on  their  knees,  as  well  as 
up  the  stairs ;  and  the  figures  they  cut,  in  their  shuffling 
progress  over  tlie  level  surface,  no  description  can  paint. 
Then,  to  see  them  Avatch  their  opportunity  from  the  porch, 
and  cut  in  where  there  was  a  place  next  the  wall !  And  to 
see  one  Juan  with  an  umbrella  (brought  on  purpose,  for  it 
was  a  fine  day)  hoisting  himself,  unlawfully,  from  stair  to 
stair !  And  to  observe  a  demure  lady  of  fifty-five  or  so, 
looking  back,  every  now  and  then,  to  assure  herself  that 
her  legs  were  properly  disposed ! 

There  were  such  odd  differences  in  the  speed  of  different 
people,  too.  Some  got  on  as  if  they  were  doing  a  match 
against  time ;  others  stopped  to  say  a  prayer  on  every  step. 
This  man  touched  every  stair  with  his  forehead,  and  kissed 
it ;  that  man  scratched  his  head  all  the  way.  The  boys  got 
on  brilliantly,  and  were  up  and  down  again  before  the  old 
lady  had  accomplished  her  half-dozen  stairs.  But  most  of 
the  penitents  came  down,  very  sprightly  and  fresh,  as  hav- 
ing done  a  real  good  substantial  deed  which  it  would  take 
a  good  deal  of  sin  to  counterbalance ;  and  the  old  gentle- 
man in  the  watch-box  was  down  upon  them  with  his  canis- 
ter while  they  were  in  this  humour,  I  promise  you. 

As  if  such  a  progress  were  not  in  its  nature  inevitably 
droll  enough,  there  lay,  on  tlie  top  of  the  stairs,  a  wooden 
figure  on  a  crucifix,  resting  on  a  sort  of  great  iron  saucer: 
so  rickety  and  unsteady,  that  whenever  an  enthusiastic  per- 
son kissed  the  figure,  with  more  than  usual  devotion,  or 
threw  a  coin  into  the  saucer,  with  more  than  common  readi- 
ness (for  it  served  in  this  respect  as  a  second  or  supplemen- 
tary canister),  it  gave  a  great  leap  and  rattle,  and  nearly 
shook  the  attendant  lamp  out:    horribly  frightening  the 


148  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

people  further  down,  and  throwing  the  guilty  party  into 
unspeakable  embarrassment. 

On  Easter  Sunday,  as  well  on  the  preceding  Thursday,  the 
Pope  bestows  his  benediction  on  the  people,  from  the  bal- 
cony in  front  of  St.  Peter's.  This  Easter  Sunday  was  a 
day  so  bright  and  blue :  so  cloudless,  balmy,  wonderfully 
bright:  that  all  the  previous  bad  weather  vanished  from 
the  recollection  in  a  moment.  I  had  seen  the  Thursday's 
Benediction  dropping  damply  on  some  hundreds  of  um- 
brellas, but  there  was  not  a  sparkle  then,  in  all  the  hundred 
fountains  of  Rome — such  fountains  as  tliey  are ! — and  on 
this  Sunday  morning  they  were  running  diamonds.  The 
miles  of  miserable  streets  through  which  we  drove  (com- 
pelled to  a  certain  course  by  the  Pope's  dragoons :  the  Ro- 
man police  on  such  occasions)  were  so  full  of  colour,  that 
nothing  in  them  was  capable  of  wearing  a  faded  aspect. 
The  common  people  came  out  in  their  gayest  dresses ;  the 
richer  people  in  their  smartest  vehicles ;  Cardinals  rattled 
to  the  church  of  the  Poor  Fishermen  in  their  state  car- 
riages ;  shabby  magnificence  flaunted  its  thread-bare  liveries 
and  tarnished  cocked  hats,  in  the  sun ;  and  every  coach  in 
Rome  was  put  in  requisition  for  the  Great  Piazza  of  St. 
Peter's. 

One  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  people  were  there  at 
least !  Yet  there  was  ample  room.  How  many  carriages 
were  there,  I  don't  know ;  yet  there  was  room  for  them  too, 
and  to  spare.  The  great  steps  of  the  church  were  densely 
crowded.  There  were  many  of  the  Contadini,  from  Albano 
(who  delight  in  red),  in  that  part  of  the  square,  and  the 
mingling  of  bright  colours  in  the  crowd  was  beautiful.  Be- 
low the  steps,  the  troops  were  ranged.  In  the  magnificent 
proportions  of  the  place,  they  looked  like  a  bed  of  flowers. 
Sulky  Romans,  lively  peasants  from  the  neighbouring 
country,  groups  of  pilgrims  from  distant  parts  of  Italy, 
sight-seeing  foreigners  of  all  nations,  made  a  murmur  in  the 
clear  air,  like  so  many  insects ;  and  high  above  them  all, 
plashing  and  bubbling,  and  making  rainbow  colours  in  the 
light,  the  two  delicious  fountains  welled  and  tumbled  boun- 
tifully. 

A  kind  of  bright  carpet  was  hung  over  the  front  of  the 
balcony ;  and  the  sides  of  the  great  window  were  bedecked 
with  crimson  drapery.  An  awning  was  stretched  too,  over 
the  top,  to  screen  the  old  man  from  the  hot  rays  of  the  sun. 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  149 

As  noon  approached,  all  eyes  were  turned  up  to  this  win- 
dow. In  due  time,  the  chair  was  seen  approaching  to  the 
front,  with  the  gigantic  fans  of  peacock's  feathers,  close 
behind.  The  doll  within  it  (for  the  balcony  is  very  high) 
then  rose  up,  and  stretched  out  its  tiny  arms,  while  all  the 
male  spectators  in  the  square  uncovered,  and  some,  but  not 
by  any  means  the  greater  part,  kneeled  down.  The  guns 
upon  the  ramparts  of  the  Castle  of  St.  Angelo  proclaimed, 
next  moment,  that  the  benediction  was  given  ;  drums  beat ; 
trumpets  sounded ;  arms  clashed ;  and  the  great  mass  be- 
low, suddenly  breaking  mto  smaller  heaps,  and  scattering 
here  and  there  in  rills,  was  stirred  like  parti-coloured 
sand. 

What  a  bright  noon  it  was,  as  we  rode  away !  The  Tiber 
was  no  longer  yellow,  but  blue.  There  was  a  blush  on  the 
old  bridges,  that  made  them  fresh  and  hale  again.  The 
Pantheon,  with  its  majestic  front,  all  seamed  and  furrowed 
like  an  old  face,  had  summer  light  upon  its  battered  walls. 
Every  squalid  and  desolate  hut  in  the  Eternal  City  (bear 
ivitness  every  grim  old  palace,  to  the  filth  and  misery  of 
the  plebeian  neighbour  that  elbows  it,  as  certainly  as  Time 
has  laid  its  grip  on  its  patrician  head !)  was  fresh  and  new 
with  some  ray  of  the  sun.  The  very  prison  in  the  crowded 
street,  a  whirl  of  carriages  and  people,  had  some  stray 
sense  of  the  day,  dropping  through  its  chinks  and  crevices: 
and  dismal  prisoners  wlio  could  not  wind  their  faces  round 
the  barricading  of  the  blocked-up  windows,  stretched  out 
their  hands,  and  clinging  to  the  rusty  bars,  turned  them 
towards  the  overflowing  street:  as  if  it  were  a  cheerful 
fire,  and  could  be  shared  in,  that  way. 

But,  when  the  night  came  on,  without  a  cloud  to  dim  the 
full  moon,  what  a  sight  it  was  to  see  the  Great  Square  full 
once  more,  and  the  whole  church,  from  the  cross  to  the 
ground,  lighted  with  innumerable  lanterns,  tracing  out  the 
architecture,  and  winking  and  shining  all  round  the  colon- 
nade of  the  piazza!  And  what  a  sense  of  exultation,  joy, 
delight,  it  was,  when  the  great  bell  struck  half -past  seven 
— on  the  instant — to  behold  one  bright  red  mass  of  fire, 
soar  gallantly  from  the  top  of  the  cupola  to  the  extremest 
summit  of  the  cross,  and  tlie  moment  it  leaped  into  its 
place,  become  the  signal  of  a  bursting  out  of  countless 
lights,  as  great,  and  red,  and  blazing  as  itself,  from  every 
part  of  the  gigantic  church  j  so  that  every  cornice,  capital. 


150  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

and  smallest  ornament  of  stone,  expressed  itself  in  fire: 
and  the  black  solid  groundwork  of  the  enormous  dome 
seemed  to  grow  transparent  as  an  eggshell! 

A  train  of  gunpowder,  an  electric  chain — nothing  could 
be  lired  moie  suddenly  and  swiftly  than  this  second  illu- 
mination; and  when  we  had  got  away,  and  gone  upon  a 
distant  height,  and  looked  towards  it  two  hours  afterwards, 
there  it  still  stood,  shining  and  glittering  in  the  calm  night 
like  a  jewel!  Not  a  line  of  its  proportions  wanting;  not 
an  angle  blunted;  not  an  atom  of  its  radiance  lost. 

The  next  night — Easter  Monday — there  was  a  great  dis- 
play of  fireworks  from  the  Castle  of  St.  Angelo.  We  hired 
a  room-  in  an  opposite  house,  and  made  our  way,  to  our 
places,  in  good  time,  through  a  dense  mob  of  people  chok- 
ing up  the  square  in  front,  and  all  the  avenues  leading  to  it ; 
and  so  loading  the  bridge  by  which  the  castle  is  approached, 
that  it  seemed  ready  to  sink  into  the  rapid  Tiber  below. 
There  are  statues  on  this  bridge  (execrable  works),  and, 
among  them,  great  vessels  full  of  burning  tow  were  placed : 
glaring  strangely  on  the  faces  of  the  crowd,  and  not  lesS 
strangely  on  the  stone  counterfeits  above  them. 

The  show  began  with  a  tremendous  discharge  of  cannon ; 
and  then,  for  twenty  minutes  or  half  an  hour,  the  whole 
castle  was  one  incessant  sheet  of  fire,  and  labyrinth  of  blaz- 
ing wheels  of  every  colour,  size,  and  speed :  while  rockets 
streamed  into  the  sky,  not  by  ones  or  twos,  or  scores,  but 
hundreds  at  a  time.  The  concluding  burst — the  Girandola 
— was  like  the  blowing  up  into  the  air  of  the  whole  massive 
castle,  without  smoke  or  dust. 

In  half  an  hour  afterwards,  the  immense  concourse  had 
dispersed;  the  moon  was  looking  calmly  down  upon  her 
wrinkled  image  in  the  river;  and  half-a-dozen  men  and 
boys,  with  bits  of  lighted  candle  in  their  hands :  moving 
here  and  there,  in  search  of  anything  worth  having,  that 
might  have  been  dropped  in  the  press :  had  the  whole  scene 
to  themselves. 

By  way  of  contrast  we  rode  out  into  old  ruined  Rome, 
after  all  this  firing  and  booming,  to  take  our  leave  of  the 
Coliseum.  I  had  seen  it  by  moonlight  before  (I  never  could 
get  through  a  day  without  going  back  to  it),  but  its  tre- 
mendous solitude,  that  night,  is  past  all  telling.  The 
ghostly  pillars  in  the  Forum ;  the  triumphal  arches  of  Old 
Emperors;  those  enormous  masses  of  ruin  which  were  once 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  151 

their  palaces ;  the  grass-grown  mounds  that  mark  the  graves 
of  ruined  temples ;  the  stones  of  the  Via  Sacra,  smooth  with 
the  tread  of  feet  in  ancient  Rome ;  even  these  were  dimmed, 
in  their  transcendent  melancholy,  by  the  dark  ghost  of  its 
bloody  holidays,  erect  and  grim ;  haunting  the  old  scene ; 
despoiled  by  pillaging  Popes  and  fighting  Princes,  but  not 
laid ;  wringing  wild  hands  of  weed,  and  grass,  and  bramble ; 
and  lamenting  to  the  night  in  every  gap  and  broken  arch 
— the  shadow  of  its  awful  self,  immovable ! 

As  we  lay  down  on  the  grass  of  the  Campagna,  next  day, 
on  our  way  to  Florence,  hearing  the  larks  sing,  we  saw 
that  a  little  wooden  cross  had  been  erected  on  the  spot 
where  the  poor  Pilgrim-Countess  was  murdered.  So,  we 
piled  some  loose  stones  about  it,  as  the  beginning  of  a 
mound  to  her  memory,  and  wondered  if  we  should  ever 
rest  there  again,  and  look  back  at  Rome. 


A  RAPID  DIORAMA. 

We  are  bound  for  Naples !  And  we  cross  the  threshold 
of  tbe  Eternal  City  at  yonder  gate,  the  Gate  of  San  Giovanni 
Laterano,  where  the  two  last  objects  that  attract  the  notice 
of  a  departing  visitor,  and  the  two  first  objects  that  attract 
the  notice  of  an  arriving  one,  are  a  proud  church  and  a  de- 
caying ruin — good  emblems  of  Rome. 

Our  way  lies  over  the  Campagna,  which  looks  more  sol- 
emn on  a  bright  blue  day  like  this,  than  beneath  a  darker 
sky ;  the  great  extent  of  ruin  being  plainer  to  the  eye :  and 
the  sunshine  through  the  arches  of  the  broken  aqueducts, 
showing  other  broken  arches  shining  through  them  in  the 
melancholy  distance.  When  we  have  traversed  it,  and  look 
back  from  Albano,  its  dark  undulating  surface  lies  below 
us  like  a  stagnant  lake,  or  like  a  broad  dull  Lethe  flowing 
round  the  walls  of  Rome,  and  separating  it  from  all  the 
"world!  How  often  have  the  Legions,  in  triumphant 
march,  gone  glittering  across  that  purple  waste,  so  silent 
and  unpeopled  now !  How  often  has  the  train  of  captives 
looked,  with  sinking  hearts,  upon  the  distant  city,  and 
beheld  its  population  pouring  out,  to  hail  the  return  of 
their  conqueror !  What  riot,  sensuality,  and  murder,  have 
run  mad  in  the  vast  Palaces  now  heaps  of  brick  and  sliat- 


Ite  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

tered  marble!  What  glare  of  fires,  and  roar  of  popular 
tumult,  and  wail  of  pestilence  and  famine,  have  come  sweep- 
ing over  the  wild  plain  where  nothing  is  now  heard  but  the 
wind,  and  where  the  solitary  lizards  gambol  unmolested  in 
the  sun! 

The  train  of  Wine-carts  going  into  Rome,  each  driven  by 
a  shaggy  peasant  reclining  beneath  a  little  gipsy-fashioned 
canopy  of  sheepskin,  is  ended  now,  and  we  go  toiling  up 
into  a  higher  country  where  there  are  trees.  The  next  day 
brings  us  on  the  Pontine  Marshes,  wearily  flat  and  lone- 
some, and  overgrown  with  brushwood,  and  swamped  with 
water,  but  with  a  fine  road  made  across  them,  shaded  by  a 
long,  long  avenue.  Here  and  there,  we  pass  a  solitary 
guard-house ;  here  and  there  a  hovel,  deserted,  and  walled 
up.  Some  herdsmen  loiter  on  the  banks  of  the  stream 
beside  the  road,  and  sometimes  a  flat-bottomed  boat,  towed 
by  a  man,  comes  rippling  idly  along  it.  A  horseman  passes 
occasionally,  carrying  a  long  gun  cross-wise  on  the  saddle 
before  him,  and  attended  by  fierce  dogs ;  but  there  is  noth- 
ing else  astir  save  the  wind  and  the  shadows,  until  we  come 
in  sight  of  Terracina. 

How  blue  and  bright  the  sea,  rolling  below  the  windows 
of  the  Inn  so  famous  in  robber  stories !  How  picturesque 
the  great  crags  and  points  of  rock  overhanging  to-mor- 
row's narrow  road,  where  galley-slaves  are  working  in  the 
quarries  above,  and  the  sentinels  who  guard  them  lounge 
on  the  sea-shore !  All  night  there  is  the  murmur  of  the  sea 
beneath  the  stars ;  and,  in  the  morning,  just  at  daybreak, 
the  prospect  suddenly  becoming  expanded,  as  if  by  a  mira- 
cle, reveals — in  the  far  distance,  across  the  Sea  there! 
— Naples  with  its  Islands,  and  Vesuvius  spouting  fire. 
Within  a  quarter  of  an  hour,  the  whole  is  gone  as  if  it  were 
a  vision  in  the  clouds,  and  there  is  nothing  but  the  sea  and 
sky. 

The  Neapolitan  Frontier  crossed,  after  two  hours'  travel- 
ling ;  and  the  hungriest  of  soldiers  and  custom-house  offi- 
cers with  difficulty  appeased ;  we  enter,  by  a  gateless  por- 
tal, into  the  first  Neapolitan  town — Fondi.  Take  note  of 
Fondi,  in  the  name  of  all  that  is  wretched  and  beggarly. 

A  filthy  channel  of  mud  and  refuse  meanders  down  the 
centre  of  the  miserable  street,  fed  by  obscene  rivulets  that 
trickle  from  the  abject  houses.  There  is  not  a  door,  a 
window,  or  a  shutter ;  not  a  roof,  a  wall,  a  post;  or  a  pillar^ 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  153 

in  all  Fondi,  but  is  decayed,  and  crazy,  and  rotting  away. 
The  wretched  history  of  the  town,  with  all  its  sieges  and 
pillages  by  Barbarossa  and  the  rest,  might  have  been  acted 
last  year.  How  the  gaunt  dogs  that  sneak  about  the  mis- 
erable street,  come  to  be  alive,  and  undevoured  by  the  peo- 
ple, is  one  of  the  enigmas  of  the  world. 

A  hollow-cheeked  and  scowling  people  they  are!  All 
beggars;  but  that's  nothing.  Look  at  them  as  they  gather 
round.  Some,  are  too  indolent  to  come  down  stairs,  or  are 
too  wisely  mistrustful  of  the  stairs,  perhaps,  to  venture :  so 
stretch  out  their  lean  hands  from  upper  windows,  and  howl ; 
others,  come  flocking  about  us,  fighting  and  jostling  one 
another,  and  demanding,  incessantly,  charity  for  the  love 
of  God,  charity  for  the  love  of  the  Blessed  Virgin,  charity 
for  tlie  love  of  all  the  Saints.  A  group  of  miserable  chil- 
dren, almost  naked,  screaming  forth  the  same  petition,  dis- 
cover that  they  can  see  themselves  reflected  in  the  varnish 
of  the  carriage,  and  begin  to  dance  and  make  grimaces,  that 
they  may  have  the  pleasure  of  seeing  their  antics  repeated 
in  this  mirror.  A  crippled  idiot,  in  the  act  of  striking  one 
of  them  who  drowns  his  clamorous  demand  for  charity,  ob- 
serves his  angry  counterpart  in  the  panel,  stops  short,  and 
thrusting  out  his  tongue,  begins  to  wag  his  head  and  chat- 
ter. The  shrill  cry  raised  at  this,  awakens  half-a-dozen 
wild  creatures  wrapped  in  frowsy  brown  cloaks,  who  are 
lying  on  the  church-steps  with  pots  and  pans  for  sale. 
These,  scrambling  up,  approach,  and  beg  defiantly.  "I 
am  hungry.  Give  me  something.  Listen  to  me,  Signor. 
lam  hungry!"  Then,  a  ghastly  old  woman,  fearful  of 
being  too  late,  comes  hobbling  down  the  street,  stretching 
out  one  hand,  and  scratching  herself  all  the  way  with  the 
other,  and  screaming,  long  before  she  can  be  heard,  "  Char- 
ity, charity!  I'll  go  and  pray  for  you  directly,  beautiful 
lady,  if  you'll  give  me  charity!  "  Lastly,  the  members  of 
a  brotherhood  for  burying  the  dead :  hideously  masked,  and 
attired  in  shabby  black  robes,  white  at  the  skirts,  with  the 
splashes  of  many  muddy  winters :  escorted  by  a  dirty  priest, 
and  a  congenial  cross-bearer:  come  hurrying  past.  Sur- 
rounded by  this  motley  concourse,  we  move  out  of  Fondi : 
bad  bright  eyes  glaring  at  us,  out  of  the  darkness  of  every 
crazy  tenement,  like  glistening  fragments  of  its  filth  and 
putrefaction. 

A  noble  mountain-pass,  with  the  ruins  of  a  fort  on  a 


164  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

strong  eminence,  traditionally  called  the  Fort  of  Fra  Dia- 
volo ;  the  old  town  of  Itri,  like  a  device  in  pastry,  built  up, 
almost  perpendicularly,  on  a  hill,  and  approached  by  long 
steep  flights  of  steps;  beautiful  Mola  di  Gaeta,  whose 
wines,  like  those  of  Albano,  have  degenerated  since  the 
days  of  Horace,  or  his  taste  for  wine  was  bad :  which  is  not 
likely  of  one  who  enjoyed  it  so  much,  and  extolled  it  so 
well ;  another  night  upon  the  road  at  St.  Agata ;  a  rest  next 
day  ^t  Capua,  which  is  picturesque,  but  hardly  so  seductive 
to  a  traveller  now,  as  the  soldiers  of  Praetorian  Rome 
were  wont  to  find  the  ancient  city  of  that  name ;  a  flat  road 
among  vines  festooned  and  looped  from  tree  to  tree ;  and 
Mount  Vesuvius  close  at  hand  at  last ! — its  cone  and  summit 
whitened  with  snow ;  and  its  smoke  hanging  over  it,  in  the 
heavy  atmosphere  of  the  day,  like  a  dense  cloud.  So  we 
go,  rattling  down-hill,  into  Naples. 

A  funeral  is  coming  up  the  street,  towards  us.  Tlie 
body,  on  an  open  bier,  borne  on  a  kind  of  palanquin,  cov- 
ered with  a  gay  cloth  of  crimson  and  gold.  Tlie  mourners, 
in  white  gowns  and  masks.  If  there  be  death  abroad,  life 
is  well  represented  too,  for  all  Naples  would  seem  to  be 
out  of  doors,  and  tearing  to  and  fro  in  carriages.  Some  of 
these,  the  common  Vetturino  vehicles,  are  drawn  by  three 
horses  abreast,  decked  with  smart  trappings  and  great 
abundance  of  brazen  ornament,  and  always  going  very  fast. 
Not  that  their  loads  are  light;  for  the  smallest  of  them  has 
at  least  six  people  inside,  four  in  front,  four  or  five  more 
hanging  on  behind,  and  two  or  three  more,  in  a  net  or  bag 
below  the  axle-tree,  where  they  lie  half-suffocated  with 
mud  and  dust.  Exhibitors  of  Punch,  buffo  singers  with 
guitars,  reciters  of  poetry,  reciters  of  stories,  a  row  of  cheap 
exhibitions  with  clowns  and  showmen,  drums,  and  trum- 
pets, painted  cloths  representing  the  wonders  within,  and 
admiring  crowds  assembled  without,  assist  the  whirl  and 
bustle.  Ragged  lazzaroni  lie  asleep  in  doorways,  archways, 
and  kennels;  the  gentry,  gaily  dressed,  are  dashing  up  and 
down  in  carriages  on  the  Chiaja,  or  walking  in  the  Public 
Gardens ;  and  quiet  letter-writers,  percihed  behind  their  lit- 
tle desks  and  inkstands  under  the  Portico  of  the  Great 
Theatre  of  San  Carlo,  in  the  public  street,  are  waiting  for 
clients. 

Here  is  a  Galley-slave  in  chains,  who  wants  a  letter  writ- 
ten to  a  friend.     He  approaches  a  clerkly- looking  man,  sit- 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  155 

ting  under  the  corner  arch,  and  makes  his  bargain.  He 
has  obtained  permission  of  the  Sentinel  who  guards  him : 
who  stands  near,  leaning  against  the  wall  and  cracking 
nuts.  The  Galley-slave  dictates  in  the  ear  of  the  letter- 
writer,  what  he  desires  to  say;  and  as  he  can't  read  writ- 
ing, looks  intently  in  his  face,  to  read  there  whether  he 
sets  down  faithfully  what  he  is  told.  After  a  time,  the 
Galley-slave  becomes  discursive — incoherent.  The  Secre- 
tary pauses  and  rubs  his  chin.  The  Galley-slave  is  volu- 
ble and  energetic.  The  Secretary,  at  length,  catches  the 
idea,  and  with  the  air  of  a  man  who  knows  how  to  word  it, 
sets  it  down  j  stopping,  now  and  then,  to  glance  back  at  his 
text  admiringly.  The  Galley-slave  is  silent.  The  Soldier 
stoically  cracks  his  nuts.  Is  there  anything  more  to  say? 
inquires  the  letter-writer.  No  more.  Then  listen,  friend 
of  mine.  He  reads  it  through.  The  Galley-slave  is  quite 
enchanted.  It  is  folded,  and  addressed,  and  given  to  him, 
and  he  pays  the  fee.  The  Secretary  falls  back  indolently 
in  his  chair,  and  takes  a  book.  The  Galley-slave  gathers 
up  an  empty  sack.  The  Sentinel  throws  away  a  handful 
of  nut-shells,  shoulders  his  musket,  and  away  they  go 
together. 

Why  do  the  beggars  rap  their  chins  constantly,  with 
their  right  hands,  when  you  look  at  them?  Everything  is 
done  in  pantomime  in  Naples,  and  that  is  the  conventional 
sign  for  hunger.  A  man  who  is  quarrelling  with  another, 
yonder,  lays  the  palm  of  his  right  hand  on  the  back  of  his 
left,  and  shakes  the  two  thumbs — expressive  of  a  donkey's 
ears — whereat  his  adversary  is  goaded  to  desperation.  Two 
people  bargaining  for  fish,  the  buyer  empties  an  imaginary 
waistcoat  pocket  when  he  is  told  the  price,  and  walks  away 
without  a  word :  having  thoroughly  conveyed  to  the  seller 
that  he  considers  it  too  dear.  Two  people  in  carriages, 
meeting,  one  touches  his  lips,  twice  or  thrice,  holding  up 
the  five  fingers  of  his  right  hand,  and  gives  a  horizontal  cut 
in  the  air  with  the  palm.  The  other  nods  briskly,  and 
goes  his  way.  He  has  been  invited  to  a  friendly  dinner  at 
half-past  five  o'clock,  and  will  certainly  come. 

All  over  Italy,  a  peculiar  shake  of  the  right  hand  from 
the  wrist,  with  the  forefinger  stretched  out,  expresses 
a  negative — the  only  negative  beggars  will  ever  under- 
stand. But,  in  Naples,  those  five  fingers  are  a  copious 
language. 


156  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

All  this,  and  every  other  kind  of  out-door  life  and  stir, 
and  maccaroni-eating  at  sunset,  and  flower-selling  all  day 
long,  and  begging  and  stealing  everywhere  and  at  all  hours, 
you  see  upon  the  bright  sea-shore,  where  the  waves  of  the 
Bay  sparkle  merrily.  But,  lovers  and  hunters  of  the  pic- 
turesque, let  us  not  keep  too  studiously  out  of  view  the 
miserable  depravity,  degradation,  and  wretchedness,  with 
which  this  gay  Neapolitan  life  is  inseparably  associated ! 
It  is  not  well  to  find  Saint  Giles's  so  repulsive,  and  the 
Porta  Capuana  so  attractive.  A  pair  of  naked  legs  and  a 
ragged  red  scarf,  do  not  make  all  the  difference  between 
what  is  interesting  and  what  is  coarse  and  odious?  Paint- 
ing and  poetising  for  ever,  if  you  will,  the  beauties  of  this 
most  beautiful  and  lovely  spot  of  earth,  let  us,  as  our  duty, 
try  to  associate  a  new  picturesque  with  some  faint  recogni- 
tion of  man's  destiny  and  capabilities;  more  hopeful,  I  be- 
lieve, among  the  ice  and  snow  of  the  Korth  Pole,  than  in 
the  sun  and  bloom  of  Naples. 

Capri — once  made  odious  by  the  deified  beast  Tiberius — 
Ischia,  Procida,  and  the  thousand  distant  beauties  of  the 
Bay,  lie  in  the  blue  sea  yonder,  changing  in  the  mist  and 
sunshine  twenty  times  a  day :  now  close  at  hand,  now  far 
off,  now  unseen.  The  fairest  country  in  the  world,  is 
spread  about  us.  Whether  we  turn  towards  the  Miseno 
shore  of  the  splendid  watery  amphitheatre,  and  go  by  the 
Grotto  of  Posilipo  to  the  Grotto  del  Cane  and  away  to 
Baise :  or  take  the  other  way,  towards  Vesuvius  and  Sor- 
rento, it  is  one  succession  of  delights.  In  the  last-named 
direction,  where,  over  doors  and  archways,  there  are  count- 
less little  images  of  San  Gennaro,  with  this  Canute's  hand 
stretched  out,  to  check  the  fury  of  the  burning  Mountain, 
we  are  carried  pleasantly,  by  a  railroad  on  the  beautiful 
Sea  Beach,  past  the  town  of  Torre  del  Greco,  built  upon 
the  ashes  of  the  former  town  destroyed  by  an  eruption  of 
Vesuvius,  within  a  hundred  years ;  and  past  the  flat-roofed 
houses,  granaries,  and  maccaroni  manufactories ;  to  Castel- 
lamare,  with  its  ruined  castle,  now  inhabited  by  fishermen, 
standing  in  the  sea  upon  a  heap  of  rocks.  Here,  the  rail- 
road terminates ;  but,  hence  we  may  ride  on,  by  an  unbro- 
ken succession  of  enchanting  bays,  and  beautiful  scenery, 
sloping  from  the  highest  summit  of  Saint  Angelo,  the  high- 
est neighbouring  mountain,  down  to  the  water's  edge — 
among  vineyards,  olive-trees,  gardens  of  oranges  and  lem- 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY  157 

ons,  orchards,  heaped-up  rocks,  green  gorges  in  the  hills 
— and  by  the  bases  of  snow-covered  heights,  and  through 
small  towns  with  handsome,  dark-haired  women  at  the 
doers — and  pass  delicious  summer  villas — to  Sorrento, 
where  the  poet  Tasso  drew  his  inspiration  from  the  beauty 
surrounding  him.  Eeturning,  we  may  climb  the  heights 
above  Castellamarc,  and  looking  down  among  the  boughs 
and  leaves,  see  the  crisp  water  glistening  in  the  sun ;  and 
clusters  of  white  houses  in  distant  Naples,  dwindling,  in 
the  great  extent  of  prospect,  down  to  dice.  The  coming 
back  to  the  city,  by  the  beach  again,  at  sunset :  with  the 
glowing  sea  on  one  side,  and  the  darkening  mountain,  with 
its  smoke  and  flame,  upon  the  other:  is  a  sublime  conclu- 
sion to  the  glory  of  the  day. 

That  church  by  the  Porta  Capuana — near  the  old  fisher- 
'iiiarket  in  the  dirtiest  quarter  of  dirty  Naples,  where  the 
revolt  of  Masaniello  began — is  memorable  for  having  been 
the  scene  of  one  of  his  earliest  proclamations  to  the  people, 
and  is  particularly  remarkable  for  nothing  else,  unless  it 
be  its  waxen  and  bejewelled  Saint  in  a  glass  case,  with  two 
odd  hands ;  or  the  enormous  number  of  beggars  who  are 
constantly  rapping  their  chins  there,  like  a  battery  of  cas- 
tanets. The  cathedral  with  the  beautiful  door,  and  the 
columns  of  African  and  Egyptian  granite  that  once  orna- 
mented the  temple  of  Apollo,  contains  the  famous  sacred 
blood  of  San  Gennaro  or  Januarius :  which  is  preserved  in 
two  phials  in  a  silver  tabernacle,  and  miraculously  liquefies 
three  times  a  year,  to  the  great  admiration  of  the  people. 
At  the  same  moment,  the  stone  (distant  some  miles)  where 
tlie  Saint  suffered  martyrdom,  becomes  faintly  red.  It  is 
jiaid  that  the  officiating  priests  turn  faintly  red  also,  some- 
times, when  these  miracles  ocCur. 

The  old,  old  men  who  live  in  hovels  at  the  entrance  of 
these  ancient  catacombs,  and  who,  in  their  age  and  infirm- 
ity, seem  waiting  here,  to  be  buried  themselves,  are  mem- 
bers of  a  curious  body,  called  the  Eoyal  Hospital,  who  are 
the  official  attendants  at  funerals.  Two  of  these  old  spec- 
tres totter  away,  with  lighted  tapers,  to  show  the  caverns 
of  death — as  unconcerned  as  if  they  were  immortal.  They 
were  used  as  burying-places  for  three  hundred  years ;  and, 
in  one  part,  is  a  large  pit  full  of  skulls  and  bones,  said  to 
be  the  sad  remains  of  a  great  mortality  occasioned  by  a 
plague.     In  the  rest,  there  is  nothing  but  dust.       They 


158  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

consist,  chiefly,  of  great  wide  corridors  and  labyrinths, 
hewn  out  of  the  rock.  At  the  end  of  some  of  these  long 
passages,  are  unexpected  glimpses  of  the  daylight,  shining 
down  from  above.  It  looks  as  ghastly  and  as  strange: 
among  the  torches,  and  the  dust,  and  tlie  dark  vaults :  as 
if  it,  too,  were  dead  and  buried. 

The  present  burial-place  lies  out  yonder,  on  a  hill  be- 
tween the  city  and  Vesuvius.  The  old  Campo  Santo  with 
its  three  hundred  and  sixty-five  pits,  is  only  used  for  those 
who  die  in  hospitals,  and  prisons,  and  are  unclaimed  by 
their  friends.  The  graceful  new  cemetery,  at  no  great  dis- 
tance from  it,  though  yet  unfinished,  has  already  many 
graves  among  its  shrubs  and  flowers,  and  airy  colonnades. 
It  might  be  reasonably  objected  elsewhere,  that  some  of  the 
tombs  are  meretricious  and  too  fanciful ;  but  the  general 
brightness  seems  to  justify  it  here;  and  Mount  Vesuvius, 
separated  from  them  by  a  lovely  slope  of  ground,  exalts 
and  saddens  the  scene. 

If  it  be  solemn  to  behold  from  this  new  City  of  the  Dead, 
with  its  dark  smoke  hanging  in  the  clear  sky,  how  much 
more  awful  and  impressive  is  it,  viewed  from  the  ghostly 
ruins  of  Herculaneum  and  Pompeii! 

Stajid  at  tlie  bottom  of  tlie  great  market-place  of  Pom- 
peii>  and  look  up  the  silent  streets,  through  the  ruined 
temples  of  Jupiter  and  Isis,  over  the  broken  houses  with 
their  inmost  sanctuaries  open  to  the  day,  away  to  Mount 
Vesuvius,  bright  and  snowy  in  the  peaceful  distance ;  and 
lose  all  count  of  time,  and  heed  of  other  things,  in  the 
strange  and  melancholy  sensation  of  seeing  the  Destroyed 
and  the  Destroyer  making  this  quiet  picture  in  the  sun. 
Then,  ramble  on,  and  see,  at  every  turn,  the  little  familiar 
tokens  of  human  habitation  and  everyday  pursuits;  the 
chafing  of  the  bucket-rope  in  the  stone  rim  of  the  exhausted 
well ;  the  track  of  carriage-wheels  in  the  pavement  of  the 
street ;  the  marks  of  drinking-vessels  on  the  stone  counter 
of  the  wine-shop ;  the  amphorae  in  private  cellars,  stored 
away  so  many  hundred  years  ago,  and  undisturbed  to  this 
hour — all  rendering  the  solitude  and  deadly  lonesomeness 
of  the  place,  ten  thousand  times  more  solemn,  than  if  the 
volcano,  in  its  fury,  had  swept  the  city  from  the  earth,  and 
sunk  it  in  the  bottom  of  the  sea. 

After  it  was  shaken  by  the  earthquake  which  preceded 
the  eruption,  workmen  were  employed  in  shaping  out,  in 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  159 

stone,  ne^v  ornaments  for  temples  and  other  buildings  that 
had  sufi'ered.  Here  lies  their  work,  outside  the  city  gate, 
as  if  they  would  return  to-morrow. 

In  the  cellar  of  Diomede's  house,  where  certain  skeletons 
were  found  huddled  together,  close  to  the  door,  the  impres- 
sion of  their  bodies  on  the  ashes,  hardened  with  the  ashes, 
and  became  stamped  and  fixed  there,  after  they  had 
shrunk,  inside,  to  scanty  bones.  So,  in  the  Theatre  of 
Herculaneum,  a  comic  mask,  floating  on  the  stream  when 
it  was  hot  and  liquidj  stamped  its  mimic  features  in  it  as  it 
hardened  into  stone ;  and  now,  it  turns  upon  the  stranger 
the  fantastic  look  it  turned  upon  the  audiences  in  that  same 
Theatre  two  tliousand  years  ago. 

Next  to  the  wonder  of  going  up  and  down  the  streets, 
and  in  and  out  of  tlie  houses,  and  traversing  the  secret 
chambers  of  the  temples  of  a  religion  that  has  vanished 
from  the  earth,  and  linding  so  many  fresh  traces  of  remote 
antiquity :  as  if  the  course  of  Time  had  been  stopped  after 
this  desolatioji,  and  there  had  been  no  nights  and  days, 
months,  years,  and  centuries,  since :  nothing  is  more  im- 
pressive and  terrible  than  the  many  evidences  of  the  search- 
ing nature  of  the  ashes,  as  bespeaking  their  irresistible 
power,  and  the  impossibility  of  escaping  them.  In  the 
wine-cellars,  thej'-  forced  their  way  into  the  earthen  vessels : 
displacing  the  wine  and  choking  them,  to  the  brim,  with 
dust.  In  the  tombs,  they  forced  the  ashes  of  the  dead 
from  the  funeral  urns,  and  rained  new  ruin  even  into  them. 
The  moutlis,  and  eyes,  and  skulls  of  all  the  skeletons,  were 
stuffed  witli  tliis  terrible  hail.  In  Herculaneum,  where  the 
flood  was  of  a  different  and  a  heavier  kind,  it  rolled  in, 
like  a  sea.  Imagine  a  deluge  of  water  turned  to  marble,  at 
its  height — and  that  is  what  is  called  "  the  lava  "  here. 

Some  workmen  were  digging  the  gloomy  well  on  the 
brink  of  which  we  now  stand,  looking  down,  when  they 
came  on  some  of  the  stone  benches  of  the  Theatre — those 
steps  (for  such  they  seem)  at  the  bottom  of  the  excavation 
— and  found  the  buried  city  of  Herculaneum.  Presently 
going  down,  with  lighted  torches,  we  are  perplexed  by 
great  walls  of  monstrous  thickness,  rising  up  between  the 
benches,  shutting  out  tlie  stage,  obtruding  their  shapeless 
forms  in  absurd  places,  confusing  the  whole  plan,  and  mak- 
ing it  a  disordered  dream.  We  cannot,  at  flrst,  believe, 
or  picture  to  ourselves,  that  This  came  rolling  in,   and 


160  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

drowned  the  city ;  and  that  all  that  is  not  here,  has  been 
cut  away,  by  the  axe,  like  solid  stone.  But  this  perceived 
and  understood,  the  horror  and  oppression  of  its  presence 
are  indescribable. 

Many  of  the  paintings  on  the  walls  in  the  roofless  cham- 
bers of  both  cities,  or  carefully  removed  to  the  museum  at 
Naples,  are  as  fresh  and  plain,  as  if  they  had  been  exe' 
cuted  yesterday.  Here  are  subjects  of  still  life,  as  provi- 
sions, dead  game,  bottles,  glasses,  and  the  like;  familiar 
classical  stories,  or  mythological  fables,  always  forcibly 
and  plainly  told ;  conceits  of  Cupids,  quarrelling,  sporting, 
working  at  trades;  theatrical  rehearsals;  poets  reading 
their  productions  to  their  friends;  inscriptions  chalked 
upon  the  walls;  political  squibs,  advertisements,  rough 
drawings  by  schoolboys ;  everything  to  people  and  restore 
the  ancient  cities,  in  the  fancy  of  their  wondering  visitor. 
Furniture,  too,  you  see,  of  every  kind — lamps,  tables, 
couches ;  vessels  for  eating,  drinking,  and  cooking ;  work- 
men's tools,  surgical  instruments,  tickets  for  the  theatre, 
pieces  of  money,  personal  ornaments,  bunches  of  keys 
found  clenched  in  the  grasp  of  skeletons,  helmets  of  guards 
and  warriors ;  little  household  bells,  yet  musical  with  their 
old  domestic  tones. 

The  least  among  these  objects,  lends  its  aid  to  swell  the 
interest  of  Vesuvius,  and  invest  it  with  a  perfect  fascina- 
tion. The  looking,  from  either  ruined  city,  into  the  neigh- 
bouring grounds  overgrown  with  beautiful  vines  and  luxu- 
riant trees;  and  remembering  that  house  upon  house, 
temple  on  temple,  building  after  building,  and  street  after 
street,  are  still  lying  underneath  the  roots  of  all  the  quiet 
cultivation,  waiting  to  be  turned  up  to  the  light  of  day;  is 
something  so  wonderful,  so  full  of  mystery,  so  captivating 
to  the  imagination,  that  one  would  think  it  would  be  para- 
mount, and  yield  to  nothing  else.  To  nothing  but  Vesu- 
vius; but  the  mountain  is  the  genius  of  the  scene.  From 
every  indication  of  the  ruin  it  has  worked,  we  look,  again, 
with  an  absorbing  interest  to  where  its  smoke  is  rising  up 
into  the  sky.  It  is  beyond  us,  as  we  thread  the  ruined 
streets :  above  us,  as  we  stand  upon  the  ruined  walls ;  we 
follow  it  through  every  vista  of  broken  columns,  as  we 
wander  through  the  empty  courtyards  of  the  houses ;  and 
through  the  garlandings  and  interlacings  of  every  wanton 
vine.     Turning  away  to  Psestum  yonder,  to  see  the  awful 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  161 

Structures  built,  the  least  aged  of  them,  hundreds  of  years 
before  the  birth  of  Christ,  and  standing  yet,  erect  in  lonely 
majesty,  upon  the  wild,  malaria-blighted  plain — we  watch 
Vesuvius  as  it  disappears  from  the  prospect,  and  watch  for 
it  agaiu,  on  our  return,  with  the  same  thrill  of  interest:  as 
the  doom  and  destiny  of  all  this  beautiful  country,  biding 
its  terrible  time. 

It  is  very  warm  in  the  sun,  on  this  early  spring-day, 
when  we  return  from  Paestum,  but  very  cold  in  the  shade : 
insomuch,  that  although  we  may  lunch,  pleasantly,  at  noon, 
in  the  open  air,  by  the  gate  of  Pompeii,  the  neighbouring 
rivulet  supplies  thick  ice  for  our  wine.  But,  the  sun  is 
shining  brightly ;  there  is  not  a  cloud  or  speck  of  vapour 
in  the  whole  blue  sky,  looking  down  upon  the  bay  of  Na- 
ples ;  and  the  moon  will  be  at  the  full  to-night.  No  matter 
that  the  snow  and  ice  lie  thick  upon  the  summit  of  Vesu- 
vius, or  that  we  have  been  on  foot  all  day  at  Pompeii,  or 
that  croakers  maintain  that  strangers  should  not  be  on  the 
moiiutaiu  by  night,  in  such  unusual  season.  Let  us  take 
advantage  of  the  fine  weather;  make  the  best  of  our  way 
to  Resiua,  the  little  village  at  the  foot  of  the  mountain; 
prepare  ourselves,  as  well  as  we  can,  on  so  short  a  notice, 
at  the  guide's  house ;  ascend  at  once,  and  have  sunset  half- 
way up,  moonlight  at  the  top,  and  midnight  to  come  down  in ! 

At  four  o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  there  is  a  terrible  up- 
roar in  the  little  stable-yard  of  Signor  Salvatore,  the  recog- 
nised head-guide,  with  the  gold  band  round  his  cap ;  and 
thirty  under-guides  who  are  all  scuffling  and  screaming  at 
once,  are  preparing  half-a-dozen  saddled  ponies,  three  lit- 
ters, and  some  stout  staves,  for  the  journey.  Every  one  of 
the  thirty,  quarrels  with  the  other  twenty-nine,  and  fright- 
ens the  six  ponies ;  and  as  much  of  the  village  as  can  possi- 
bly squeeze  itself  into  the  little  stable-yard,  participates  in 
the  tumult,  and  gets  trodden  on  by  the  cattle. 

After  much  violent  skirmishing,  and  more  noise  than 
would  suffice  for  the  storming  of  Naples,  the  procession 
starts.  The  head  guide,  who  is  liberally  paid  for  all  the 
attendants,  rides  a  little  in  advance  of  the  party ;  the  other 
thirty  guides  proceed  on  foot.  Eight  go  forward  with  the 
litters  that  are  to  be  used  by-and-by ;  and  the  remaining 
two-and-twenty  beg. 

We  ascend,  gradually,  by  stony  lanes  like  rough  broad 
flights  of  stairs,  for  some  time.  At  length,  we  leave  these, 
11 


162  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

and  the  vineyards  on  either  side  of  them,  and  emerge  upon 
a  bleak  bare  region  where  the  lava  lies  confusedly,  in 
enormous  rusty  masses :  as  if  the  earth  had  been  ploughed 
up  by  burning  thunder-bolts.  And  now,  we  halt  to  see  the 
sunset.  The  change  tliat  falls  upon  the  dreary  region  and 
on  the  whole  mountain,  as  its  red  light  fades,  and  the  night 
comes  on — and  the  unutterable  solemnity  and  dreariness 
that  reign  around,  who  that  has  witnessed  it,  can  ever 
forget ! 

It  is  dark,  when  after  winding,  for  some  time,  over  the 
broken  ground,  we  arrive  at  the  foot  of  the  cone :  which  is 
extremely  steep,  and  seems  to  rise,  almost  perpendicularly, 
from  the  spot  where  we  dismount.  The  only  light  is  re- 
flected from  the  snow,  deep,  hard,  and  white,  with  which 
the  cone  is  covered.  It  is  now  intensely  cold,  and  the  air 
is  piercing.  The  thirty-one  have  brought  no  torches,  know- 
ing that  the  moon  will  rise  before  we  reach  the  top.  Two 
of  the  litters  are  devoted  to  the  two  ladies ;  the  third,  to 
a  rather  heavy  gentleman  from  Naples,  whose  hospitality 
and  good-nature  have  attached  him  to  the  expedition,  and 
determined  him  to  assist  in  doing  the  honours  of  the  moun- 
tain. The  rather  heavy  gentleman  is  carried  by  fifteen 
men ;  each  of  the  ladies  by  half-a-dozen.  We  who  walk, 
make  the  best  use  of  our  staves ;  and  so  the  whole  party 
begin  to  labour  upward  over  the  snow, — as  if  they  were 
toiling  to  the  summit  of  an  antediluvian  Twelfth-cake. 

We  are  a  long  time  toiling  up;  and  the  head  guide  looks 
oddly  about  him  when  one  of  the  company — not  an  Italian, 
though  an  habitue  of  the  mountain  for  many  years :  whom 
we  will  call,  for  our  present  purpose,  Mr.  Pickle  of  Portici 
— suggests  that,  as  it  irf  freezing  hard,  and  the  usual  foot- 
ing of  ashes  is  covered  by  the  snow  and  ice,  it  will  surely 
be  difficult  to  descend.  But  the  sight  of  the  litters  above, 
tilting  up,  and  down,  and  jerking  from  this  side  to  that,  as 
the  bearers  continually  slip  and  tumble,  diverts  our  atten- 
tion :  more  especially  as  the  whole  length  of  the  rather 
heavy  gentleman  is,  at  that  moment,  presented  to  us  alarm- 
ingly foreshortened,  with  his  head  downwards. 

The  rising  of  the  moon  soon  afterwards,  revives  the  flag- 
ging spirits  of  the  Bearers.  Stimulating  each  other  with 
their  usual  watchword,  "Courage,  friend!  It  is  to  eat 
maccaroni!  "  they  press  on,  gallantly,  for  the  summit. 

From  tinging  the  top  of  the  snow  above  us,  with  a  band 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  163 

of  light,  and  pouring  it  in  a  stream  through  the  valley  be- 
low, while  we  have  been  ascending  in  the  dark,  the  moon 
soon  lights  the  whole  white  mountain  side,  and  the  broad 
sea  down  below,  and  tiny  Naples  in  the  distance,  and  every 
village  in  the  country  round.  The  whole  prospect  is  in  this 
lovely  state,  when  we  come  upon  the  platform  on  the 
mountain-top — the  region  of  Fire — an  exhausted  crater 
formed  of  great  masses  of  gigantic  cinders,  like  blocks  of 
stone  from  some  tremendous  waterfall,  burnt  up;  from 
every  chink  and  crevice  of  which,  hot,  sulphurous  smoke  is 
pouring  out:  while,  from  another  conical-shaped  hill, 
the  present  crater,  rising  abruptly  from  this  platform  at  the 
end,  great  sheets  of  fire  are  streaming  forth :  reddening  the 
night  with  flame,  blackening  it  with  smoke,  and  spotting  it 
with  red-hot  stones  and  cinders,  that  fly  up  into  the  air 
like  feathers,  and  fall  down  like  lead.  What  words  can 
paint  the  gloom  and  grandeur  of  this  scene ! 

The  broken  ground ;  the  smoke ;  the  sense  of  suffocation 
from  the  sulphur;  the  fear  of  falling  down  through  the 
crevices  in  the  yawning  ground;  the  stopping,  every  now 
and  then,  for  somebody  who  is  missing  in  the  dark  (for  the 
dense  smoke  now  obscures  the  moon)  ;  the  intolerable  noise 
of  the  thirty;  and  the  hoarse  roaring  of  the  mountain; 
make  it  a  scene  of  such  confusion,  at  the  same  time,  that 
we  reel  again.  But,  dragging  the  ladies  through  it,  and 
across  another  exhausted  crater  to  the  foot  of  the  present 
Volcano,  we  approach  close  to  it  on  the  windy  side,  and 
then  sit  down  among  the  hot  ashes  at  its  foot,  and  look  up 
in  silence;  faintly  estimating  the  action  that  is  going  on 
within,  from  its  being  full  a  hundred  feet  higher,  at  this 
minute,  than  it  was  six  weeks  ago. 

There  is  something  in  the  fire  and  roar,  that  generates 
an  irresistible  desire  to  get  nearer  to  it.  We  cannot  rest 
long,  without  starting  off,  two  of  us,  on  our  hands  and 
knees,  accompanied  by  the  head  guide,  to  climb  to  the 
brim  of  the  flaming  crater,  and  try  to  look  in.  Meanwhile, 
the  thirty  yell,  as  with  one  voice,  that  it  is  a  dangerous 
proceeding,  and  call  to  us  to  come  back ;  frightening  the 
rest  of  the  party  out  of  their  wits. 

Wliat  with  their  noise,  and  what  with  the  trembling  of 
the  thin  crust  of  ground,  that  seems  about  to  open  under- 
neath our  feet  and  plunge  us  in  the  burning  gulf  below 
(which  is  the  real  danger,  if  there  be  any) ;  and  what  with 


164  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

the  flashing  of  the  fire  in  our  faces,  and  the  shower  of  red- 
hot  ashes  that  is  raining  down,  and  the  choking  smoke 
and  sulphur ;  we  may  well  feel  giddy  and  irrational,  like 
drunken  men.  But,  we  contrive  to  climb  up  to  the  brim, 
and  look  down,  for  a  moment,  into  the  Hell  of  boiling  fire 
below.  Then,  we  all  three  come  rolling  down ;  blackened, 
and  singed,  and  scorched,  and  hot,  and  giddy:  and  each 
with  his  dress  alight  in  half-a-dozen  places 

You  have  read,  a  thousand  times,  that  the  usual  way  of 
descending,  is,  by  sliding  down  the  ashes :  which,  forming 
a  gradually-increasing  ledge  below  the  feet,  prevent  too 
rapid  a  descent.  But,  when  we  have  crossed  the  two  ex- 
hausted craters  on  our  way  back,  and  are  come  to  this  pre- 
cipitous place,  there  is  (as  Mr.  Pickle  has  foretold)  no  ves- 
tige of  ashes  to  be  seen ;  the  whole  being  a  smooth  sheet 
of  ice 

In  this  dilemma,  ten  or  a  dozen  of  the  guides  cautiously 
join  hands,  and  make  a  chain  of  men ;  of  whom  the  fore- 
most beat,  as  well  as  they  can,  a  rough  track  with  their 
sticks,  down  which  we  prepare  to  follow.  The  way  being 
fearfully  steep,  and  none  of  the  party :  even  of  the  thirty : 
being  able  to  keep  their  feet  for  six  paces  togethei-,  the 
ladies  are  taken  out  of  their  litters,  and  placed,  each  be- 
tween two  careful  persons ;  while  others  of  the  thirty  hold 
by  their  skirts,  to  prevent  their  falling  forward — a  neces- 
sary precaution,  tending  to  the  immediate  and  hopeless 
dilapidation  of  their  apparel.  The  rather  heavy  gentleman 
is  abjured  to  leave  his  litter  too,  and  be  escorted  in  a  simi- 
lar manner ;  but  he  resolves  to  be  brought  down  as  he  was 
brought  up,  on  the  principle  that  his  fifteen  bearers  are  not 
likely  to  tumble  all  at  once,  and  that  he  is  safer  so,  than 
trusting  to  his  own  legs. 

In  this  order,  we  begin  the  descent :  sometimes  on  foot, 
sometimes  shuffling  on  the  ice:  always  proceeding  much 
more  quietly  and  slowly,  than  on  our  upward  way :  and  con- 
stantly alarmed  by  the  falling  among  us  of  somebody  from 
behind,  who  endangers  the  footing  of  the  whole  party,  and 
clings  pertinaciously  to  anybody's  ankles.  It  is  impossible 
for  the  litter  to  be  in  advance,  too,  as  the  track  has  to  be 
made;  and  its  appearance  behind  us,  overhead — with  some 
one  or  other  of  the  bearers  always  down,  and  the  rather 
heavy  gentleman  with  his  legs  always  in  the  air — is  very 
threatening  and  frightful.     We  have  gone  on  thus,  a  very 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  165 

little  way,  painfully  and  anxiously,  but  quite  merrily,  and 
regarding  it  as  a  great  success — and  have  all  fallen  several 
times,  and  have  all  been  stopped,  somehow  or  other,  as  we 
were  sliding  away — when  Mr.  Pickle,  of  Portici,  in  the  act 
of  remarking  on  these  uncommon  circumstances  as  quite 
beyond  his  experience,  stumbles,  falls,  disengages  himself, 
with  quick  presence  of  mind,  from  those  about  him,  plunges 
away  heafti  foremost,  and  rolls,  over  and  over,  down  the 
whole  surface  of  the  cone ! 

Sickening  as  it  is  to  look,  and  be  so  powerless  to  help 
him,  I  see  him  there,  in  the  moonlight — I  have  had  such  a 
dream  often — skimming  over  the  white  ice,  like  a  cannon- 
ball.  Almost  at  the  same  .moment,  there  is  a  cry  from  be- 
hind ;  and  a  man  wlio  has  carried  a  light  basket  of  spare 
cloaks  on  his  head,  comes  rolling  past,  at  the  same  friglit- 
ful  speed,  closely  followed  by  a  boy.  At  this  climax  of 
the  chapter  of  accidents,  the  remaining  eight-and-twenty 
vociferate  to  that  degree,  that  a  pack  of  wolves  would  be 
music  to  them ! 

Giddy,  and  bloody,  and  a  mere  bundle  of  rags,  is  Pickle 
of  Portici  when  we  reach  the  place  where  we  dismounted, 
and  where  the  horses  are  waiting;  but,  thank  God,  sound 
in  limb!  And  never  are  we  likely  to  be  more  glad  to  see  a 
man  alive  and  on  his  feet,  than  to  see  him  now — making 
light  of  it  too,  though  sorely  bruised  and  in  great  pain. 
The  boy  is  brought  into  the  Hermitage  on  the  Mountain, 
while  we  are  at  supper,  Avith  his  head  tied  up ;  and  the  man 
is  heard  of,  some  hours  afterwards.  He  too  is  bruised  and 
stunned,  but  has  broken  no  bones ;  the  snow  having,  fortu- 
nately, cov-ered  all  the  larger  blocks  of  rock  and  stone,  and 
rendered  them  harmless. 

After  a  cheerful  meal,  and  a  good  rest  before  a  blazing 
fire,  we  again  take  horse,  and  continue  our  descent  to 
Salvatore's  house — very  slowly,  by  reason  of  our  bruised 
friend  being  hardly  able  to  keep  the  saddle,  or  endure  the 
pain  of  motion.  Though  it  is  so  late  at  night,  or  t  .irly  in 
the  morning,  all  the  people  of  the  village  are  waiting  about 
the  little  stable-yard  when  we  arrive,  and  looking  up  the 
road  by  which  we  are  expected.  Our  appearance  is  hailed 
with  a  great  clamour  of  tongues,  and  a  general  sensation 
for  which  in  our  modesty  we  are  somewhat  at  a  loss  to  ac- 
count, until,  turning  into  the  yard,  we  find  that  one  of  a 
party  of  French  gentlemen  who  were  ou  the  mountain  at 


1^  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

the  same  time  is  lying  on  some  straw  in  the  stable,  with  a 
broken  limb :  looking  like  Deacli,  and  suffering  great  tor- 
ture ;  and  that  we  were  confidently  supposed  to  have  en- 
countered some  worse  accident. 

So  "  well  returned,  and  Heaven  be  praised ! "  as  the 
cheerful  Vetturino,  who  has  borne  us  company  all  the  way 
from  Pisa,  says,  with  all  his  heart!  And  away  with  his 
ready  horses,  into  sleeping  Naples !  , 

It  wakes  again  to  Policinelli  and  pickpockets,  buffo  sing- 
ers and  beggars,  rags,  puppets,  flowers,  brightness,  dirt, 
and  universal  degradation ;  airing  its  Harlequin  suit  in  the 
sunshine,  next  day  and  every  day;  singing,  starving,  dan- 
cing, gaming,  on  the  seashore ;  and  leaving  all  labour  to  the 
burning  mountain,  which  is  ever  at  its  work. 

Our  English  dilettanti  would  be  very  pathetic  on  the 
subject  of  the  national  taste,  if  they  could  hear  an  Italian 
opera  half  as  badly  sung  in  England  as  we  may  hear  the 
Foscari  performed,  to-night,  in  the  splendid  theatre  of  San 
Carlo.  But,  for  astonishing  truth  and  spirit  in  seizing  and 
embodying  the  real  life  about  it,  the  shabby  little  San 
Carlino  Theatre — the  rickety  house  one  story  high,  with  a 
staring  picture  outside :  down  among  the  drums  and  trum- 
pets, and  the  tumblers,  and  the  lady  conjuror — is  v/ithout  a 
rival  anywhere. 

Tliere  is  one  extraordinary  feature  in  the  real  life  of  Na- 
ples, at  which  we  may  take  a  glance  before  we  go — the 
Lotteries. 

They  prevail  in  most  parts  of  Italy,  but  are  particularly 
obvious,  in  their  effects  and  influences,  here.  They  are 
drawn  every  Saturday.  They  bring  an  immense  revenue 
to  the  Government ;  and  diffuse  a  taste  for  gamblinr;  among 
the  poorest  of  the  poor,  which  is  very  comfortable  to  the 
coffers  of  the  State,  and  very  ruinous  to  themselves.  The 
lowest  stake  is  one  grain ;  less  than  a  farthing.  One  hun- 
dred numbers — from  one  to  a  hundred,  inclusive — are  put 
into  a  box.  Five  are  drawn.  Those  are  the  prizes.  I  buy 
three  numbers.  If  one  of  them  come  up,  I  win  a  small 
prize.  If  two,  some  hundreds  of  times  my  stake.  If  three, 
three  thousand  five  hundred  times  my  stake.  I  stake  (or 
play  as  they  call  it)  what  I  can  upon  my  numbers,  and  buy 
what  numbers  I  please.  The  amount  I  play,  I  pay  at  tiie 
lottery  office,  where  I  purchase  the  ticket;  and  it  is  stated 
on  the  ticket  itself. 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  167 

Every  lottery  office  keeps  a  printed  book,  an  Universal 
Lottery  Diviner,  where  every  possible  accident  and  circum- 
stance is  provided  for,  and  has  a  number  against  it.  For 
instance,  let  us  take  two  carlini — about  sevenpence.  On 
our  way  to  the  lottery  office,  we  run  against  a  black  man. 
When  we  get  there,  we  say  gravely,  "The  Diviner."  It  is 
handed  over  the  counter,  as  a  serious  matter  of  business. 
We  look  at  the  black  man.  Such  a  number.  "Give  us 
that."  We  look  at  running  against  a  person  in  the  street. 
"  Give  us  that."  We  look  at  the  name  of  the  street  itself. 
"Give  us  that."     Now,  we  have  our  tliree  numbers. 

If  the  roof  of  the  theatre  of  San  Carlo  were  to  fall  in, 
so  many  people  would  play  upon  the  numbers  attached  to 
such  an  accident  in  the  Diviner,  that  the  Government 
would  soon  close  those  numbers,  and  decline  to  run  the 
risk  of  losing  any  more  upon  them.  This  often  happens. 
Not  long  ago,  when  there  was  a  fire  in  the  King's  Palace, 
there  was  such  a  desperate  run  on  fire,  and  king,  and  palace, 
that  further  stakes  on  the  numbers  attached  to  those  words 
in  the  Golden  Book  were  forbidden.  Every  accident  or 
event,  is  supposed,  by  the  ignorant  populace,  to  be  a  reve- 
lation to  the  beholder,  or  party  concerned,  in  connection 
with  the  lottery.  Certain  people  who  have  a  talent  for 
dreaming  fortunately,  are  much  sought  after;  and  there 
are  some  priests  who  are  constantly  favoured  with  visions 
of  the  lucky  numbers. 

I  heard  of  a  horse  running  away  with  a  man,  and  dash- 
ing him  down,  dead,  at  the  corner  of  a  street.  Pursuing 
the  horse  with  incredible  speed,  was  another  man,  who  ran 
so  fast,  that  he  came  up,  immediately  after  the  accident. 
He  threw  himself  upon  his  knees  beside  the  unfortunate 
rider,  and  clasped  his  hand  with  an  expression  of  the  wild- 
est grief.  "If  you  have  life,"  he  said,  "speak  one  word 
to  me!  If  you  have  one  gasp  of  breath  left,  mention  your 
age  for  Heaven's  sake,  that  I  may  play  that  number  in  the 
lottery." 

It  is  four  o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  and  we  may  go  to  see 
our  lottery  drawn.  The  ceremony  takes  place  every  Satur- 
day, in  the  Tribunale,  or  Court  of  Justice — this  singular, 
earthy-smelling  room,  or  gallery,  as  mouldy  as  an  old  cel- 
lar, and  as  damp  as  a  dungeon.  At  the  upper  end  is  a 
platform,  with  a  large  horse-shoe  table  upon  it ;  and  a  Presi- 
dent and  Council  sitting  round — all  Judges  of  the  Law.    The 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

man  on  the  little  stool  behind  the  President,  is  the  Capo 
Lazzarone,  a  kind  of  tribune  of  the  people,  appointed  on 
their  behalf  to  see  that  all  is  fairly  conducted :  attended 
by  a  few  personal  friends.  A  ragged,  swarthy  fellow  he 
is :  with  long  matted  hair  hanging  down  all  over  his  face  : 
and  covered,  from  head  to  foot,  with  most  unquestionably 
genuine  dirt.  All  the  body  of  the  room  is  filled  with  the 
commonest  of  the  Neapolitan,  people :  and  between  them 
and  the  platform,  guarding  the  steps  leading  to  the  latter, 
is  a  small  body  of  soldiers. 

There  is  some  delay  in  the  arrival  of  the  necessary  num- 
ber of  judges;  during  which,  the  box,  in  which  the  num- 
bers are  being  placed,  is  a  source  of  the  deepest  interest. 
When  the  box  is  full,  the  boy  who  is  to  draw  the  numbers 
out  of  it  becomes  the  prominent  feature  of  the  proceedings. 
He  is  already  dressed  for  his  part,  in  a  tight  brown  Hol- 
land coat,  with  only  one  (the  left)  sleeve  to  it,  which  leaves 
his  right  arm  bared  to  the  shoulder,  ready  for  plunging 
down  into  the  mysterious  chest. 

During  the  hush  and  whisper  that  pervade  the  room,  all 
eyes  are  turned  on  this  young  minister  of  fortune.  People 
begin  to  inquire  his  age,  with  a  view  to  the  next  lottery ; 
and  the  number  of  his  brothers  and  sisters ;  and  the  age  of 
his  father  and  mother;  and  whether  he  has  any  moles  or 
dimples  upon  him ;  and  where,  and  how  many ;  when  the 
arrival  of  the  last  judge  but  one  (a  little  old  man,  univer- 
sally dreaded  as  possessing  the  Evil  Eye)  makes  a  slight 
diversion,  and  would  occasion  a  greater  one,  but  that  he  is 
immediately  deposed,  as  a  source  of  interest,  by  the  officiat- 
ing priest,  who  advances  gravely  to  his  place,  followed  by 
a  very  dirty  little  boy,  carrying  his  sacred  vestments,  and 
a  pot  of  Holy  Water. 

Here  is  the  last  judge  come  at  last,  and  now  he  takes  his 
place  at  the  horse-shoe  table ! 

There  is  a  murmur  of  irrepressible  agitation.  In  the 
midst  of  it,  the  priest  puts  his  head  into  the  sacred  vest- 
ments, and  pulls  the  same  over  his  shoulders.  Then  he 
says  a  silent  prayer ;  and  dipping  a  brush  into  the  pot  of 
Holy  Water,  sprinkles  it  over  the  box  and  over  the  boy, 
and  gives  them  a  double-barrelled  blessiug,  which  the  box 
and  the  boy  are  both  hoisted  on  the  table  to  receive.  The 
boy  remaining  on  the  table,  the  box  is  now  carried  round 
the  front  of  the  platform,  by  an  attendant,  who  holds  it  up 


PICTURES  PROM  ITALY.  169 

and  shakes  it  lustily  all  the  time ;  seeming  to  say,  like  the 
conjuror,  "There  is  no  deception,  ladies  and  gentlemen; 
keep  your  eyes  upon  me,  if  you  please !  " 

At  last,  the  box  is  set  before  the  boy ;  and  the  boy,  first 
holding  up  his  naked  arm  and  open  hand,  dives  down  into 
the  hole  (it  is  made  like  a  ballot-box)  and  pulls  out  a  num- 
ber, which  is  rolled  up,  round  something  hard,  like  a  bon- 
bon. This  he  hands  to  the  judge  next  him,  who  unrolls  a 
little  bit,  and  hands  it  to  the  President,  next  to  whom  he 
sits.  The  President  unrolls  it,  very  slowly.  The  Capo 
Lazzarone  leans  over  his  shoulder.  The  President  holds 
it  up,  unrolled,  to  the  Capo  Lazzarone.  The  Capo  Lazza- 
rone, looking  at  it  eagerly,  cries  out,  in  a  shrill  loud  voice, 
"  Sessanta-due ! "  (sixty-two),  expressing  the  two  upon  his 
lingers,  as  he  calls  it  out.  Alas !  the  Capo  Lazzarone  him- 
self has  not  staked  on  sixty- two.  His  face  is  very  long, 
and  his  eyes  roll  wildly. 

As  it  happens  to  be  a  favourite  number,  however,  it  is 
pretty  well  received,  which  is  not  always  the  case.  They 
are  all  drawn  with  the  same  ceremony,  omitting  the  bless- 
ing. One  blessing  is  enough  for  the  whole  multiplication- 
table.  The  only  new  incident  in  the  proceedings,  is  the 
gradually  deepening  intensity  of  the  change  in  the  Capo 
Lazzarone,  who  has,  evidently,  speculated  to  the  very 
utmost  extent  of  his  means ;  and  who,  when  he  sees  the 
last  number,  and  finds  that  it  is  not  one  of  his,  clasps  his 
hands,  and  raises  his  eyes  to  the  ceiling  before  proclaiming 
it,  as  though  remonstrating,  in  a  secret  agony,  with  his 
patron  saint,  for  having  committed  so  gross  a  breach  of 
confidence.  I  hope  the  Capo  Lazzarone  may  not  desert 
him  for  some  other  member  of  the  Calendar,  but  he  seems 
to  threaten  it. 

Where  the  winners  may  be,  nobody  knows.  They  cer- 
tainly are  not  present ;  the  general  disappointment  filling 
one  with  pity  for  the  poor  people.  They  look :  when  we 
stand  aside,  observing  them,  in  their  passage  through  the 
courtyard  down  below :  as  miserable  as  the  prisoners  in  the 
gaol  (it  forms  a  part  of  the  building),  who  are  peeping 
down  upon  them,  from  between  their  bars ;  or,  as  the  frag- 
ments of  human  heads  which  are  still  dangling  in  chains 
outside,  in  memory  of  the  good  old  times,  when  their 
owners  were  strung  up  there,  for  the  popular  edification. 

Away  from  Naples  in  a  glorious  sunrise,  by  the  road  to 


170  PICTURES  PROM  ITALY. 

Capua,  and  then  on  a  three  days'  journey  along  by-roads, 
that  we  may  see,  on  the  way,  the  monastery  of  Monte  Cas- 
sino,  which  is  perched  on  the  steep  and  lofty  hill  above  the 
little  town  of  San  Germano,  and  is  lost  on  a  misty  morning 
in  the  clouds. 

So  much  the  better,  for  the  deep  sounding  of  its  bell, 
which,  as  we  go  winding  up,  on  mules,  towards  the  convent, 
is  heard  mysteriously  in  the  still  air,  while  nothing  is  seen 
but  the  grey  mist,  moving  solemnly  and  slowly,  like  a  fu- 
neral procession.  Behold,  at  length,  the  shadowy  pile  of 
building  close  before  us :  its  grey  walls  and  towers  dimly 
seen,  though  so  near  and  so  vast:  and  the  raw  vapour 
rolling  through  its  cloisters  heavily. 

There  are  two  black  shadows  walking  to  and  fro  in  the 
quadrangle,  near  the  statues  of  the  Patron  Saint  and  his 
sister;  and  hopping  on  behind  them,  in  and  out  of  the  old 
arches,  is  a  raven,  croaking  in  answer  to  the  bell,  and  ut- 
tering, at  intervals,  the  purest  Tuscan.  How  like  a  Jesuit 
he  looks!  There  never  was  a  sly  and  stealthy  fellow  so  at 
home  as  is  this  raven,  standing  now  at  the  refectory  door, 
with  his  head  on  one  side,  and  pretending  to  glance  another 
way,  while  he  is  scrutinizing  the  visitors  keenly,  and  listen- 
ing with  fixed  attention.  What  a  dull-headed  man  the 
'^^rter  becomes  in  comparison ! 

"  He  speaks  like  us !  "  says  the  porter :  "quite  as  plainly." 
Quite  as  plainly.  Porter.  Nothing  could  be  more  expres- 
sive than  his  reception  of  the  peasants  who  are  entering  the 
gate  with  baskets  and  burdens.  There  is  a  roll  in  his  eye, 
and  a  chuckle  in  his  throat,  which  should  qualify  him  to 
be  chosen  Superior  of  an  Order  of  Ravens.  He  knows  all 
about  it.  "It's  all  right,"  he  says.  "We  know  what  we 
know.     Come  along,  good  people.     Glad  to  see  you !  " 

How  was  this  extraordinary  structure  ever  built  in  such 
a  situation,  where  the  labour  of  conveying  the  stone,  and 
iron,  and  marble,  so  great  a  height,  must  have  been  prodig- 
ious? "Caw!"  says  the  raven,  welcoming  the  peasants. 
How,  being  despoiled  by  plunder,  fire  and  earthquake,  has 
it  risen  from  its  ruins,  and  been  again  made  what  we  now 
see  it,  with  its  church  so  sumptuous  and  magnificent? 
"Caw!"  says  the  raven,  welcoming  the  peasants.  These 
people  have  a  miserable  appearance,  and  (as  usual)  are 
densely  ignorant,  and  all  beg,  while  the  monks  are  chaunt- 
ing  in  the  chapel.     "  Caw !  "  says  the  raven,  "  Cuckoo !  " 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  171 

So  we  leave  him,  chuckling  and  rolling  his  eye  at 
the  convent  gate,  and  wind  slowly  down  again  through  the 
cloud.  At  last  emerging  from  it,  we  come  in  sight  of  the 
village  far  below,  and  the  flat  green  country  intersected  by 
rivulets;  which  is  pleasant  and  fresh  to  see  after  the  ob- 
scurity and  haze  of  the  convent — no  disrespect  to  the  raven, 
or  the  holy  friars. 

Away  we  go  again,  by  muddy  roads,  and  through  the 
most  shattered  and  tattered  of  villages,  where  there  is  not 
a  whole  window  among  all  the  hoiises,  or  a  whole  garment 
among  all  the  peasants,  or  the  least  appearance  of  any- 
thing to  eat,  in  any  of  the  wretched  hucksters'  shops. 
The  women  wear  a  bright  red  bodice  laced  before  and  be- 
hind, a  white  skirt,  and  the  Neapolitan  head-dress  of 
square  folds  of  linen,  primitively  meant  to  carry  loads  on. 
The  men  and  children  wear  anything  they  can  get.  The 
soldiers  are  as  dirty  and  rapacious  as  the  dogs.  The  inns 
are  such  hobgoblin  places,  that  they  are  infinitely  more 
attractive  and  amusing  than  the  best  hotels  in  Paris.  Here 
is  one  near  Valmontone  (that  is  Valmontone,  the  round, 
walled  town  on  the  mount  opposite),  which  is  approached 
by  a  quagmire  almost  knee-deep.  There  is  a  wild  colon- 
nade below,  and  a  dark  yard  full  of  empty  stables  and 
lofts,  aad  a  great  long  kitchen  with  a  great  long  bench  and 
a  great  long  form,  where  a  party  of  travellers,  with  two 
priests  among  them,  are  crowding  round  the  fire  while  their 
supper  is  cooking.  Above  stairs,  is  a  rough  brick  gallery 
to  sit  in,  with  very  little  windows  with  very  small  patches 
of  knotty  glass  in  them,  and  all  the  doors  that  open  from 
it  (a  dozen  or  two)  off  their  hinges,  and  a  bare  board  on 
tressels  for  a  table,  at  which  thirty  people  might  dine 
easily,  and  a  fireplace  large  enough  in  itself  for  a  breakfast- 
parlour,  where,  as  the  faggots  blaze  and  crackle,  they 
illuminate  the  ugliest  and  grimmest  of  faces,  drawn  in 
charcoal  on  the  whitewashed  chimney-sides  by  previous 
travellers.  There  is  a  flaring  country  lamp  on  the  table  •, 
and,  hovering  about  it,  scratching  her  thick  black  hair 
continually,  a  yellow  dwarf  of  a  woman,  who  stands  on 
tiptoe  to  arrange  the  hatchet  knives,  and  takes  a  flying  leap 
to  look  into  the  water-jug.  The  beds  in  the  adjoining 
rooms  are  of  the  liveliest  kind.  There  is  not  a  solitary 
scrap  of  looking-glass  in  the  house,  and  the  washing  ap- 
paratus is  identical  with  the  cooking  utensils.     But  the  yel- 


172  PICTURES  FROM  ITALV. 

low  dwarf  sets  on  the  table  a  good  flask  of  excellent  wine, 
holding  a  quart  at  least;  and  produces,  among  half-a-dozen 
other  dishes,  two-thirds  of  a  roasted  kid,  smoking  hot. 
She  is  as  good-humoured,  too,  as  dirty,  which  is  saying  a 
great  deal.  So  here's  long  life  to  her,  in  the  flask  of  wine, 
and  prosperity  to  the  establishment ! 

Eome  gained  and  left  behind,  and  with  it  the  Pilgrims 
who  are  now  repairing  to  their  own  homes  again — each  with 
his  scallop  shell  and  staff,  and  soliciting  alms  for  the  love 
of  God — we  come,  by  a  fair  country,  to  the  Falls  of  Terni, 
where  the  whole  Velino  river  dashes,  headlong,  from  a 
rockj'^  height,  amidst  shining  spray  and  rainbows.  Peru- 
gia, strongly  fortified  by  art  and  nature,  on  a  lofty  emi- 
nence, rising  abruptly  from  the  plain  where  purple  moun- 
tains mingle  with  the  distant  sky,  is  glowing,  on  its  market 
day,  with  radiant  colours.  They  set  off  its  sombre  but  rich 
Gothic  buildings  admirably.  The  pavement  of  its  market- 
place is  strewn  with  country  goods.  All  along  the  steep 
hill  leading  from  the  town,  under  the  town  wall,  there  is  a 
noisy  fair  of  calves,  lambs,  pigs,  horses,  mules,  and  oxen. 
Fowls,  geese,  and  turkeys,  flutter  vigorously  among  their 
very  hoofs ;  and  buyers,  sellers,  and  spectators,  clustering 
everywhere,  block  up  the  road  as  we  come  shouting  down 
upon  them. 

Suddenly,  there  is  a  ringing  sound  among  our  horses. 
The  driver  stops  them.  Sinking  in  his  saddle,  and  casting 
up  his  eyes  to  Heaven,  he  delivers  this  apostrophe,  "  Oh 
Jove  Omnipotent !  here  is  a  horse  has  lost  his  shoe !  " 

Notwithstanding  the  tremendous  nature  of  this  accident, 
and  the  utterly  forlorn  look  and  gesture  (impossible  in  any 
one  but  an  Italian  Vetturino)  with  which  it  is  announced, 
it  is  not  long  in  being  repaired  by  a  mortal  Farrier,  by 
whose  assistance  we  reach  Castiglione  the  same  night,  and 
Arezzo  next  day.  Mass  is,  of  course,  performing  in  its 
fine  cathedral,  where  the  sun  shines  in  among  the  clus- 
tered pillars,  through  rich  stained-glass  windows:  half 
revealing,  half  concealing  the  kneeling  figures  on  the 
pavement,  and  striking  out  paths  of  spotted  light  in  the 
long  aisles. 

But,  how  much  beauty  of  another  kind  is  here,  when,  on 
a  fair  clear  morning,  we  look,  from  the  summit  of  a  hill, 
on  Florence !  See  where  it  lies  before  us  in  a  sun-lighted 
valley,  bright  with  the  winding  Arno,  and  shut  in  by  swell- 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  173 

ing  hills ;  its  domes,  and  towers,  and  palaces,  rising  from 
the  rich  country  in  a  glittering  heap,  and  shining  in  the  sun 
like  gold! 

Magnificently  stern  and  sombre  are  the  streets  of  beauti- 
ful Florence ;  and  the  strong  old  piles  of  building  make 
such  heaps  of  shadow,  on  the  ground  and  in  the  river,  that 
there  is  another  and  a  different  city  of  rich  forms  and  fan- 
cies, always  lying  at  our  feet.  Prodigious  palaces,  con- 
structed for  defence,  with  small  distrustful  windows 
heavily  barred,  and  walls  of  great  thickness  formed  of 
huge  masses  of  rough  stone,  frown,  in  their  old  sulky  state, 
on  every  street.  In  the  midst  of  the  city — in  the  Piazza 
of  the  Grand  Duke,  adorned  with  beautiful  statues  and  the 
Fountain  of  Neptune — rises  the  Palazzo  Vecchio,  with  its 
enormous  overhanging  battlements,  and  the  Great  Tower 
that  watches  over  the  whole  town.  In  its  courtyard — 
worthy  of  the  Castle  of  Otranto  in  its  ponderous  gloom — is 
a  massive  staircase  that  the  heaviest  waggon  and  the  stout- 
est team  of  horses  might  be  driven  up.  Within  it,  is  a 
Great  Saloon,  faded  and  tarnished  in  its  stately  decorations, 
and  mouldering  by  grains,  but  recording  yet,  in  pictures  on 
its  walls,  the  triumphs  of  the  Medici  and  the  wars  of  the 
old  Florentine  people.  The  prison  is  hard  by,  in  an  adja- 
cent courtyard  of  the  building — a  foul  and  dismal  place, 
where  some  men  are  shut  up  close,  in  small  cells  like  ovens ; 
and  where  others  look  through  bars  and  beg ;  where  some 
are  playing  draughts,  and  some  are  talking  to  their  friends, 
who  smoke,  the  while,  to  purify  the  air ;  and  some  are  buy- 
ing wine  and  fruit  of  women -vendors;  and  all  are  squalid, 
dirty,  and  vile  to  look  at.  "  They  are  merry  enough,  Si- 
gnore,"  says  the  Jailer.  "  They  are  all  blood-stained  here," 
he  adds,  indicating,  with  his  hand,  three-fourths  of  the 
whole  building.  Before  the  hour  is  out,  an  old  man,  eighty 
years  of  age,  quarrelling  over  a  bargain  with  a  young  girl 
of  seventeen,  stabs  her  dead,  in  the  market-place  full  of 
bright  flowers;  and  is  brought  in  prisoner,  to  swell  the 
number. 

Among  the  four  old  bridges  that  span  the  river,  the 
Ponte  Vecchio — that  bridge  which  is  covered  with  the  shops 
of  Jewellers  and  Goldsmiths — is  a  most  enchanting  feature 
in  the  scene.  The  space  of  one  house,  in  the  centre,  being 
left  open,  the  view  beyond,  is  shown  as  in  a  frame ;  and 
that  precious  glimpse  of  sky,  and  water,  and  rich  buildings, 


174  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

shining  so  quietly  among  the  huddled  roofs  and  gables  on 
the  bridge,  is  exquisite.  Above  it,  the  Gallery  of  the 
Grand  Duke  crosses  the  river.  It  was  built  to  connect  the 
two  Great  Palaces  by  a  secret  passage ;  and  it  takes  its 
jealous  course  among  the  streets  and  houses,  with  true  des- 
potism :  going  where  it  lists,  and  spurning  every  obstacle 
away,  before  it. 

The  Grand  Duke  has  a  worthier  secret  passage  through 
the  streets,  in  his  black  robe  and  hood,  as  a  member  of  the 
Compagnia  della  Misericordia,  which  brotherhood  includes 
all  ranks  of  men.  If  an  accident  take  place,  their  office 
is,  to  raise  the  sufferer,  and  bear  him  tenderly  to  the  Hos- 
pital. If  a  fire  break  out,  it  is  one  of  their  functions  to  re- 
pair to  the  spot,  and  render  their  assistance  and  protection. 
It  is,  also,  among  their  commonest  offices,  to  attend  and 
console  the  sick ;  and  they  neither  receive  money,  nor  eat, 
nor  drink,  in  any  house  they  visit  for  this  purpose.  Those 
who  are  on  duty  for  the  time,  are  all  called  together,  on  a 
moment's  notice,  by  the  tolling  of  the  great  bell  of  the 
Tower ;  and.  it  is  said  that  the  Grand  Duke  has  been  seen, 
at  this  sound,  to  rise  from  his  seat  at  table,  and  quietly 
withdraw  to  attend  the  summons. 

In  this  other  large  Piazza,  where  an  irregular  kind  of 
market  is  held,  and  stores  of  old  iron  and  other  small  mer- 
chandise are  set  out  on  stalls,  or  scattered  on  the  pavement, 
are  grouped  together,  the  Cathedral  with  its  great  Dome, 
the  beautiful  Italian  Gothic  Tower  the  Campanile,  and  the 
Baptistery  with  its  wrought  bronze  doors.  And  here,  a 
small  untrodden  square  in  the  pavement,  is  "the  Stone  of 
Dante,"  where  (so  runs  the  story)  he  was  used  to  bring  his 
stool,  and  sit  in  contemplation.  I  wonder  was  he  ever,  in 
his  bitter  exile,  withheld  from  cursing  the  very  stones  in 
the  streets  of  Florence  the  ungrateful,  by  any  kind  remem- 
brance of  this  old  musing-place,  and  its  association  with 
gentle  thoughts  of  little  Beatrice ! 

The  chapel  of  the  Medici,  the  Good  and  Bad  Angels  of 
Florence ;  the  church  of  Santa  Croce  where  Michael  Angelo 
lies  buried,  and  where  every  stone  in  the  cloisters  is  elo- 
quent on  great  men's  deaths;  innumerable  churches,  often 
masses  of  unfinished  heavy  brickwork  externally,  but  sol- 
emn and  serene  within  ;  arrest  our  lingering  steps,  in  stroll- 
ing through  the  city. 

In  keeping  with  the  tombs  among  the  cloisters,  is  the 


PICTURES  FROM  ITALY.  175 

Museum  of  Natural  History,  famous  through  the  world  for 
its  preparations  in  wax ;  beginning  with  models  of  leaves, 
seeds,  plants,  inferior  animals;  and  gradually  ascending, 
through  separate  organs  of  the  human  frame,  up  to  the 
whole  structure  of  that  wonderful  creation,  exquisitely 
presented,  as  in  recent  death.  Few  admonitions  of  our 
frail  mortality  can  be  more  solemn  and  more  sad,  or  strike 
so  home  upon  the  heart,  as  the  counterfeits  of  Youth  and 
Beauty  that  are  lying  there,  upon  their  beds,  in  their  last 
sleep. 

Beyond  the  walls,  the  whole  sweet  Valley  of  the  Arno, 
the  convent  at  Fiesole,  the  Tower  of  Galileo,  Boccaccio's 
house,  old  villas  and  retreats ;  innumerable  spots  of  inter- 
est, all  glowing  in  a  landscape  of  surpassing  beauty  steeped 
in  the  richest  light ;  are  spread  before  us.  Eeturning  from 
so  much  brightness,  how  solemn  and  how  grand  the  streets 
again,  with  their  great,  dark,  mournful  palaces,  and  many 
legends:  not  of  siege,  and  war,  and  might,  and  Iron  Hand 
alone,  but  of  the  triumphant  growth  of  peaceful  Arts  and 
Sciences. 

What  light  is  shed  upon  the  world^  at  this  day,  from 
amidst  tliese  rugged  Palaces  of  Florence !  Here,  open  to  all 
comers,  in  their  beautiful  and  calm  retreats,  the  ancient 
Sculptors  are  immortal,  side  by  side  with  Michael  Angelo, 
Canova,  Titian,  Rembrandt,  Raphael,  Poets,  Historians, 
Philosophers— those  illustrious  men  of  history,  beside 
whom  its  crowned  heads  and  harnessed  warriors  show  so 
poor  and  small,  and  are  so  soon  forgotten.  Here,  the  im- 
perishable part  of  noble  minds  survives,  placid  and  equal, 
when  strongholds  of  assault  and  defence  are  overthrown; 
when  the  tyranny  of  the  many,  or  the  few,  or  both,  is  but 
a  tale ;  when  Pride  and  Power  are  so  much  cloistered  dust. 
The  fire  within  the  stern  streets,  and  among  the  massive 
Palaces  and  Towers,  kind.t'i  b^  lays  from  Heaven,  is  still 
burning  brightly,  when  the  flickering  of  war  is  extinguished 
and  the  household  fires  of  generations  have  decayed ;  as 
thousands  upon  thousands  of  faces,  rigid  with  the  strife 
and  passion  of  the  hour,  have  faded  out  of  the  old  Squares 
and  public  haunts,  while  tlie  nameless  Florentine  Lady, 
preserved  from  oblivion  by  a  Painter's  hand,  yet  lives  on, 
in  enduring  grace  and  youth. 

Let  us  look  back  on  Florence  while  we  may,  and  when 
ii;s  shining  Dome  is  seen  no  more,  go  travelling  through 


176  PICTURES  FROM  ITALY. 

cheerful  Tuscany,  with  a  bright  remembrance  of  it;  for 
Italy  will  be  the  fairer  for  the  recollection.  The  summer 
time  being  come:  and  Genoa,  and  Milan,  and  the  Lake  of 
Como  lying  far  behind  us :  and  we  resting  at  Faido,  a  Swiss 
village,  near  the  awful  rocks  and  mountains,  the  everlast- 
ing snows  and  roaring  cataracts,  of  the  Great  Saint  Go- 
thard :  hearing  the  Italian  tongue  for  the  last  time  on  this 
journey :  let  us  part  from  Italy,  with  all  its  miseries  and 
wrongs,  affectionately,  in  our  admiration  of  the  beauties, 
natural  and  artificial,  of  which  it  is  full  to  overflowing, 
and  in  our  tenderness  towards  a  people,  naturally  well-dis- 
posed, and  patient,'  and  sweet-tempered.  Years  of  neglect, 
oppression,  and  misrule,  have  been  at  work,  to  change 
their  nature  and  reduce  their  spirit ;  miserable  jealousies, 
fomented  by  petty  Princes  to  whom  union  was  destruction, 
and  division  strength,  have  been  a  canker  at  the  root  of 
their  nationality,  and  have  barbarized  their  language ;  but 
the  good  that  was  in  them  ever,  is  in  them  yet,  and  a  noble 
people  may  be,  one  day,  raised  up  from  these  ashes.  Let 
us  entertain  that  hope !  And  let  us  not  remember  Italy 
the  less  regardfully,  because,  in  every  fragment  of  her 
fallen  temples,  and  every  stone  of  her  deserted  palaces  and 
prisons,  she  helps  to  inculcate  the  lesson  that  the  wheel  of 
Time  is  rolling  for  an  end,  and  that  the  world  is,  in  all 
great  essentials,  better,  gentler,  more  forbearing,  and  more 
hopeful,  as  it  rolls  I 


TFF  jmn 


HUNTED   DOWN. 


HUNTED  DOWN. 

[I860.] 


I. 

Most  of  us  see  some  romances  in  life.  In  my  capacity 
as  Chief  Manager  of  a  Life  Assurance  Office,  I  think  1 
have  within  the  last  thirty  years  seen  more  romances  than 
the  generality  of  men,  however  unpromising  the  opportunity 
may,  at  first  sight,  seem. 

As  I  have  retired,  and  live  at  my  ease,  I  possess  the 
means  that  I  used  to  want,  of  considering  what  I  have 
seen,  at  leisure.  My  experiences  have  a  more  remarkable 
aspect,  so  reviewed,  than  they  had  when  they  were  in 
progress.  I  have  come  home  from  the  Play  now,  and  can 
recall  the  scenes  of  the  Drama  upon  which  the  curtain  has 
fallen,  free  from  the  glare,  bewilderment,  and  bustle  of 
the  Theatre. 

Let  me  recall  one  of  these  Eomances  of  the  real  world. 

There  is  nothing  truer  than  physiognomy,  taken  in  con- 
nection with  manner.  The  art  of  reading  that  book  of 
which  Eternal  Wisdom  obliges  every  human  creature  to 
present  his  or  her  own  page  with  the  individual  character 
written  on  it,  is  a  difficult  one,  perhaps,  and  is  little  studied. 
It  may  require  some  natural  aptitude,  and  it  must  require 
(for  everything  does)  some  patience  and  some  pains.  That 
these  are  not  usually  given  to  it, — that  numbers  of  people 
accept  a  few  stock  commonplace  expressions  of  face  as  the 
whole  list  of  characteristics,  and  neither  seek  nor  know  the 
refinements  that  are  truest, — that  You,  for  instance,  give 
a  great  deal  of  time  and  attention  to  the  reading  of  music, 
Greek,  Latin,  French,  Italian,  Hebrew,  if  you  please,  and 
do  not  qualify  yourself  to  read  the  face  of  the  master  or 
mistress  looking  over  your  shoulder  teaching  it  to  you, — I 
assume  to  be  five  hundred  times  more  probable  than  im- 
1 


2  HUNTED  DOWN. 

probable.  Perhaps  a  little  self-sufficiency  may  be  at  the 
bottom  of  this;  facial  expression  requires  no  study  from 
you,  you  think;  it  comes  by  nature  to  you  to  know  enough 
about  it,  and  you  are  not  to  be  taken  in. 

I  confess,  for  my  part,  that  I  have  been  taken  in,  over 
and  over  again.  I  have  been  taken  in  by  acquaintances, 
and  I  have  been  taken  in  (of  course)  by  friends;  far  bftener 
by  friends  than  by  any  other  class  of  persons.  How  came 
I  to  be  so  deceived?     Had  I  quite  misread  their  faces? 

No.  Believe  me,  my  first  impression  of  those  people, 
founded  on  face  and  manner  alone,  was  invariably  true. 
My  mistake  was  in  suffering  them  to  come  nearer  to  me 
and  explain  themselves  away. 


IL 

The  partition  which  separated  my  own  office  from  our 

general  outer  office  in  the  City  was  of  thick  plate-glass.  I 
could  see  through  it  what  passed  in  the  outer  office,  with- 
out hearing  a  word.  I  had  it  put  up  in  place  of  a  wall 
that  had  been  there  for  years, — ever  since  the  house  was 
built.  It  is  no  matter  whether  I  did  or  did  not  make  the 
change  in  order  that  I  might  derive  my  first  impression  of 
strangers,  who  came  to  us  on  business,  from  their  faces 
alone,  Avithout  being  influenced  b}'  anything  they  said. 
Enough  to  mention  that  I  turned  my  glass  partition  to 
that  account,  and  that  a  Life  Assurance  Office  is  at  all 
times  exposed  to  be  practised  upon  by  the  most  crafty  and 
cruel  of  the  human  race. 

It  was  through  my  glass  partition  that  I  first  saw  the 
gentleman  whose  story  I  am  going  to  tell. 

He  had  come  in  without  my  observing  it,  and  had  put 
his  hat  and  umbrella  on  the  broad  counter,  and  was  bend- 
ing over  it  to  take  some  papers  from  one  of  the  clerks.  He 
was  about  forty  or  so,  dark,  exceedingly  well  dressed  in 
black, — being  in  mourning. — and  the  hand  he  extended 
with  a  polite  air  had  a  particularly  well-fitting  black-kid 
glove  upon  it.  His  hair,  which  was  elaborately  brushed 
and  oiled,  was  parted  straight  up  the  middle;  and  he  pre- 
sented this  parting  to  the  clerk,  exactly  (to  my  thinking) 
as  if  he  had  said,  in  so  many  words,  "  You  must  take  me, 
if  you  please,  my  friend,  just  as  I  show  myself.     Come 


ON   THE   PAPER   WAS    PENCILLED:   "  HEAVENS  !    CAN    I    WRITE   THE   WORD? 
IS    MY    HUSBAND   A   COW  ?  " 


HUNTED  DOWN.  8 

straight  up  here,  follow  the  gravel  path,  keep  off  the  grass, 
I  allow  no  trespassing," 

I  conceived  a  very  great  aversion  to  that  man  the  mo- 
ment I  thus  saw  him. 

He  had  asked  for  some  of  our  printed  forms,  and  the 
clerk  was  giving  them  to  him  and  explaining  them.  An 
obliged  and  agreeable  smile  was  on  his  face,  and  his  eyes 
met  those  of  the  clerk  with  a  sprightly  look.  (I  have 
known  a  vast  quantity  of  nonsense  talked  about  bad  men 
not  looking  you  in  the  face.  Don't  trust  that  conventional 
idea.  Dishonesty  will  stare  honesty  out  of  countenance, 
any  day  in  the  week,  if  there  is  anything  to  be  got  by 
it.) 

I  saw,  in  the  corner  of  his  eyelash,  that  he  became  aware 
of  my  looking  at  him.  Immediately  he  turned  the  parting 
in  his  hair  toward  the  glass  partition,  as  if  he  said  to  me 
with  a  sweet  smile,  "  Straight  up  here,  if  you  please.  Off 
the  grass ! " 

In  a  few  moments  he  had  put  on  his  hat  and  taken  up 
his  umbrella,  and  was  gone. 

I  beckoned  the  clerk  into  my  room,  and  asked,  "  Who 
was  that?  " 

He  had  the  gentleman's  card  in  his  hand.  "Mr.  Julius 
Slinkton,  Middle  Temple." 

"A  barrister,  Mr,  Adams?" 

"I  think. not,  sir." 

"  I  should  have  thought  him  a  clergyman,  but  for  his 
having  no  Reverend  here,"  said  I. 

"Probably,  from  his  appearance,"  Mr.  Adams  replied, 
"he  is  reading  for  orders." 

I  should  mention  that  he  wore  a  dainty  white  cravat, 
and  dainty  linen  altogether. 

"  What  did  he  want,  Mr.  Adams?" 

** Merely  a  forn"!  of  proposal,  sir,  and  form  of  reference." 
"■  "Recommended  here?     Did  he  say?  " 

"  Yes,  he  said  he  was  recommended  here  by  a  friend  of 
yours.  He  noticed  you,  but  said  that  as  he  had  not  the 
pleasure  of  your  personal  acquaintance  he  would  not  trouble 
you. " 

"  Did  he  know  my  name?  " 

"  Oh  yes,  sir  !  He  said,  *  There  is  Mr.  Sampson,  I  see  P  " 

"  A  well-spoken  gentleman,  apparently?  " 

"  Remarkably  so,  sir." 


4  HUNTED  DOWN. 

"  Insinuating  manners,  apparently?  " 

"Very  much  so,  indeed,  sir." 

"  Hall !  "  said  I.    "  I  want  nothing  at  present,  Mr.  Adams. '^ 

Within  a  fortnight  of  that  day  I  went  to  dine  with  a 
friend  of  mine,  a  merchant,  a  man  of  taste,  who  buys  pic- 
tures and  books;  and  the  first  man  I  saw  among  the  com- 
pany was  Mr.  Julius  Slinkton.  There  he  was,  standing 
before  the  fire,  with  good  large  eyes  and  an  open  expression 
of  face;  but  still  (I  thought)  requiring  everybody  to  come 
at  him  by  the  prepared  way  he  offered,  and  by  no  other. 

I  noticed  him  ask  my  friend  to  introduce  him  to  Mr. 
Sampson,  and  my  friend  did  so.  Mr.  Slinkton  was  very 
happy  to  see  me.  Not  too  happy;  there  was  no  over-doing 
of  the  matter;  happy  in  a  thoroughly  well-bred,  perfectly 
unmeaning  way. 

*'  I  thought  you  had  met,"  our  host  observed. 

"No,"  said  Mr.  Slinkton.  "I  did  look  in  at  Mr.  Samp- 
son's office  on  your  recommendation;  but  I  really  did  not 
feel  justified  in  troubling  Mr.  Sampson  himself,  on  a  point 
in  the  e very-day  routine  of  an  ordinary  clerk." 

I  said  I  should  have  been  glad  to  show  him  any  attention 
on  our  friend's  introduction. 

"I  am  sure  of  that,"  said  he,  "and  am  much  obliged. 
At  another  time,  perhaps,  I  may  be  less  delicate.  Only, 
however,  if  I  have  real  business;  for  I  know,  Mr.  Samp- 
son, how  precious  business  time  is,  and  what  a  vast  number 
of  impertinent  people  there  are  in  the  world. "  ' 

I  acknowledged  his  consideration  with  a  slight  bow. 
"  You  were  thinking,"  said  I,  "  of  effecting  a  policy  on 
your  life." 

"  Oh  dear,  no !  I  am  afraid  I  am  not  so  prudent  as  you 
pay  me  the  compliment  of  supposing  me  to  be,  Mr.  Samp- 
son. I  merely  inquired  for  a  friend.  But  you  know  what 
friends  are  in  such  matters.  Nothing  may  ever  come  of  it. 
I  have  the  greatest  reluctance  to  trouble  men  of  business 
with  inquiries  for  friends,  knowing  the  probabilities  to  be 
a  thousand  to  one  that  the  friends  will  never  follow  them 
up.  People  are  so  fickle,  so  selfish,  so  inconsiderate. 
Don't  you,  in  your  business,  find  them  so  every  day,  Mr. 
Sampson?  " 

I  was  going  to  give  a  qualified  answer;  but  he  turned  his 
smooth,  white  parting  on  me  with  its  "  Straight  up  here,  if 
you  please ! "  and  I  answered,  "  Yes." 


HUNTED   DOWX.  5 

"I  hear,  Mr.  Sampson,"  lie  resumed  presently,  for  our 
friend  had  a  new  cook,  and  dinner  was  not  so  punctual  as 
usual,  "  that  your  profession  has  recently  suffered  a  great 
loss." 

"In  money?  "  said  I. 

He  laughed  at  my  ready  association  of  loss  with  money, 
and  replied,  "No,  in  talent  and  vigour." 

Not  at  once  following  out  his  allusion,  I  considered  for  a 
moment.  "  Has  it  sustained  a  loss  of  that  kind?  "  said  I. 
"  I  was  not  aware  of  it." 

"  Understand  me,  Mr.  Sampson.  I  don't  imagine  that 
you  have  retired.  It  is  not  so  bad  as  that.  But  Mr. 
Meltham  "— 

"O,  to  be  sure!"  said  I.  "Yes!  Mr.  Meltham,  the 
young  actuary  of  the  '  Inestimable.'  " 

"  Just  so,"  he  returned,  in  a  consoling  way. 

"  He  is  a  great  loss.  He  was  at  once  the  most  profound, 
the  most  original,  and  the  most  energetic  man  I  have  ever 
known  connected  with  Life  Assurance." 

I  spoke  strongly;  for  I  had  a  high  esteem  and  admira- 
tion for  Meltham,  and  my  gentleman  had  indefinitely  con- 
veyed to  me  some  suspicion  that  he  wanted  to  sneer  at  him. 
He  recalled  me  to  my  guard  by  presenting  that  trim  path- 
way up  his  head,  with  its  infernal  "Not  on  the  grass,  if 
you  please — the  gravel." 

"You  knew  him,  Mr.  Slinkton." 

"  Only  by  reputation.  To  have  him  as  an  acquaintance, 
or  as  a  friend,  is  an  honour  I  should  have  sought  if  he  had 
remained  in  society,  though  I  might  never  have  had  the 
good  fortune  to  attain  it,  being  a  man  of  far  inferior  mark. 
He  was  scarcely  above  thirty,  I  suppose?  " 

"About  thirty." 

"Ah!  "  he  sighed,  in  his  former  consoling  way.  "What 
creatures  we  are !  To  break  up,  Mr.  Sampson,  and  become 
incapable  of  business  at  that  time  of  life! — Any  reason 
assigned  for  the  melancholy  fact?  " 

("Humph!"  thought  I,  as  I  looked  at  him.  "But  I 
won't  go  up  the  track,  and  I  will  go  on  the  grass.") 

"  What  reason  have  you  heard  assigned,  Mr.  Slinkton?  '* 
I  asked,  point-blank. 

"  Most  likely  a  false  one.  You  know  what  Rumour  is, 
Mr.  Sampson.  I  never  repeat  what  I  hear;  it  is  the  only 
way  of  paring  the  nails  and  shaving  the  head  of  Rumour. 


6  HUNTED  DOWN. 

But,  when  you  ask  me  what  reason  I  have  heard  assigned 
for  Mr.  Meltham's  passing  away  from  among  men,  it  is 
another  thing.  I  am  not  gratifying  idle  gossip  then.  I 
was  told,  Mr.  Sampson,  that  Mr.  Meltham  had  relinquished 
all  his  avocations  and  all  his  prospects,  because  he  was,  in 
fact,  broken-hearted.  A  disappointed  attachment  I  heard, 
— though  it  hardly  seems  probable,  in  the  case  of  a  man  so 
distinguished  and  so  attractive." 

"Attractions  and  distinctions  are  no  armour  against 
death,"  said  I. 

"  Oh,  she  died?  Pray  pardon  me.  I  did  not  hear  that. 
That,  indeed,  makes  it  very,  very  sad.  Poor  Mr.  Meltham ! 
She  died?     Ah,  dear  me!     Lamentable,  lamentable ! " 

I  still  thought  his  pity  was  not  quite  genuine,  and  I  still 
suspected  an  unaccountable  sneer  under  all  this,  until  lie 
said,  as  we  were  parted,  like  the  other  knots  of  talkers,  by 
the  announcement  of  dinuer, — 

"  Mr.  Sampson,  you  are  surprised  to  see  me  so  moved  on 
behalf  of  a  man  whom  I  have  never  known.  I  am  not  so 
disinterested  as  you  may  suppose.  I  have  suffered,  and 
recently  too,  from  death  myself.  I  have  lost  one  of  two 
charming  nieces,  who  were  my  constant  companions.  She 
died  young — barely  three  and  twenty,  and  even  her  remain- 
ing sister  is  far  from  strong.     The  world  is  a  grave!  " 

He  said  this  with  deep  feeling,  and  I  felt  reproached  for^ 
the  coldness  of  my  manner.  Coldness  and  distrust  had 
been  engendered  in  me,  I  knew,  by  my  bad  experiences; 
they  were  not  natural  to  me;  and  I  often  thought  how 
much  I  had  lost  in  life,  losing  trustfulness,  and  how  little 
I  had  gained,  gaining  hard  caution.  This  state  of  mind 
being  habitual  to  me,  I  troubled  myself  more  about  this 
conversation  than  I  might  have  troubled  myself  about  a 
gi'eater  matter.  I  listened  to  his  talk  .  at  dinner,  and 
observed  how  readily  other  men  responded  to  it,  and  with 
what  a  graceful  instinct  he  adapted  his  subjects  to  the 
knowledge  and  habits  of  those  he  talked  with.  As,  in 
talking  with  me,  he  had  easily  started  the  subject  I  miglit 
be  supposed  to  understand  best,  and  to  be  the  most  inter- 
ested in,  so,  in  talking  with  others,  he  guided  himself  by 
the  same  rule.  The  company  was  of  a  varied  character; 
but  he  was  not  at  fault,  that  I  could  discover,  with  any 
member  of  it.  He  knew  just  as  much  of  each  man's  pur- 
suit as  made  him  agreeable  to  that  man  in  reference  to  it. 


HUNTED  DOWN.  7 

and  just  as  little  as  made  it  natural  in  him  to  seek  modestly 

for  information  when  the  theme  was  broached. 

As  he  talked  and  talked — but  really  not  too  much,  for 
the  rest  of  us  seemed  to  force  it  upon  him — I  became  quite 
angry  with  myself.  I  took  his  face  to  pieces  in  my  mind, 
like  a  watch,  and  examined  it  in  detail.  I  could  not  say 
much  against  any  of  his  features  separately;  I  could  say 
even  less  against  them  when  they  were  put  together. 
"Then  is  it  not  monstrous,"  I  asked  myself,  "that  because 
a  man  happens  to  part  his  hair  straight  up  the  middle  of 
his  head,  I  should  permit  myself  to  suspect,  and  even  to 
detest  him?  " 

(I  may  stop  to  remark  that  this  was  no  proof  of  my 
sense.  An  observer  of  men  who  finds  himself  steadily  re- 
pelled by  some  apparently  trifling  thing  in  a  stranger  is 
right  to  give  it  great  weight.  It  may  be  the  clew  to  the 
whole  mystery.  A  hair  or  two  will  show  where  a  lion  is 
hidden.     A  very  little  key  will  open  a  very  heavy  door.) 

I  took  my  part  in  the  conversation  with  him  after  a  time, 
and  we  got  on  remarkably  well.  In  the  drying-room  I 
asked  the  host  how  long  he  had  known  Mr.  Slinkton.  He 
answered,  not  many  months;  he  had  met  him  at  the  house 
of  a  celebrated  painter  then  present,  who  had  known  him 
well  when  he  was  travelling  with  his  nieces  in  Italy  for 
their  health.  His  plans  in  life  being  broken  by  the  death 
of  one  of  them,  he  was  reading  with  the  intention  of  going 
back  to  college  as  a  matter  of  form,  taking  his  degree,  and 
going  into  orders.  I  could  not  but  argue  with  myself  that 
here  was  the  true  explanation  of  his  interest  in  poor  Mel- 
tham,  and  that  I  had  been  almost  brutal  in  my  distrust  on 
that  simple  head. 

III. 

On  the  very  next  day  but  one  I  was  sitting  behind  my 
glass  partition,  as  before,  when  he  came  into  the  outer 
office,  as  before.  The  moment  I  saw  him  again  without 
hearing  him,  I  hated  him  worse  than  ever. 

It  was  only  for  a  moment  that  I  had  this  opportunity; 
for  he  waved  his  tight-fitting  black  glove  the  instant  I 
looked  at  him,  and  came  straight  in. 

"Mr.  Sampson,  good-day!  I  presume,  you  see,  upon 
your  kind  permission  to  intrude  upon  you.     I  don't  keep 


8  HUNTED  DOWN. 

my  word  in  being  justified  by  business,  for  my  business 
here — if  I  may  so  abuse  the  word — is  of  the  slightest 
nature." 

I  asked,  was  it  anything  I  could  assist  him  in? 

"I  thank  you,  no.  I  merely  called  to  inquire  outside 
whether  my  dilatory  friend  had  been  so  false  to  himself  as 
to  be  practical  and  sensible.  But,  of  course,  he  has  done 
nothing.  I  gave  hira  your  papers  with  my  own  hand,  and 
he  was  hot  upon  the  intention,  but  of  course  he  has  done 
nothing.  Apart  from  the  general  human  disinclination  to 
do  anything  that  ought  to  be  done,  I  dare  say  there  is  a 
specialty  about  assuring  one's  life.  You  find  it  like  will- 
making.  People  are  so  superstitious,  and  take  it  for  granted 
they  will  die  soon  afterwards." 

"  Up  here,  if  you  please;  straight  up  here,  Mr.  Sampson. 
Neither  to  the  right  nor  to  the  left."  I  almost  fancied  I 
could  hear  him  breathe  the  words  as  he  sat  smiling  at  me, 
with  that  intolerable  parting  exactly  opposite  the  bridge  of 
my  nose. 

"  There  is  such  a  feeling  sometimes,  no  doubt,"  I  replied; 
"but  I  don't  think  it  obtains  to  any  great  extent." 

"Well,"  said  he,  with  a  shrug  and  a  smile,  "I  wish 
some  good  angel  would  influence  my  friend  in  the  right 
direction.  I  rashly  promised  his  mother  and  sister  in  Nor- 
folk to  see  it  done,  and  he  promised  them  that  he  would 
do  it.     But  I  suppose  he  never  will." 

He  spoke  for  a  minute  or  two  on  indifferent  topics,  and 
went  away. 

I  had  scarcely  unlocked  the  drawers  of  my  writing-table 
next  morning,  when  he  reappeared.  I  noticed  that  he 
came  straight  to  the  door  in  the  glass  partition,  and  did 
not  pause  a  single  moment  outside. 

"  Can  you  spare  me  two  minutes,  my  dear  Mr.  Sampson?  " 

"By  all  means." 

"Much  obliged,"  laying  his  hat  and  umbrella  on  the  ta- 
ble; "I  came  early,  not  to  interrupt  you.  The  fact  is,  I 
am  taken  by  surprise  in  reference  to  this  proposal  my  friend 
has  made." 

"  Has  he  made  one?  "  said  I. 

"Ye-es,"  he  answered,  deliberately  looking  at  me;  and 
then  a  bright  idea  seemed  to  strike  him — "  or  he  only  tells 
me  he  has.  Perhaps  that  may  be  a  new  way  of  evading 
the  matter.     By  Jupiter,  I  never  thought  of  that ! " 


HUNTED  DOWN.  9 

Mr.  Adams  was  opening  the  morning's  letters  in  the 
outer  office.     "  What  is  the  name,  Mr.  Slinkton?  "  I  asked. 

"Beck  with." 

I  looked  out  at  the  door  and  requested  Mr.  Adams,  if 
there  were  a  proposal  in  that  name,  to  bring  it  in.  He  had 
already  laid  it  out  of  his  hand  on  the  counter.  It  was 
easily  selected  from  the  rest,  and  he  gave  it  me.  "Alfred 
Beckwith.  Proposal  to  eifect  a  policy  with  us  for  two 
thousand  pounds.     Dated  yesterday." 

"From  the  Middle  Temple,  I  see,  Mr.  Slinkton." 

"  Yes.  He  lives  on  the  same  staircase  with  me;  his  door 
is  opposite.  I  never  thought  he  would  make  me  his  refer- 
ence though." 

"It  seems  natural  enough  that  he  should." 

"Quite  so,  Mr.  Sampson;  but  I  never  thought  of  it. 
Let  me  see."  He  took  the  printed  paper  from  his  pocket. 
"  How  am  I  to  answer  all  these  questions?  " 

"According  to  the  truth,  of  course,"  said  I, 

"  Oh,  of  course ! "  he  answered,  looking  up  from  the  pa- 
per with  a  smile;  "I  meant  they  were  so  many.  But  you 
do  right  to  be  particular.  It  stands  to  reason  that  you 
must  be  particular.  Will  you  allow  me  to  use  your  pen 
and  ink?  " 

"Certainly." 

"  And  your  desk?  " 

"Certainly." 

He  had  been  hovering  about  between  his  hat  and  his 
umbrella  for  a  place  to  write  on.  He  now  sat  down  in  my 
chair,  at  my  blotting-paper  and  inkstand,  with  the  long 
walk  up  his  head  in  accurate  perspective  before  me,  as  I 
stood  with  my  back  to  the  fire. 

Before  answering  each  question  he  ran  over  it  aloud,  and 
discussed  it.  How  long  had  he  known  Mr.  Alfred  Beck- 
with? That  he  had  to  calculate  by  years  upon  his  fingers. 
What  were  his  habits?  No  difficulty  about  them;  temper- 
ate in  the  last  degree,  and  took  a  little  too  much  exercise, 
if  anything.  All  the  answers  were  satisfactory.  When 
he  had  written  them  all,  he  looked  them  over,  and  finally 
signed  them  in  a  very  pretty  hand.  He  supposed  he 
had  now  done  with  the  business.  I  told  him  he  was  not 
likely  to  be  troubled  any  farther.  Should  he  leave  the 
papers  there?  If  he  pleased.  Much  obliged.  Gkwd-mom- 
ing. 


10  HUNTED  DOWN. 

I  had  had  one  other  visitor  before  him;  not  at  the  office, 
but  at  my  own  house.  That  visitor  had  come  to  my  bed- 
side when  it  was  not  yet  daylight,  and  had  been  seen  by 
no  one  else  but  by  my  faithful  confidential  servant. 

A  second  reference  paper  (for  we  required  always  two) 
was  sent  down  into  Norfolk,  and  was  duly  received  back 
by  post.  This,  likewise,  was  satisfactorily  answered  in 
every  respect.  Our  forms  were  all  complied  with;  we 
accepted  the  proposal,  and  the  premium  for  one  year  was 
paid. 

IV. 

For  six  or  seven  months  I  saw  no  more  of  Mr.  Slinkton. 
He  called  once  at  my  house,  but  I  was  not  at  home;  and 
he  once  asked  me  to  dine  with  him  in  the  Temple,  but  I 
was  engaged.  His  friend's  assurance  was  effected  in 
March.  Late  in  September  or  early  in  October  I  was  down 
at  Scarborough  for  a  breath  of  sea-air,  where  I  met  him  on 
the  beach.  It  was  a  hot  evening;  he  came  towards  me  with 
his  hat  in  his  hand;  and  there  was  the  walk  I  had  felt  so 
strongly  disinclined  to  take  in  perfect  order  again,  exactly 
in  front  of  the  bridge  of  my  nose. 

He  was  not  alone,  but  had  a  young  lady  on  his  arm. 

She  was  dressed  in  mourning,  and  I  looked  at  her  with 
great  interest.  She  had  the  appearance  of  being  extremely 
delicate,  and  her  face  was  remarkably  pale  and  melancholy; 
but  she  was  very  pretty.  He  introduced  her  as  his  niece. 
Miss  Niner. 

"Are  you  strolling,  Mr.  Sampson?  Ig  it  possible  you 
can  be  idle?  " 

It  was  possible,  and  I  was  strolling. 

"  Shall  we  stroll  together?  " 

"With  pleasure." 

The  young  lady  walked  between  us,  and  we  walked  on 
the  cool  sea-sand,  in  the  direction  of  Filey, 

"There  have  been  wheels  here,"  said  Mr.  Slinkton. 
"And  now  I  look  again,  the  wheels  of  a  hand-carriage! 
Margaret,  my  love,  your  shadow  without  doubt ! " 

"Miss  Niner' s  shadow?"  I  repeated,  looking  down  at  it 
on  the  sand. 

"Not  that  one,"  Mr.  Slinkton  returned,  laughing. 
"  Margaret,  my  dear,  tell  Mr.  Sampson." 


HUNTED  DOWN.  11 

"Indeed,"  said  the  young  lady,  turning  to  me,  "there  is 
nothing  to  tell — except  that  I  constantly  see  the  same  inva- 
lid old  gentleman  at'all  times,  wherever  I  go.  I  have  men- 
tioned it  to  my  uncle,  and  he  calls  the  gentleman  my 
shadow." 

"  Does  he  live  in  Scarborough?  "  I  asked. 

"He  is  staying  here." 

"  Do  you  live  in  Scarborough?  " 

"No,  I  am  staying  here.  My  rmcle  has  placed  me  with 
a  family  here,  for  my  health." 

"And  your  shadow?  "  said  I,  smiling. 

"My  shadow,"  she  answered,  smiling  too,  "is — like  my- 
self— not  very  robust,  I  fear;  for  I  lose  my  shadow  some 
times,  as  my  shadow  loses  me  at  other  times.  We  both 
seem  liable  to  confinement  to  the  house.  I  have  not  seen 
my  shadow  for  days  and  days;  but  it  does  oddly  happen, 
occasionally,  that  wherever  I  go,  for  many  days  together, 
this  gentleman  goes.  We  have  come  together  in  the  most 
unfrequented  nooks  on  this  shore." 

'*  Is  this  he?  "  said  I,  pointing  before  us. 

The  wheels  had  swept  down  to  the  water's  edge,  and 
described  a  great  loop  on  the  sand  in  turning.  Bringing 
the  loop  back  towards  us,  and  spinning  it  out  as  it  came, 
was  a  hand-carriage  drawn  by  a  man. 

"Yes,"  said  Miss  Niner,  "this  really  is  my  shadow, 
imcle." 

As  the  carriage  approached  us  and  we  approached  the 
carriage,  I  saw  within  it  an  old  man,  whose  head  was  sunk 
on  his  breast,  and  who  was  enveloped  in  a  variety  of  wrap- 
pers. He  was  drawn  by  a  very  quiet  but  very  keen-looking 
man,  with  iron-gray  hair,  who  was  slightly  lame.  They 
had  passed  us,  when  the  carriage  stopped,  and  the  old  gen- 
tleman within,  putting  out  his  arm,  called  to  me  by  my 
name.  I  went  back,  and  was  absent  from  Mr.  Slinkton 
and  his  niece  for  about  five  minutes. 

When  I  rejoined  them,  Mr.  Slinkton  was  the  first  to 
speak.  Indeed,  he  said  to  me  in  a  raised  voice  before  I 
came  up  with  him, — 

"  It  is  well  you  have  not  been  longer,  or  my  niece  might 
have  died  of  curiosity  to  know  who  her  shadow  is,  Mr. 
Sampson." 

"An  old  East  India  Director,"  said  I.  "An  intimate 
friend  of  our  friend's,  at  whose  house  I  first  had  the 


12  HUNTED   DOWN. 

pleasure  of  meeting  you.  A  certaiu  Major  Banks.  You 
have  heard  of  him?  " 

"Never." 

"Very  rich,  Miss  Niner;  but  very  old,  and  very  crip- 
pled. An  amiable  man,  sensible — much  interested  in  you. 
He  has  just  been  expatiating  on  the  affection  that  he  has 
observed  to  exist  between  you  and  your  uncle." 

Mr.  Slinkton  was  holding  his  hat  again,  and  he  passed 
his  hand  up  the  straight  walk,  as  if  he  himself  went  up  it 
serenely,  after  me. 

"Mr.  Sampson,"  he  said,  tenderly  pressing  his  niece's 
arm  in  his,  "our  affection  was  always  a  strong  one,  for  we 
have  had  but  few  near  ties.  We  have  still  fewer  now. 
We  have  associations  to  bring  us  together,  that  are  not  of 
this  world,  Margaret." 

"  Dear  uncle ! "  murmured  the  young  lady,  and  turned 
her  face  aside  to  hide  her  tears. 

"  My  niece  and  I  have  such  remembrances  and  regrets  in 
common,  Mr.  Sampson,"  he  feelingly  pursued,  "that  it 
would  be  strange  indeed  if  the  relations  betAveen  us  were 
cold  or  indifferent.  If  I  remember  a  conversation  we  once 
had  together,  you  will  understand  the  reference  I  make. 
Cheer  up,  dear  Margaret.  Don't  droop,  don't  droop.  My 
Margaret!     I  cannot  bear  to  see  you  droop!  " 

The  poor  young  lady  was  very  much  affected,  but  con- 
trolled herself.  His  feelings,  too,  were  very  acute.  In  a 
word,  he  found  himself  under  such  great  need  of  a  restora- 
tive, that  he  presently  went  away,  to  take  a  bath  of  sea- 
water,  leaving  the  young  lady  and  me  sitting  by  a  point  of 
rock,  and  probably  presuming — but  that  you  will  say  was 
a  pardonable  indulgence  in  a  luxury — that  she  would  praise 
him  with  all  her  heart. 

She  did,  poor  thing !  With  all  her  confiding  heart,  she 
praised  him  to  me,  for  his  care  of  her  dead  sister,  and  for 
his  untiring  devotion  in  her  last  illness.  The  sister  had 
wasted  away  very  slowly,  and  wild,  and  terrible  fantasies 
had  come  over  her  towards  the  end,  but  he  had  never  been 
impatient  with  her,  or  at  a  loss;  had  always  been  gentle, 
watchful,  and  self-possessed.  The  sister  had  known  him, 
as  she  had  known  him,  to  be  the  best  of  men,  the  kindest 
of  men,  and  yet  a  man  of  such  admirable  strength  of  char- 
acter, as  to  be  a  very  tower  for  the  support  of  their  weak 
natures  while  their  poor  lives  endured 


HUNTED  DOWN.  13 

"I  shall  leave  him,  Mr.  Sampson,  very  soon,"  said  the 
young  lady;  "I  know  my  life  is  drawing  to  an  end;  and 
when  I  am  gone,  I  hope  he  will  marry  and  be  happy.  I 
am  sure  he  has  lived  single  so  long,  only  for  my  sake,  and 
for  my  poor,  poor  sister's." 

The  little  hand-carriage  had  made  another  great  loop  on 
the  damp  sand,  and  was  coming  back  again,  gradually 
spinning  out  a  slim  figure  of  eight,  half  a  mile  long. 

"  Young  lady,"  said  I,  looking  around,  laying  my  hand 
upon  her  arm,  and  speaking  in  a  low  voice,  "time  presses. 
You  hear  the  gentle  murmur  of  that  sea?  " 
'  She  looked  at  me  with  the  utmost  wonder  and  alarm, 
saying, 

"  Yes ! " 

"  And  you  know  what  a  voice  is  in  it  when  the  storm 
comes?  " 

"  Yes ! " 

"  You  see  how  quiet  and  peaceful  it  lies  before  us,  and 
you  know  what  an  awful  sight  of  power  without  pity  it 
might  be,  this  very  night ! " 

"Yes!" 

"  But  if  you  had  never  heard  or  seen  it,  or  heard  of  it  in 
its  cruelty,  could  you  believe  that  it  beats  every  inanimate 
thing  in  its  way  to  pieces,  without  mercy,  and  destroys  life 
without  remorse?  " 

"  You  terrify  me,  sir,  by  these  questions !  " 

"To  save  you,  young  lady,  to  save  you!  For  God's 
sake,  collect  your  strength  and  collect  your  firmness !  If 
you  were  here  alone,  and  hemmed  in  by  the  rising  tide  on 
the  flow  to  fifty  feet  above  your  head,  you  could  not  be  in 
greater  danger  than  the  danger  you  are  now  to  be  saved 
from." 

The  figure  on  the  sand  was  spun  out,  and  straggled  off 
into  a  crooked  little  jerk  that  ended  at  the  cliff  very  near  us. 

"As  I  am,  before  Heaven  and  the  Judge  of  all  mankind, 
your  friend,  and  your  dead  sister's  friend,  I  solemnly 
entreat  you.  Miss  Niner,  without  one  moment's  loss  of  time, 
to  come  to  this  gentleman  with  me !  " 

If  the  little  carriage  had  been  less  near  to  us,  I  doubt  if 
I  could  have  got  her  away;  but  it  was  so  near  that  we  were 
there  before  she  had  recovered  the  hurry  of  being  urged 
from  the  rock,  I  did  not  remain  there  with  her  two 
minutes.     Certainly  within  five,   I  had  the  inexpressible 


14  HUNTED  DOWN. 

satisfaction  of  seeing  her — from  the  point  we  had  sat  on, 
and  to  which  I  had  returned — half  supported  and  half  car- 
ried up  some  rude  steps  notched  in  the  cliff,  by  the  figure 
of  an  active  man.  With  that  figure  beside  her,  I  knew 
she  was  safe  anywhere. 

I  sat  alone  on  the  rock,  awaiting  Mr,  Slinkton's  return. 
The  twilight  was  deepening  and  the  shadows  were  heavy, 
when  he  came  round  the  point,  with  his  hat  hanging  at  liis 
button  hole,  smoothing  his  wet  hair  with  one  of  his  hands, 
and  picking  out  the  old  path  with  the  other  and  a  pocket- 
comb. 

"  My  niece  not  here,  Mr.  Sampson? "  he  said,  looking 
about. 

"  Miss  Niner  seemed  to  feel  a  chill  in  the  air  after  the 
sun  was  down,  and  has  gone  home." 

He  looked  surprised,  as  though  she  were  not  accustomed 
to  do  anything  without  him;  even  to  originate  so  slight  a 
proceeding. 

"I  persuaded  Miss  Niner,"  I  explained. 

"Ah!"  said  he.  "She  is  easily  persuaded — for  her 
good.  Thank  you,  Mr.  Sampson;  she  is  better  within 
doors.  The  bathing-place  was  farther  than  I  thought,  to 
say  the  truth." 

"  Miss  Niner  is  very  delicate,"  I  observed. 

He  shook  his  head  and  drew  a  deep  sigh.  "  Very,  very, 
very.  You  may  recollect  my  saying  so.  The  time  that 
has  since  intervened  has  not  strengthened  her.  The  gloomy 
shadow  that  fell  upon  her  sister  so  early  in  life  seems,  in 
my  anxious  eyes,  to  gather  over  her,  ever  darker,  ever 
darker.  Dear  Margaret,  dear  Margaret !  But  we  must  hope. " 

The  hand-carriage  was  spinning  away  before  us  at  a  most 
indecorous  pace  for  an  invalid  vehicle,  and  was  making 
most  irregular  curves  upon  the  sand.  Mr.  Slinkton,  notic- 
ing it  after  he  had  put  his  handkerchief  to  his  eyes,  said, — ■ 

"  If  I  may  judge  from  appearances,  your  friend  will  be 
upset,  Mr.  Sampson." 

"  It  looks  probable,  certainly,"  said  I. 

"The  servant  must  be  drunk." 

"  The  servants  of  old  gentlemen  will  get  drunk  some- 
times," said  I. 

"The  major  draws  very  light,  Mr.  Sampson." 

"  The  major  does  draw  light,"  said  I, 

By  this  time  the  carriage,  much  to  my  relief,  was  lost  in 


HUNTED  DOWN.  16 

the  darkness.  "We  walked  on  for  a  little,  side  by  side  over 
the  sand,  in  silence.  After  a  short  while  he  said,  in  a 
voice  still  affected  by  the  emotion  that  his  niece's  state  of 
health  had  awakened  in  him, — 

"  Do  you  stay  here  long,  Mr.  Sampson?  *' 

"Why,  no.     I  am  going  away  to-night." 

"  So  soon?  But  biTsiness  always  holds  you  in  request. 
Men  like  Mr.  Sampson  are  too  important  to  others,  to  be 
spared  to  their  own  need  of  relaxation  and  enjoyment." 

"I  don't  know  about  that,"  said  I.  "However,  I  am 
going  back." 

"To  London?" 

"To  London." 

"I  shall  be  there  too,  soon  after  you." 

I  knew  that  as  well  as  he  did.  But  I  did  not  tell  him 
so.  Any  more  than  I  told  him  what  defensive  weapon  my 
right  hand  rested  on  in  my  pocket,  as  I  walked  by  his  side. 
Any  more  than  I  told  him  why  I  did  not  walk  on  the  sea- 
side of  him  with  the  night  closing  in. 

We  left  the  beach,  and  our  ways  diverged.  We  ex- 
changed good-night,  and  had  parted  indeed,  when  he  said, 
returning, — 

"  Mr.  Sampson,  mai/  I  ask?  Poor  Meltham,  whom  we 
spoke  of, — dead  yet?  " 

"Not  when  I  last  heard  of  him;  but  too  broken  a  man  to 
live  long,  and  hopelessly  lost  to  his  old  calling." 

"Dear,  dear,  dear!  "  said  he,  with  great  feeling.  "  Sad, 
sad,  sad !     The  world  is  a  grave !  "     And  so  went  his  way. 

It  was  not  his  fault  if  the  world  were  not  a  grave;  but  I 
did  not  call  that  observation  after  him,  any  more  than  I 
had  mentioned  those  other  things  just  now  enumerated. 
He  went  his  way,  and  I  went  mine  with  all  expedition. 
This  happened,  as  I  have  said,  either  at  the  end  of  Septem- 
ber or  beginning  of  October.  The  next  time  I  saw  him, 
and  the  last  time,  was  late  in  November. 


V. 

I  HAD  a  very  particular  engagement  to  breakfast  in  the 
Temple.  It  was  a  bitter  north-easterly  morning,  and  the 
sleet  and  slush  lay  inches  deep  in  the  streets.  I  could  get 
no  conveyance,  and  i^as  soon  wet  to  the   knees;    but  J 


16  HTJNTED  DOWN. 

should  have  been  true  to  that  appointment,  though  I  had 
to  wade  to  it  up  to  my  neck  in  the  same  impediments. 

The  appointment  took  me  to  some  chambers  in  the  Tem- 
ple. They  were  at  the  top  of  a  lonely  corner  house  over- 
looking the  river.  The  name,  Mb.  Alfred  Beckwith, 
was  painted  on  the  outer  door.  On  the  door  opposite,  on 
the  same  landing,  the  name  Mb.  Julius  Slinkton.  The 
doors  of  both  sets  of  chambers  stood  open,  so  that  anything 
said  aloud  in  one  set  could  be  heard  in  the  other. 

I  had  never  been  in  those  chambers  before.  They  were 
dismal,  close,  unwholesome,  and  oppressive;  the  furniture, 
originally  good,  and  not  yet  old,  was  faded  and  dirty, — the 
rooms  were  in  great  disorder;  there  was  a  strong  prevailing 
smell  of  opium,  brandy,  and  tobacco;  the  grate  and  fire- 
irons  were  splashed  all  over  with  unsightly  blotches  of  rust; 
and  on  a  sofa  by  the  fire,  in  the  room  where  breakfast  had 
been  prepared,  lay  the  host,  Mr.  Beckwith,  a  man  with  all 
the  appearances  of  the  worst  kind  of  drunkard,  very  far 
advanced  upon  his  shameful  way  to  death. 

"  Slinkton  is  not  come  yet,"  said  this  creature,  stagger- 
ing up  when  I  went  in;  "I'll  call  him.  Halloa!  Julius 
Caesar !     Come  and  drink !  " 

As  he  hoarsely  roared  this  out,  he  beat  the  poker  and 
tongs  together  in  a  mad  way,  as  if  that  were  his  usual  man- 
ner of  summoning  his  associate. 

The  voice  of  Mr.  Slinkton  was  heard  through  the  clatter 
from  the  opposite  side  of  the  staircase,  and  he  came  in. 
He  had  not  expected  the  pleasure  of  meeting  me.  I  have 
seen  several  artful  men  brought  to  a  stand,  but  I  never 
saw  a  man  so  aghast  as  he  was  when  his  eyes  rested  on 
mine. 

"Julius  Caesar,"  cried  Beckwith,  staggering  between  us, 
"Mist'  Sampson!  Mist'  Sampson,  Julius  Caesar!  Julius, 
Mist'  Sampson,  is  the  friend  of  my  soul.  Julius  keeps  me 
plied  with  liquor,  morning,  noon,  and  night.  Julius  is  a 
real  benefactor.  Julius  threw  the  tea  and  coffee  out  of 
window  when  I  used  to  have  any.  Julius  empties  all  the 
water-jugs  of  their  contents,  and  fills  'em  with  spirits. 
Julius  winds  me  up  and  keeps  me  going. — Boil  the  brandy, 
Julius ! " 

There  was  a  rusty  and  furred  saucepan  in  the  ashes, — 
the  ashes  looked  like  the  accumulation  of  weeks, — and 
Beckwith,  rolling  and  staggering  between  us  as  if  he  were 


HUNTED  DOWN.  17 

going  to  plunge  headlong  into  the  fire,  got  the  saucepan  out, 
and  tried  to  force  it  into  Slinkton's  hand. 

"  Boil  the  brandy,  Julius  Caesar !  Come !  Do  your  usual 
office.     Boil  the  brandy !  " 

He  became  so  fierce  in  his  gesticulations  with  the  sauce- 
pan, that  I  expected  to  see  him  lay  open  Slinkton's  head 
with  it.  I  therefore  put  out  my  hand  to  check  him.  He 
reeled  back  to  the  sofa,  and  sat  there,  panting,  shaking, 
and  red-eyed,  in  his  rags  of  dressing-gown,  looking  at  us 
both.  I  noticed  then  that  there  was  nothing  to  drink  on 
the  table  but  brandy,  and  nothing  to  eat  but  salted  her- 
rings, and  a  hot,  sickly,  highly  peppered  stew. 

"At  all  events,  Mr.  Sampson,"  said  Slinkton,  offering 
me  the  smooth  gravel  path  for  the  last  time,  "  I  thank  you 
for  interfering  between  me  and  this  unfortunate  man's  vio- 
lence. However  you  came  here,  Mr.  Sampson,  or  with  what- 
ever motive  you  came  here,  at  least  I  thank  you  for  that." 

"  Boil  the  brandy,"  muttered  Beckwith. 

Without  gratifying  his  desire  to  know  how  I  came  there, 
I  said,  quietly,  "  How  is  your  niece,  Mr.  Slinkton?  " 

He  looked  hard  at  me,  and  I  looked  hard  at  him. 

"I  am  sorry  to  say,  Mr.  Sampson,  that  my  niece  has 
proved  treacherous  and  ungrateful  to  her  best  friend.  She 
left  me  without  a  word  of  notice  or  explanation.  She  was 
misled,  no  doubt,  by  some  designing  rascal.  Perhaps  you 
may  have  heard  of  it?  " 

"  I  did  hear  that  she  was  misled  by  a  designing  rascal. 
In  fact,  I  have  proof  of  it." 

"  Are  you  sure  of  that?  "  said  he. 

"Quite." 

"Boil  the  brandy,"  muttered  Beckwith.  "Company  to 
breakfast,  Julius  Caesar.  Do  your  usual  office, — provide 
the  usual  breakfast,  dinner,  tea,  and  supper.  Boil  the 
brandy. " 

The  eyes  of  Slinkton  looked  from  him  to  me,  and  he 
said,  after  a  moment's  consideration, — 

"Mr.  Sampson,  you  are  a  man  of  the  world,  and  so 
am  I.     I  will  be  plain  with  you." 

"0  no,  you  won't,"  said  I,  shaking  my  head. 

"I  tell  you,  sir,  I  will  be  plain  with  you." 

"And  I  tell  you  you  will  not,"  said  I.  "I  know  all 
about  you.  You  plain  with  any  one?  Nonsense,  non- 
sense ! " 

2 


18  HUNTED  DOWN. 

"I  plainly  tell  you,  Mr,  Sampson,"  he  went  on,  with  a 
manner  almost  composed,  "  that  I  understand  your  object. 
You  want  to  save  your  funds,  and  escape  from  your  liabili- 
ties; these  are  old  tricks  of  trade  with  you  Office-gentle- 
men. But  you  will  not  do  it,  sir;  you  will  not  succeed. 
You  have  not  an  easy  adversary  to  play  against,  when  you 
play  against  me.  We  shall  have  to  inquire,  in  due  time, 
when  and  how  Mr.  Beckwith  fell  into  his  present  habits. 
With  that  remark,  sir,  I  put  this  poor  creature,  and  his  in- 
coherent wanderings  of  speech,  aside,  and  wish  you  a  good- 
morning  and  a  better  case  next  time." 

W^hile  he  was  saying  this,  Beckwith  had  filled  a  half- 
pint  glass  with  brandy.  At  this  moment,  he  threw  the 
brandy  at  his  face,  and  threw  the  glass  after  it.  Slinkton 
put  his  hands  up,  half  blinded  with  the  spirit,  and  cut 
with  the  glass  across  the  forehead.  At  the  sound  of  the 
breakage,  a  fourth  person  came  into  the  room,  closed  the 
door,  and  stood  at  it;  he  was  a  very  quiet  but  very  keen- 
looking  man,  with  iron-gray  hair,  and  slightly  lame. 

Slinkton  pulled  out  his  handkerchief,  assuaged  the  pain 
in  his  smarting  eyes,  and  dabbled  the  blood  on  his  forehead. 
He  was  a  long  time  about  it,  and  I  saw  that,  in  the  doing 
of  it,  a  tremendous  change  came  over  him,  occasioned  by 
the  change  in  Beckwith, — who  ceased  to  pant  and  tremble, 
sat  upright,  and  never  took  his  eyes  off  him.  1  never  in 
my  life  saw  a  face  in  which  abhorrence  and  determination 
were  so  forcibly  painted  as  in  Beckwith' s  then. 

"Look  at  me,  you  villain,"  said  Beckwith,  "and  see  me 
as  I  really  am.  I  took  these  rooms,  to  make  them  a  trap 
for  you.  I  came  into  them  as  a  drunkard,  to  bait  the  trap 
for  you.  You  fell  into  the  trap,  and  you  will  never  leave 
it  alive.  On  the  morning  when  you  last  went  to  Mr.  Samp- 
son's office,  I  had  seen  him  first.  Your  plot  has  been 
known  to  both  of  us,  all  along,  and  you  have  been  counter- 
plotted all  along.  What?  Having  been  cajoled  into  put- 
ting that  prize  of  two  thousand  pounds  in  your  power,  I 
was  to  be  done  to  death  with  brandy,  and,  brandy  not 
proving  quick  enough,  with  something  quicker?  Have  I 
never  seen  you,  when  you  thought  my  senses  gone,  pouring 
from  your  little  bottle  into  my  glass?  Why,  you  Murderer 
and  Forger,  alone  here  with  you  in  the  dead  of  night,  as  I 
have  so  often  been,  I  have  had  my  hand  upon  the  trigger 
of  a  pistol,  twenty  times,  to  blow  your  brains  out! " 


HUNTED  DOWN.  1« 

This  sudden  starting  up  of  the  thing  that  he  had  sup- 
posed to  be  his  imbecile  victim  into  a  determined  man,  with 
a  settled  resolution  to  hunt  him  down  and  be  the  death  of 
him,  mercilessly  expressed  from  head  to  foot,  was,  in  the 
first  shock,  too  much  for  him.  Without  any  figure  of 
speech,  he  staggered  under  it.  But  there  is  no  greater 
mistake  than  to  suppose  that  a  man  who  is  .a  calculating 
criminal,  is,  in  any  phase  of  his  guilt,  otherwise  than  true 
to  himself,  and  perfectly  consistent  with  his  whole  charac- 
ter. Such  a  man  commits  murder,  and  murder  is  the  natu- 
ral culmination  of  his  course;  such  a  man  has  to  outface 
murder,  and  will  do  it  with  hardihood  and  effrontery.  It 
is  a  sort  of  fashion  to  express  surprise  that  any  notorious 
criminal,  having  such  crime  upon  his  conscience,  can  so 
brave  it  out.  Do  you  think  that  if  he  had  it  on  his  con- 
science at  all,  or  had  a  conscience  to  have  it  upon,  he  would 
ever  have  committed  the  crime? 

Perfectly  consistent  with  himself,  as  I  believe  all  such 
monsters  to  be,  this  Slinkton  recovered  himself,  and  showed 
a  defiance  that  was  sufficiently  cold  and  quiet.  He  was 
white,  he  was  haggard,  he  was  changed;  but  only  as  a 
sharper  who  had  played  for  a  great  stake  and  had  been  out- 
witted ahd  had  lost  the  game. 

"Listen  to  me,  you  villain,"  said  Beckwith,  "and  let 
every  word  you  hear  me  say  be  a  stab  in  your  wicked  heart. 
When  I  took  these  rooms,  to  throw  myself  in  your  way  and 
lead  you  on  to  the  scheme  that  I  knew  m}'^  appearance  and 
supposed  character  and  habits  would  suggest  to  such  a 
devil,  how  did  I  know  that?  Because  you  were  no  stranger 
to  me.  I  knew  you  well.  And  I  knew  you  to  be  the  cruel 
wretch  who,  for  so  much  money,  had  killed  one  innocent 
girl  while  she  trusted  him  implicitly,  and  who  was  by 
inches  killing  another." 

Sliukton  took  out  a  snuff-box,  took  a  pinch  of  snuff,  and 
laughed. 

"But  see  here,"  said  Beckwith,  never  looking  away, 
never  raising  his  voice,  never  relaxing  his  face,  never  un- 
clinching  his  hand.  "  See  what  a  dull  wolf  you  have  been, 
after  all !  The  infatuated  drunkard  who  never  drank  a 
fiftieth  part  of  the  liquor  you  plied  him  with,  but  poured 
it  away,  here,  there,  everywhere — almost  before  your  eyes; 
who  bought  over  the  fellow  you  set  to  watch  him  and  to  ply 
him,  by  outbidding  you  in  his  bribe,  before  he  had  been  at 


20  HUNTED  DOWN. 

his  work  three  days — with  whom  you  have  observed  no 
caution,  yet  who  was  so  bent  on  ridding  the  earth  of  you 
as  a  wild  beast,  that  he  would  have  defeated  you  if  you 
had  been  ever  so  prudent — that  drunkard  whom  you  have, 
many  a  time,  left  on  the  floor  of  this  room,  and  who  has 
even  let  you  go  out  of  it,  alive  and  undeceived,  when  you 
have  turned  him  over  with  your  foot — has,  almost  as  often, 
on  the  same-  night,  within  an  hour,  within  a  few  minutes, 
watched  you  awake,  had  his  hand  at  your  pillow  when  you 
were  asleep,  turned  over  your  papers,  taken  samples  from 
your  bottles  and  packets  of  powder,  changed  their  contents, 
rifled  every  secret  of  your  life !  " 

He  had  had  another  pinch  of  snuff  in  his  hand,  but  had 
gradually  let  it  drop  from  between  his  fingers  to  the  floor; 
where  he  now  smoothed  it  out  with  his  foot,  looking  down 
at  it  the  while. 

"That  drunkard,"  said  Beckwith,  "who  had  free  access 
to  your  rooms  at  all  times,  that  he  might  drink  the  strong 
drinks  that  you  left  in  his  way  and  be  the  sooner  ended, 
holding  no  more  terms  with  you  than  he  would  hold  with 
a  tiger,  has  had  his  master-key  for  all  your  locks,  his  test 
for  all  your  poisons,  his  clew  to  your  cipher-writing.  He 
can  tell  you,  as  well  as  you  can  tell  him,  how  long  it  took 
to  complete  that  deed,  what  doses  there  were,  what  inter- 
vals, what  signs  of  gradual  decay  upon  mind  and  body; 
what  distempered  fancies  were  produced,  what  observable 
changes,  what  physical  pain.  He  can  tell  you,  as  well  as 
you  can  tell  him,  that  all  this  was  recorded  day  by  day,  as 
a  lesson  of  experience  for  future  service.  He  can  tell  you 
better  than  you  can  tell  him,  where  that  journal  is  at  this 
moment." 

Slinkton  stopped  the  action  of  his  foot  and  looked  at. 
Beckwith. 

"No,"  said  the  latter,  as  if  answering  a  question  from 
him.  "Not  in  the  drawer  of  the  writing-desk  that  opens 
with  a  spring;  it  is  not  there,  and  it  never  will  be  there 
again." 

"Then  you  are  a  thief! "  said  Slinkton. 

Without  any  change  whatever  in  the  inflexible  purpose, 
which  it  was  quite  terrific  even  to  me  to  contemplate,  and 
from  the  power  of  which  I  had  always  felt  convinced  it 
was  impossible  for  this  wretch  to  escape,  Beckwith  re- 
turned,— 


HUNTED  DOWN.  21 

"And  I  am  your  niece's  shadow,  too." 

With  an  imprecation  Slinkton  put  his  hand  to  his  head, 
tore  out  some  hair,  and  flung  it  to  the  ground.  It  was  the 
end  of  the  smooth  walk;  he  destroyed  it  in  the  action,  and 
it  will  soon  be  seen  that  his  use  for  it  was  past. 

Beck  with  went  ou :  "  Whenever  you  left  here,  I  left  here. 
Although  I  imderstood  that  you  found  it  necessary  to  pause 
in  the  completion  of  that  purpose,  to  avert  suspicion,  still 
I  watched  you  close,  Avith  the  poor  confiding  girl.  When 
I  had  the  diary,  and  could  read  it  word  by  word, — it  was 
only  about  the  night  before  your  last  visit  to  Scarborough, 
— you  remember  the  night?  you  slept  with  a  small  flat  vial 
tied  to  your  wrist, — I  sent  to  Mr.  Sampson,  who  was  kept 
out  of  view.  This  is  Mr.  Sampson's  trusty  servant  stand- 
ing by  the  door.     We  three  saved  your  niece  among  us." 

Slinkton  looked  at  us  all,  took  an  uncertain  step  or  two 
from  the  place  where  he  had  stood,  returned  to  it,  and 
glanced  about  him  in  a  very  curious  way, — as  one  of  the 
meaner  reptiles  might,  looking  for  a  hole  to  hide  in.  I 
noticed  at  the  same  time,  that  a  singular  change  took  place  in 
the  figure  of  the  man, — as  if  it  collapsed  within  his  clothes, 
and  tliey  consequently  became  ill-shapen  and  ill-fitting. 

"You  shall  know,"  said  Beckwith,  "for  I  hope  the 
knowledge  will  be  bitter  and  terrible  to  you,  why  you  have 
been  pursued  by  one  man,  and  why,  when  the  whole  inter- 
est that  Mr.  Sampson  represents  would  have  expended  any 
money  in  hunting  you  down,  you  have  been  tracked  to 
death  at  a  single  individual's  charge.  I  hear  you  have  had 
the  name  of  Meltham  on  your  lips  sometimes?  " 

I  saw,  in  addition  to  those  other  changes,  a  sudden  stop- 
page come  upon  his  breathing. 

"  When  you  sent  the  sweet  girl  whom  you  murdered  (you 
know  with  what  artfully  made-out  surroundings  and  prob- 
abilities you  sent  her)  to  Meltham's  office,  before  taking 
her  abroad  to  originate  the  transaction  that  doomed  her  to 
the  grave,  it  fell  to  Meltham's  lot  to  see  her  and  to  speak 
with  her.  It  did  not  fall  to  his  lot  to  save  her,  though  I 
know  he  would  freely  give  his  own  life  to  have  done  it. 
He  admired  her; — I  would  say  he  loved  her  deeply,  if  I 
thought  it  possible  that  you  could  understand  the  word. 
When  she  was  sacrificed,  he  was  thoroughly  assured  of  your 
guilt.  Having  lost  her,  he  had  but  one  object  left  in  life, 
and  that  was  to  avenge  her  and  destroy  you." 


22  HUNTED  DOWN. 

I  saw  the  villain's  nostrils  rise  and  fall  convulsively;  but 
I  saw  no  moving  at  his  mouth. 

"That  man  Meltham,"  Beckwith  steadily  pursued,  "was 
as  absolutely  certain  that  you  could  never  elude  him  in  this 
world,  if  he  devoted  himself  to  your  destruction  with  his 
utmost  fidelity  and  earnestness,  and  if  he  divided  the  sacred 
duty  with  no  other  duty  in  life,  as  he  was  certain  that  in 
achieving  it  he  would  be  a  poor  instrument  in  the  hands  of 
Providence,  and  would  do  well  before  Heaven  in  striking 
you  out  from  among  living  men.  I  am  that  man,  and  I 
thank  God  that  I  have  done  my  work ! " 

If  Slinkton  had  been  running  for  his  life  from  swift- 
footed  savages,  a  dozen  miles,  he  could  not  have  shown 
more  emphatic  signs  of  being  oppressed  at  heart  and  labour- 
ing for  breath,  than  he  showed  now,  when  he  looked  at 
the  pursuer  who  had  so  relentlessly  hunted  him  down. 

"  You  never  saw  me  under  my  right  name  before,;  you 
see  me  under  my  right  name  now.  You  shall  see  me  once 
again  in  the  body;  when  you  are  tried  for  your  life.  You 
shall  see  me  once  again  in  the  spirit,  when  the  cord  is  round 
your  neck,  and  the  crowd  are  crying  against  you !  " 

When  Meltham  had  spoken  these  last  words,  the  mis- 
creant suddenly  turned  away  his  face,  and  seemed  to  strike 
his  mouth  with  his  open  hand.  At  the  same  instant,  the 
room  was  filled  with  a  new  and  powerful  odour,  and,  almost 
at  the  same  instant,  he  broke  into  a  crooked  run,  leap,  start, 
— I  have  no  name  for  the  spasm, — and  fell  with  a  dull 
weight  that  shook  the  heavy  old  doors  and  windows  in 
their  frames. 

That  was  the  fitting  end  of  him. 

When  we  saw  that  he  was  dead,  we  drew  away  from  the 
room,  and  Meltham,  giving  me  his  hand,  said,  with  a  weary 
air, — 

"I  have  no  more  work  on  earth,  my  friend.  But  I  shall 
see  her  again  elsewhere." 

It  was  in  vain  that  I  tried  to  rally  him.  He  might  have 
saved  her,  he  said;  he  had  not  saved  her,  and  he  reproached 
himself;  he  had  lost  her,  and  he  was  broken-hearted. 

"  The  purpose  that  sustained  me  is  over,  Sampson,  and 
there  is  nothing  now  to  hold  me  to  life.  I  am  not  fit  for 
life;  I  am  weak  and  spiritless;  I  have  no  hope  and  no  ob- 
iect;  my  day  is  done." 

In  truth,  I  could  hardly  have  believed  that  the  broken 


HUNTED  DOWN.  23 

man  who  then  spoke  to  me  was  the  man  who  had  so  strongly 
and  so  differently  impressed  me  when  'his  purpose  was  be- 
fore him.  I  used  such  entreaties  with  him,  as  I  could; 
but  he  still  said,  and  always  said,  in  a  patient,  undemon- 
strative way, — nothing  could  avail  him, — he  was  broken- 
hearted. 

He  died  early  in  the  next  spring.  He  was  buried  by 
the  side  of  the  poor  young  lady  for  whom  he  had  cherished 
those  tender  and  unhappy  regrets;  and  he  left  all  he  had 
to  her  sister.  She  lived  to  be  a  happy  wife  and  mother; 
she  married  my  sister's  son,  who  succeeded  poor  Meltham; 
she  is  living  now,  and  her  children  ride  about  the  garden 
on  my  walking-stick  when  I  go  to  see  her. 


HOLIDAY   ROMANCE. 


HOLIDAY  ROMANCE. 

IN  FOUR  PARTS. 


PART   I. 

INTRODUCTORY  ROMANCE  FROM  THE  PEN  OP 
WILLIAM  TINKLING,  ESQ.' 

This  beginning-part  is  not  made  out  of  anybody's  head, 
you  know.  It's  reaL  You  must  believe  this  beginning- 
part  more  than  what  comes  after,  else  you  won't  understand 
how  what  comes  after  came  to  be  written.  You  ml^st  be- 
lieve it  all;  but  you  must  believe  this  most,  please.  I  am 
the  editor  of  it.  Bob  Redforth  (he's  my  cousin,  and  shak- 
ing the  table  on  purpose)  wanted  to  be  the  editor  of  it;  but 
I  said  he  shouldn't  because  he  couldn't.  He  has  no  idea 
of  being  an  editor. 

Nettie  Ashford  is  my  bride.  We  were  married  in  the 
right-hand  closet  in  the  corner  of  the  dancing-school,  where 
first  we  met,  with  a  ring  (a  green  one)  from  Wilkingwater's 
toy-shop.  /  owed  for  it  out  of  my  pocket-money.  When 
the  rapturous  ceremony  was  over,  we  all  four  went  up  the 
lane  and  let  off  a  cannon  (brought  loaded  in  Bob  Redforth' s 
waistcoat-pocket)  to  announce  our  nuptials.  It  flew  right 
up  when  it  went  off,  and  turned  over.  Next  day,  Lieut. - 
Col.  Robin  Redforth  was  united,  with  similar  ceremonies, 
to  Alice  Rainbird.  This  time,  the  cannon  burst  with  a 
most  terrific  explosion,  and  made  a  puppy  bark. 

My  peerless  bride  was,  at  the  period  of  which  we  now 
treat,  in  captivity  at  Miss  Grimmer' s.  Drowvey  and  Grim- 
mer is  the  partnership,  and  opinion  is  divided  which  is 
the  greatest  beast.     The  lovely  bride  of  the  colonel  was 

'Aged  eight 


2  HOLIDAY  ROMANCE. 

also  immured  in  the  dungeons  of  the  same  establishment, 
A  vow  was  entered  into  between  the  colonel  and  myself, 
that  we  would  cut  them  out  ou  the  following  Wednesday 
when  walking  two  and  two. 

Under  the  desperate  circumstajices  of  the  case,  the  active 
brain  of  the  colonel,  combining  with  his  lawless  pursuit  (he 
is  a  pirate),  suggested  an  attack  with  fireworks.  This, 
however,  from  motives  of  humanity,  was  abandoned  as  too 
expensive. 

Lightly  armed  with  a  paper-knife  buttoned  up  under  his 
jacket,  and  waving  the  dreaded  black  flag  at  the  end  of  a 
cane,  the  colonel  took  command  of  me  at  two  p.m.  on  the 
eventful  and  appointed  day.  He  had  drawn  out  the  plan 
of  attack  on  a  piece  of  paper,  which  was  rolled  up  round  a 
hoop-stick.  He  showed  it  to  me.  My  position  and  my 
full-length  portrait  (but  my  real  ears  don't  stick  out  hori- 
zontal) was  behind  a  corner  lamp-post,  with  written  orders 
to  remain  there  till  I  should  see  Miss  Drowvey  fall.  The 
Drowvey  who  Avas  to  fall  was  the  one  in  spectacles,  not  the 
one  with  the  large  lavender  bonnet.  At  that  signal,  I  was 
to  rush  forth,  seize  my  bride,  and  fight  my  way  to  the 
lane.  There  a  junction  would  be  effected  between  myself 
and  the  colonel;  and  putting  our  brides  behind  us,  between 
ourselves  and  the  palings,  we  were  to  conquer  or  die.- 

The  enemy  appeared, — approached.  Waving  his  black 
flag,  the  colonel  attacked.  Confusion  ensued.  Anxiously 
T  awaited  my  signal;  but  my  signal  came  not.  So  far  from 
falling,  the  hated  Drowvey  in  spectacles  appeared  to  me  to 
have  muffled  the  colonel's  head  in  his  outlawed  banner, 
and  to  be  pitching  into  him  with  a  parasol.  The  one  in 
the  lavender  bonnet  also  performed  prodigies  of  valour  with 
her  fists  on  his  back.  Seeing  that  all  was  for  the  moment 
lost,  I  fought  my  desperate  way  hand  to  hand  to  the  lane. 
Through  taking  the  back  road,  I  was  so  fortunate  as  to 
meet  nobody,  and  arrived  there  uninterrupted. 

It  seemed  an  age  ere  the  colonel  joined  me.  He  had 
been  to  the  jobbing  tailor's  to  be  sewn  up  in  several  places, 
and  attributed  our  defeat  to  the  refusal  of  the  detested 
Drowvey  to  fall.  Finding  her  so  obstinate,  he  had  said  to 
her,  "  Die,  recreant !  "  but  had  found  her  no  more  open  to 
reason  on  that  point  than  the  other. 

My  blooming  bride  appeared,  accompanied  by  the  col- 
onel's bride,  at  the  dancing-school  next  day.     What?     Was 


HOLIDAY  ROMANCE.  3 

her  face  averted  from  me?  Hah?  Even  so.  With  a  look 
of  scorn,  she  put  into  my  hand  a  bit  of  paper,  and  took 
another  partner.  On  the  paper  was  pencilled,  "  Heavens ! 
Can  I  write  the  word?     Is  my  husband  a  cow?  " 

In  the  first  bewilderment  of  my  heated  brain,  I  tried  to 
think  what  slanderer  could  have  traced  my  family  to  the 
ignoble  animal  mentioned  above.  Vain  were  my  endeav- 
ours. At  the  end  of  that  dance  I  whispered  the  colonel  to 
come  into  the  cloak-room,  and  I  showed  him  the  note. 

"There  is  a  syllable  wanting,"  said  he,  with  a  gloomy 
brow. 

"  Hah!     What  syllable?  "  was  my  inquiry. 

"She  asks,  can  she  write  the  word?  And  no;  you  see 
she  couldn't,"  said  the  colonel,  pointing  out  the  passage. 

"  And  the  word  was?  "  said  I. 

"Cow — cow — coward,"  hissed  the  pirate-colonel  in  my 
ear,  and  gave  me  back  the  note. 

Feeling  that  I  must  forever  tread  the  earth  a  branded 
boy, — ^^person  I  mean, — or  that  I  must  clear  up  my  honour, 
I  demanded  to  be  tried  by  a  court-martial.  The  colonel 
admitted  my  right  to  be  tried.  Some  difficulty  was  found 
in  composing  the  court,  on  account  of  the  Emperor  of 
France's  aunt  refusing  to  let  him  come  out.  He  was  to  be 
the  president.  Ere  yet  we  had  appointed  a  substitute,  he 
made  his  escape  over  the  back- wall,  and  stood  among  us, 
a  free  monarch. 

The  court  was  held  on  the  grass  by  the  pond.  1  recog- 
nized, in  a  certain  admiral  among  my  judges,  my  deadliest 
foe.  A  cocoanut  had  given  rise  to  language  that  I  could 
not  brook;  but  confiding  in  my  innocence,  and  also  in  the 
knowledge  that  the  President  of  the  United  States  (who 
sat  next  him)  owed  me  a  knife,  I  braced  myself  for  the 
ordeal. 

It  was  a  solemn  spectacle,  that  court.  Two  executioners 
with  pinafores  reversed  led  me  in.  Under  the  shade  of 
an  umbrella  I  perceived  my  bride,  supported  by  the  bride 
of  the  pirate-colonel.  The  president,  having  reproved  a 
little  female  ensign  for  tittering,  on  a  matter  of  life  or 
death,  called  upon  me  to  plead,  "Coward  or  no  coward, 
guilty  or  not  guilty?"  I  pleaded  in  a  firm  tone,  "No 
coward,  and  not  guilty."  (The  little  female  ensign,  being 
again  reproved  by  the  president  for  misconduct,  mutinied, 
left  the  court,  and  threw  stones.) 


4  HOLIDAY  ROMANCE. 

My  implacable  enemy,  the  admiral,  conducted  the  case 
against  me.  The  colonel's  bride  was  called  to  prove  that 
I  had  remained  behind  the  corner  lamp-post  during  the 
engagement.  I  might  have  been  spared  the  anguish  of  my 
own  bride's  being  also  made  a  witness  to  the  same  point, 
but  the  admiral  knew  where  to  wound  me.  Be  still,  my 
soul,  no  matter.  The  colonel  was  then  brought  forward 
with  his  evidence. 

It  was  for  this  point  that  I  had  saved  myself  up,  as  the 
turning-point  of  my  case.  Shaking  myself  free  of  my 
guards, — who  had  no  business  to  hold  me,  the  stupids, 
unless  I  was  found  guilty, — I  asked  the  colonel  what  he 
considered  the  first  duty  of  a  soldier?  Ere  he  could  reply, 
the  President  of  the  Ilnited  States  rose  and  informed  the 
court,  that  my  foe,  the  admiral,  had  suggested  "Bravery," 
and  that  prompting  a  witness  wasn't  fair.  The  president 
of  the  court  immediately  ordered  the  admiral's  mouth  to 
be  filled  with  leaves,  and  tied  up  with  string.  I  had  the 
satisfaction  of  seeing  the  sentence  carried  into  effect  before 
the  proceedings  went  further. 

I  then  took  a  paper  from  my  trousers  pocket,  and  asked, 
"What  do  you  consider,  Col.  Redforth,  the  first  duty  of  a 
soldier?     Is  it  obedience?  " 

"It  is,"  said  the  colonel, 

"  Is  that  paper — please  to  look  at  it — in  your  hand?  *' 

"It  is,"  said  the  colonel, 

"  Is  it  a  military  sketch?  " 

"It  is,"  said  the  colonel, 

"  Of  an  engagement?  " 

"Quite  so,"  said  the  colonel. 

"  Of  the  late  engagement?  " 

"Of  the  late  engagement." 

"  Please  to  describe  it,  and  then  hand  it  to  the  president 
of  the  court. " 

From  that  triumphant  moment  my  sufferings  and  my 
dangers  were  at  an  end.  The  court  rose  up  and  jumped, 
on  discovering  that  I  had  strictly  obeyed  orders.  My  foe, 
the  admiral,  who  though  muzzled  was  malignant  yet,  con- 
trived to  suggest  that  I  was  dishonoured  by  having  quitted 
the  field.  But  the  colonel  himself  had  done  as  much,  and 
gave  his  opinion,  upon  his  word  and  honour  as  a  pirate,  that 
when  all  was  lost  the  field  might  be  quitted  without  dis- 
grace.    I  was  going  to  be  found,  "No  coward  and  not 


HOLIDAY  ROMANCR  5 

guilty,"  and  my  blooming  bride  was  going  to  be  publicly 
restored  to  my  arms  in  a  procession,  when  an  unlooked-for 
event  disturbed  the  general  rejoicing.  This  was  no  other 
than  the  Emperor  of  France's  aunt  catching  hold  of  his 
hair.  The  proceedings  abruptly  terminated,  and  the  court 
tumultuously  dissolved. 

It  was  when  the  shades  of  the  next  evening  but  one  were 
beginning  to  fall,  ere  yet  the  silver  beams  of  Luna  touched 
the  earth,  that  four  forms  might  have  been  descried  slowly 
advancing  towards  the  weeping  willow  on  the  borders  of 
the  pond,  the  now  deserted  scene  of  the  day  before  yester- 
day's agonies  and  triumphs.  On  a  nearer  approach,  and 
by  a  practised  eye,  these  might  have  been  identified  as  the 
forms  of.  the  pirate-colonel  with  his  bride,  and  of  the  day 
before  yesterday's  gallant  prisoner  with  his  bride. 

On  the  beauteous  faces  of  the  Nymphs  dejection  sat  en- 
throned. All  four  reclined  under  the  willow  for  some 
minutes  without  speaking,  till  at  length  the  bride  of  the 
colonel  poutingly  observed,  "  It's  of  no  use  pretending  any 
more,  and.  we  had  better  give  it  up." 

*'  Ha ! "  exclaimed  the  pirate.     "  Pretending?  " 

"  Don't  go  on  like  that;  you  worry  me,"  returned  his 
bride. 

The  lovely  bride  of  Tinkling  echoed  the  incredible 
declaration.     The  two  warriors  exchanged  stony  glances. 

"If,"  said  the  bride  of  the  pirate-colonel,  "grown-up 
people  won't  do  what  they  ought  to  do,  and  will  put  us 
out,  what  comes  of  our  pretending?  " 

"  We  only  get  into  scrapes,"  said  the  bride  of  Tinkling. 

"  You  know  very  well,"  pursued  the  colonel's  bride,  "  that 
Miss  Drowvey  wouldn't  fall.  You  complained  of  it  your- 
self. And  you  know  how  disgracefully  the  court-martial 
ended.  As  to  our  marriage;  would  my  people  acknowledge 
it  at  home?  " 

"  Or  would  my  people  acknowledge  ours?  "  said  the  bride 
of  Tinkling. 

Again  the  two  warriors  exchanged  stony  glances. 

"  If  you  knocked  at  the  door  and  claimed  me,  after  you 
were  told  to  go  away,"  said  the  colonel's  bride,  "you  would 
only  have  your  hair  pulled,  or  your  ears,  or  your  nose." 

"  If  you  persisted  in  ringing  at  the  bell  and  claiming 
me,"  said  the  bride  of  Tinkling  to  that  gentleman,  "you 
would  have  things  dropped  on  your  head  from  the  window 


6  HOLIDAY  ROMANCE. 

over  the  handle,  or  you  would  be  played  upon  by  the  gar- 
den-engine." 

"And  at  your  own  homes,"  resumed  the  bride  of  the 
colonel,  "  it  would  be  just  as  bad.  You  would  be  sent  to 
bed,  or  something  equally  undignified.  Again,  how  would 
you  support  us?  " 

The  pirate-colonel  replied  in  a  courageous  voice,  "By 
rapine ! "  But  his  bride  retorted,  "  Suppose  the  grown-up 
people  wouldn't  be  rapined?" — "Then,"  said  the  colonel, 
"they  should  pay  the  penalty  in  blood." — "But  suppose 
they  should  object,"  retorted  his  bride,  "and  wouldn't  pay 
the  penalty  in  blood  or  anything  else?  " 

A  mournful  silence  ensued. 

"  Then  do  you  no  longer  love  me,  Alice?  "  asked  the  colo- 
nel. 

"Redforth!  I  am  ever  thine,"  returned  his  bride. 

"Then  do  you  no  longer  love  me,  Nettie?"  asked  the 
present  writer. 

"Tinkling!  I  am  ever  thine,"  returned  my  bride. 

We  all  four  embraced.  Let  me  not  be  misunderstood  by 
the  giddy.  The  colonel  embraced  his  own  bride,  and  I 
embraced  mine.     But  two  times  two  make  four. 

"Nettie  and  I,"  said  Alice  mournfully,  "have  been  con- 
sidering our  position.  The  grown-up  people  are  too  strong 
for  us.  They  make  us  ridiculous.  Besides,  they  have 
changed  the  times.  William  Tinkling's  baby  brother  was 
christened  yesterday.  What  took  place?  Was  any  king 
present?  Answer,  William." 

I  said  No,  unless  disguised  as  Great-uncle  Chopper. 

"  Any  queen?  " 

There  had  been  no  queen  that  I  knew  of  at  our  house. 
There  might  have  been  one  in  the  kitchen;  but  I  didn't 
think  so,  or  the  servants  would  have  mentioned  it. 

"  Any  fairies?  " 

None  that  were  visible. 

"  We  had  an  idea  among  us,  I  think,"  said  Alice,  with 
a  melancholy  smile,  "  we  four,  that  Miss  Grimmer  would 
prove  to  be  the  wicked  fairy,  and  would  come  in  at 
the  christening  with  her  crutch  stick,  and  give  the  child 
a  bad  gift.  Was  there  anything  of  that  sort?  Answer, 
William." 

I  said  that  ma  had  said  afterwards  (and  so  she  had), 
that  Great-uncle  Chopper's  gift  was  a  shabby  one;  but  she 


HOLIDAY  ROMANCE.  7 

hadn't  said  a  bad  one.  She  had  called  it  shabby,  electro- 
typed,  second-hand,  and  below  his  income. 

"  It  must  be  the  grown-up  people  who  have  changed  all 
this,"  said  Alice.  "  We  couldn't  have  changed  it,  if  we 
had  been  so  inclined,  and  we  never  should  have  been.  Or 
perhaps  Miss  Grimmer  is  a  wicked  fairy  after  all,  and 
won't  act  up  to  it  because  the  grown-up  people  have  per- 
suaded her  not  to.  Either  way,  they  would  make  us 
ridiculous  if  we  told  them  what  we  expected." 

"  Tyrants ! "  muttered  the  pirate-colonel. 

"Nay,  my  Redforth,"  said  Alice,  "say  not  so.  Call  not 
names,  my  Redforth,  or  they  will  apply  to  pa." 

"Let'em!"  said  the  colonel.  "I  don't  care.  Who's 
he?" 

Tinkling  here  undertook  the  perilous  task  of  remonstrat- 
ing with  his  lawless  friend,  who  consented  to  withdraw  the 
moody  expressions  above  quoted. 

"  What  remains  for  us  to  do?  "  Alice  went  on  in  her  mild, 
wise  way.  "  We  must  educate,  we  must  pretend  in  a  new 
manner,  we  must  wait." 

The  colonel  clinched  his  teeth, — four  out  in  front,  and 
a  piece  of  another,  and  he  had  been  twice  dragged  to  the 
door  of  a  dentist-despot,  but  had  escaped  from  his  guards. 
"  How  educate?  How  pretend  in  a  new  manner?  How 
wait?  " 

"  Educate  the  grown-up  people,"  replied  Alice.  "  We 
part  to-night.  Yes,  Redforth,"  for  the  colonel  tucked  up 
his  cuffs, — "part  to-night!  Let  us  in  these  next  holidays, 
now  going  to  begin,  throw  our  thoughts  into  something  edu- 
cational for  the  grown-up  people,  hinting  to  them  how 
things  ought  to  be.  Let  us  veil  our  meaning  under  a  mask 
of  romance;  you,  I,  and  Nettie.  William  Tinkling,  being 
the  plainest  and  quickest  writer,  shall  copy  out.  Is  it 
agreed?  " 

The  colonel  answered  sulkily,  "  I  don't  mind."  He  then 
asked,  "  How  about  pretending?  " 

"We  will  pretend,"  said  Alice,  "that  we  are  children; 
not  that  we  are  those  grown-up  people  who  won't  help  us 
out  as  they  ought,  and  who  understand  us  so  badly." 

The  colonel,  still  much  dissatisfied,  growled,  "How 
about  waiting?  " 

"  We  will  wait,  answered  little  Alice,  taking  Nettie's 
hand  in  hers,  and  looking  up  to  the  sky,  we  will  wait— 


8  HOLIDAY  ROMANCE. 

ever  constant  and  true — till  the  times  have  got  so  changed 
as  that  everything  helps  us  out,  and  nothing  makes  us 
ridiculous,  and  the  fairies  have  come  back.  We  will  wait 
— ever  constant  and  true — till  we  are  eighty,  ninety,  or 
one  hundred.  And  then  the  fairies  will  send  tis  children, 
and  we  will  help  them  out,  poor  pretty  little  creatures,  if 
they  pretend  ever  so  much." 

"So  we  will,  dear,"  said  Nettie  Ashford,  taking  her 
round  the  waist  with  both  arms  and  kissing  her.  "  And  now 
if  my  husband  will  go  and  buy  some  cherries  for  us,  I  have 
got  some  money." 

In  the  friendliest  manner  I  invited  the  colonel  to  go  with 
me;  but  he  so  far  forgot  himself  as  to  acknowledge  the  in- 
vitation by  kicking  out  behind,  and  then  lying  down  on  his 
stomach  on  the  grass,  pulling  it  up  and  chewing  it.  When 
I  came  back,  however,  Alice  had  nearly  brought  him  out 
of  his  vexation,  and  was  soothing  him  by  telling  him  how 
soon  we  should  all  be  ninety. 

As  we  sat  under  the  willow-tree  and  ate  the  cherries 
(fair,  for  Alice  shared  them  out),  we  played  at  being  ninety. 

Nettie  complained  that  she  had  a  bone  in  her  old  back, 
and  it  made  her  hobble;  and  Alice  sang  a  song  in  an  old 
woman's  way,  but  it  was  very  pretty,  and  we  were  all 
merry.  At  least,  I  don't  know  about  merry  exactly,  but 
all  comfortable. 

There  was  a  most  tremendous  lot  of  cherries;  and  Alice 
always  had  with  her  some  neat  little  bag  or  box  or  case,  to 
hold  things.  In  it  that  night  was  a  tiny  wine-glass.  So 
Alice  and  Nettie  said  they  would  make  some  cherry  wine 
to  drink  our  love  at  parting. 

Each  of  us  had  a  glassful,  and  it  was  delicious;  and 
each  of  us  drank  the  toast,  "Our  love  at  parting."  The 
colonel  drank  his  wine  last;  and  it  got  into  my  head  di- 
rectly that  it  got  into  his  directly.  Anyhow,  his  eyes 
rolled  immediately  after  he  had  turned  the  glass  upside 
down;  and  he  took  me  on  one  side  and  proposed  in  a  hoarse 
whisper,  that  we  should  "Cut  'em  out  still," 

"How  did  he  mean?"  I  asked  my  lawless  friend. 

"  Cut  our  brides  out,"  said  the  colonel,  and  then  cut  our 
way,  without  going  down  a  single  turning,  bang  to  the 
Spanish  main ! " 

We  might  have  tried  it,  though  I  didn't  think  it  would 
answer;  only  we  looked  round .  and  saw  that  there  was 


HOLIDAY  ROMANCE.  9 

nothing  but  moonlight  under  the  willow-tree,  and  that  our 
pretty,  pretty  wives  were  gone.  We  burst  out  crying. 
The  colonel  gave  in  second,  and  came  to  first;  but  he  gave 
in  strong.  We  were  ashamed  of  our  red  eyes,  and  hung 
about  for  half  an  hour  to  whiten  them.  Likewise  a  piece 
of  chalk  round  the  rims,  I  doing  the  colonel's,  and  he  mine", 
but  afterwards  found  in  the  bedroom  looking-glass  not  nat- 
ural, besides  inflammation.  Our  conversation  turned  on 
being  ninety.  The  colonel  told  me  he  had  a  pair  of  boots 
that  wanted  soling  and  heeling;  but  he  thought  it  hardly 
worth  while  to  mention  it  to  his  father,  as  he  himself 
should  so  soon  be  ninety,  when  he  thought  shoes  would  be 
more  convenient.  The  colonel  also  told  me,  with  his  hand 
upon  his  hip,  that  he  felt  himself  already  getting  on  in 
life,  and  turning  rheumatic.  And  I  told  him  the  same. 
And  when  they  said  at  our  house  at  supper  (they  are 
always  bothering  about  something)  that  I  stooped,  I  felt 
so  glad ! 

This  is  the  end  of  the  beginning-part  that  you  were  to 
believe  most. 


PABT  n. 

ROMANCE.     PROM  THE  PEN  OF  MWS  ALICE  RAINBIRD.' 

There  was  once  a  king,  and  he  had  a  queen;  and  he 
was  the  manliest  of  his  sex,  and  she  was  the  loveliest  of 
hers.  The  king  was,  in  his  private  profession,  under  gov- 
ernment. The  queen's  father  had  been  a  medical  man  out 
of  town. 

They  had  nineteen  children,  and  were  always  having 
more.  Seventeen  of  these  children  took  care  of  the  baby; 
and  Alicia,  the  eldest,  took  care  of  them  all.  Their  ages 
varied  from  seven  years  to  seven  months. 

Let  us  now  resume  our  story. 

One  day  the  king  was  going  to  the  office,  when  he  stopped 
at  the  fishmonger's  to  buy  a  pound  and  a  half  of  salmon 
not  too  near  the  tail,  which  the  queen  (who  was  a  careful 
housekeeper)  had  requested  him  to  send  home.  Mr. 
Pickles,  the  fishmonger,  said,  "Certainly,  sirj  is  there 
any  other  artrcle?    Good-morning," 

'Aged  eevexi. 


10  HOLIDAY   ROMANCE. 

The  king  went  on  towards  the  office  in  a  melancholy 
mood;  for  quarter-day  was  such  a  long  way  off,  and  several 
of  the  dear  children  were  growing  out  of  their  clothes.  He 
had  not  proceeded  far,  when  Mr.  Pickles' s  errand-boy 
came  running  after  him,  and  said,  "Sir,  you  didn't  notice 
the  old  lady  in  our  shop." 

"  What  old  lady?  "  inquired  the  king.     "  I  saw  none." 

Now  the  king  had  not  seen  any  old  lady,  because  this 
old  lady  had  been  invisible  to  him,  though  visible  to  Mr. 
Pickles's  boy.  Probably  because  he  messed  and  splashed 
the  water  about  to  that  degree,  and  flopped  the  pairs  of 
soles  down  in  that  violent  manner,  that,  if  she  had  not 
been  visible  to  him,  he  would  have  spoilt  her  clothes. 

Just  then  the  old  lady  came  trotting  up.  She  was 
dressed  in  shot-silk  of  the  richest  quality,  smelling  of  dried 
lavender. 

"  King  Watkins  the  First,  I  believe?  "  said  the  old  lady. 

"  Watkins,"  replied  the  king,  "is  my  name." 

"  Papa,  if  I  am  not  mistaken,  of  the  beautiful  Princess 
Alicia?  "  said  the  old  lady. 

"And  of  eighteen  other  darlings,"  replied  the  king. 

"  Listen.      You  are  going  to  the  office,"  said  the  old  lady. 

It  instantly  flashed  upon  the  king  that  she  must  be  a 
fairy,  or  how  could  she  know  that? 

"You  are  right,"  said  the  old  lady,  answering  his 
thoughts.  "  I  am  the  good  Fairy  Grandmarina.  Attend ! 
When  you  return  home  to  dinner,  politely  invite  the  Prin- 
cess Alicia  to  have  some  of  the  salmon  you  bought  just 
now." 

"It  may  disagree  with  her,"  said  the  king. 

The  old  lady  became  so  very  angry  at  this  absurd  idea, 
that  the  king  was  quite  alarmed,  and  humbly  begged  her 
pardon. 

"  We  hear  a  great  deal  too  much  about  this  thing  disa- 
greeing," said  the  old  lady,  with  the  greatest  contempt  it 
was  possible  to  express.  "Don't  be  greedy.  I  think  you 
want  it  all  yourself." 

The  king  hung  his  head  under  this  reproof,  and  said  he 
wouldn't  talk  about  things  disagreeing  any  more. 

"Be  good,  then,"  said  the  Fairy  Grandmarina,  "and 
don't!  When  the  beautiful  Princess  Alicia  consents  to 
partake  of  the  salmon, — as  I  think  she  will, — you  will  find 
she  will  leave  a  fish-bone  on  her  plate.     Tell  her  to  dry  it, . 


HOLIDAY  ROMANCE.  11 

and  to  rub  it,  and  to  polish  it,  till  it  shines  like  mother-of- 
pearl,  and  to  take  care  of  it  as  a  present  from  me." 

"  Is  that  all?  "  asked  the  king. 

"Don't  be  impatient,  sir,"  returned  the  Fairy  Grand- 
marina,  scolding  him  severely.  "  Don't  catch  people  short, 
before  they  have  done  speaking.  Just  the  way  with  you 
grown-up  persons.     You  are  always  doing  it." 

The  king  again  hung  his  head,  and  said  he  wouldn't  do 
so  any  more. 

"Be  good,  then,"  said  the  Fairy  Grandmarina,  "and 
don't!  Tell  the  Princess  Alicia,  with  my  love,  that  the 
fish-bone  is  a  magic  present  which  can  only  be  used  once; 
but  that  it  will  bring  her,  that  once,  whatever  she  wishes 

for,    PROVIDED     SHE    WISHES    FOR   IT    AT   THE   RIGHT    TIME. 

That  is  the  message.     Take  care  of  it." 

The  king  was  beginning,  "Might  I  ask  the  reason?" 
when  the  fairy  became  absolutely  furious. 

"  Will  you  be  good,  sir?  "  she  exclaimed,  stamping  her 
foot  on  the  ground.  "The  reason  for  this,  and  the  reason 
for  that,  indeed !  You  are  always  wanting  the  reason. 
No  reason.  There!  Hoity  toity  me !  I  am  sick  of  your 
grown-up  reasons." 

The  king  was  extremely  frightened  by  the  old  lady's 
flying  into  such  a  passion,  and  said  he  was  very  sorry  to 
have  offended  her,  and  he  wouldn't  ask  for  reasons  any 
more. 

"Be  good,  then,"  said  the  old  lady,  "and  don't!" 

With  those  words,  Grandmarina  vanished,  and  the  king 
went  on  and  on  and  on,  till  he  came  to  the  office.  There 
he  wrote  and  wrote  and  wrote,  till  it  was  time  to  go  home 
again.  Then  he  politely  invited  the  Princess  Alicia,  as 
the  fairy  had  directed  him,  to  partake  of  the  salmon.  And 
when  she  had  enjoyed  it  very  much,  he  saw  the  fish-bone 
on  her  plate,  as  the  fairy  had  told  him  he  would,  and  he 
delivered  the  fairy's  message,  and  the  Princess  Alicia  took 
care  to  dry  the  bone,  and  to  rub  it,  and  to  polish  it,  till  it 
shone  like  mother-of-pearl. 

And  so,  when  the  queen  was  going  to  get  up  in  the  morn- 
ing, she  said,  "Oh,  dear  me,  dear  me;  my  head,  my 
head !  "  and  then  she  fainted  away. 

The  Princess  Alicia,  who  happened  to  be  looking  in  at 
the  chamber  door,  asking  about  breakfast,  was  very  much 
alarmed  when  she  saw  her  royal  mamma  in  this  state,  and 


12  HOLIDAY  ROMANCE. 

she  rang  the  bell  for  Peggy,  which  was  the  name  of  the 
lord  chamberlain.  But  remembering  where  the  smelling- 
bottle  was,  she  climbed  on  a  chair  and  got  it;  and  after 
that  she  climbed  on  another  chair  by  the  bedside,  and  held 
the  smelling-bottle  to  the  queen's  nose;  and  after  that  she 
jumped  down  and  got  some  water;  and  after  that  she 
jumped  up  again  and  wetted  the  queen's  forehead;  and,  in 
short,  when  the  lord  chamberlain  came  in,  that  dear  old 
woman  said  to  the  little  princess,  "  What  a  trot  you  are ! 
I  couldn't  have  done  it  better  myself! " 

But  that  was  not  the  worst  of  the  good  queen's  illness. 
Oh,  no!  She  was  very  ill  indeed,  for  a  long  time.  The 
Princess  Alicia  kept  the  seventeen  young  princes  and  prin- 
cesses quiet,  and  dressed  and  undressed  and  danced  the 
baby,  and  made  the  kettle  boil,  and  heated  the  soup,  and 
swept  the  hearth,  and  poured  out  the  medicine,  and  nursed 
the  queen,  and  did  all  that  ever  she  could,  and  was  as 
busy,  busy,  busy  as  busy  could  be;  for  there  were  not 
many  servants  at  that  palace  for  three  reasons:  because 
the  king  was  short  of  money,  because  a  rise  in  his  office 
never  seemed  to  come,  and  because  quarter-day  was  so  far 
off  that  it  looked  almost  as  far  off  and  as  little  as  one  of 
the  stars. 

But  on  the  morning  when  the  queen  fainted  away,  where 
was  the  magic  fish-bone?  Why,  there  it  was  in  the  Prin- 
cess Alicia's  pocket !  She  had  almost  taken  it  out  to  bring 
the  queen  to  life  again,  when  she  put  it  back,  and  looked 
for  the  smelling-bottle. 

After  the  queen  had  come  out  of  her  swoon  that  morning 
and  was  dozing,  the  Princess  Alicia  hurried  up-stairs  to 
tell  a  most  particular  secret  to  a  most  particular  confiden- 
tial friend  of  hers,  who  was  a  duchess.  People  did  sup- 
pose her  to  be  a  doll;  but  she  was  really  a  duchess,  though 
nobody  knew  it  except  the  princess. 

This  most  particular  secret  was  the  secret  about  the 
magic  fish-bone,  the  history  of  which  was  well  known  to 
the  duchess,  because  the  princess  told  her  everything.  The 
princess  kneeled  down  by  the  bed  on  which  the  duchess 
was  lying,  full-dressed  and  wide-awake,  and  whispered  the 
secret  to  her.  The  duchess  smiled  and  nodded.  People 
might  have  supposed  that  she  never  smiled  and  nodded; 
but  she  often  did,  though  nobody  knew  it  except  the 
princess. 


HOLIDAY  ROMANCE.  ^ 

Then  the  Princess  Alicia  hurried  down-stairs  again  to 
keep  watch  in  the  queen's  room.  She  often  kept  watch  by 
herself  in  the  queen's  room;  but  every  evening,  while  the 
illness  lasted,  she  sat  there  watching  with  the  king.  And 
every  evening  the  king  sat  looking  at  her  with  a  cross  look, 
wondering  why  she  never  brought  out  the  magic  fish-bone. 
As  often  as  she  noticed  this,  she  ran  up-stairs,  whispered 
the  secret  to  the  duchess  over  again,  and  said  to  the  duch- 
ess besides,  *'They  think  we  children  never  have  a  rea- 
son or  a  meaning!"  And  the  duchess,  though  the  most 
fashionable  duchess  that  ever  was  heard  of,  winked  her 
eye. 

"Alicia,"  said  the  king,  one  evening,  when  she  wished 
him  good-nigh*".. 

"Yes,  papa." 

"  What  is  become  of  the  magic  fish-bone?  * 

"  In  my  pocket,  papa ! " 

"  I  thought  you  had  lost  it?  " 

"0,  no,  papa! " 

"  Or  forgotten  it?  " 

"No,  indeed,  papa." 

And  so  another  time  the  dreadful  little  snapping  pug- 
dog,  next  door,  made  a  rush  at  one  of  the  young  princes  as 
he  stood  on  the  steps  coming  home  from  school,  and  terri 
fied  him  out  of  his  wits;  and  he  put  his  hand  through  a 
pane  of  glass,  and  bled,  bled,  bled.  When  the  seventeen 
other  young  princes  and  princesses  saw  him  bleed,  bleed, 
bleed,  they  were  terrified  out  of  their  wits  too,  and  screamed 
themselves  black  in  their  seventeen  faces  all  at  once.  But 
the  Princess  Alicia  put  her  hands  over  all  their  seventeen 
mouths,  one  after  another,  and  persuaded  them  to  be  quiet 
because  of  the  sick  queen.  And  then  she  put  the  wounded 
prince's  hand  in  a  basin  of  fresh  cold  water,  while  they 
stared  with  their  twice  seventeen  are  thirty-four,  put  down 
four  and  carry  three,  eyes,  and  then  she  looked  in  the  hand 
for  bits  of  glass,  and  there  were  fortunately  no  bits  of  glass 
there.  And  then  she  said  to  two  chubby-legged  princes, 
who  were  sturdy  though  small,  "  Bring  me  in  the  royal 
rag-bag:  I  must  snip  and  stitch  and  cut  and  contrive." 
So  these  two  young  jn-inces  tugged  at  the  royal  rag-bag, 
and  lugged  it  in;  and  the  Princess  Alicia  sat  down  on  the 
floor,  with  a  large  pair  of  scissors  and  a  needle  and  thread, 
and  snipped  and  stitched  and  cut  and  contrived,  and  made 


14  HOLIDAY   ROMANCE. 

a  bandage,  and  put  it  on,  and  it  fitted  beautifully;  and  so 
when  it  was  all  done,  she  saw  the  king  her  papa  looking 
on  by  the  door. 

"Alicia." 

"Yes,  papa." 

"  What  have  yon  been  doing?  " 

*'  Snipping,  stitching,  cutting,  and  contriving,  papa." 

"  Where  is  the  magic  fish-bone?  " 

"In  my  pocket,  papa." 

"  I  thought  you  had  lost  it?  " 

"  Oh,  no,  papa ! " 

"  Or  forgotten  it?  " 

"No,  indeed,  papa." 

After  that,  she  ran  up-stairs  to  the  duchess,  and  told  her 
what  had  passed,  and  told  her  the  secret  over  again;  and 
the  duchess  shook  her  flaxen  curls,  and  laughed  with  her 
rosy  lips. 

Well !  and  so  another  time  the  baby  fell  under  the  grate. 
The  seventeen  young  princes  and  princesses  were  used  to 
it;  for  they  were  almost  always  falling  under  the  grate  or 
down  the  stairs;  but  the  baby  was  not  used  to  it  yet,  and 
it  gave  him  a  swelled  face  and  a  black  eye.  The  way  the 
poor  little  darling  came  to  tumble  was,  that  he  was  out  of 
the  Princess  Alicia's  lap  just  as  she  was  sitting,  in  a  great 
coarse  apron  that  quite  smothered  her,  in  front  of  the 
kitchen  fire,  beginning  to  peel  the  turnips  for  the  broth  for 
dinner;  and  the  way  she  came  to  be  doing  that  was,  that 
the  king's  cook  had  run  away  that  morning  with  her  own 
true  love,  who  was  a  very  tall  but  very  tipsy  soldier. 
Then  the  seventeen  young  princes  and  princesses,  who  cried 
at  everything  that  happened,  cried  and  roared.  But  the 
Princess  Alicia  (who  couldn't  help  crying  a  little  herself) 
quietly  called  to  them  to  be  still,  on  account  of  not  throw- 
ing back  the  queen  up-stairs,  who  was  fast  getting  well, 
and  said,  "  Hold  your  tongues,  you  wicked  little  monkeys, 
every  one  of  you,  while  I  examine  baby  !  "  Then  she  ex- 
amined baby,  and  found  that  he  hadn't  broken  anything; 
and  she  held  cold  iron  to  his  poor  dear  eye,  and  smoothed 
his  poor  dear  face,  and  he  presently  fell  asleep  in  her  arms. 
Then  she  said  to  the  seventeen  princes  and  princesses,  "I 
am  afraid  to  let  him  down  yet,  lest  he  should  wake  and 
feel  pain;  be  good,  and  you  shall  all  be  cooks."  They 
jumped  for  joy  when  they  heard  that,  and  began  making 


HOLIDAY  ROMANCE.  15 

themselves  cooks'  caps  out  of  old  newspapers.  So  to  one  she 
gave  the  salt-box,  and  to  one  she  gave  the  barley,  and  to  one 
she  gave  the  herbs,  and  to  one  she  gave  the  turnips,  and 
to  one  she  gave  the  carrots,  and  to  one  she  gave  the  onions, 
and  to  one  she  gave  the  spice-box,  till  they  were  all  cooks, 
and  all  running  about  at  work,  she  sitting  in  the  middle, 
smothered  in  the  great  coarse  apron,  nursing  baby.  By 
and  by  the  broth  was  done;  and  the  baby  woke  up,  smiling 
like  an  angel,  and  was  trusted  to  the  sedatest  princess  to 
hold,  while  the  other  princes  and  princesses  were  squeezed 
into  a  far-off  corner  to  look  at  the  Princess  Alicia  turning 
out  the  saucepanful  of  broth,  for  fear  (as  they  were  always 
getting  into  trouble)  they  should  get  splashed  and  scalded. 
When  the  broth  came  tumbling  out,  steaming  beautifully, 
and  smelling  like  a  nosegay  good  to  eat,  they  clapped  their 
hands.  That  made  the  baby  clap  his  hands;  and  that,  and 
his  looking  as  if  he  had  a  comic  toothache,  made  all  the 
princes  and  princesses  laugh.  So  the  Princess  Alicia  said, 
"  Laugh  and  be  good ;  and  after  dinner  we  will  make  him  a 
nest  on  the  floor  in  a  corner,  and  he  shall  sit  in  his  nest 
and  see  a  dance  of  eighteen  cooks."  That  delighted  the 
young  princes  and  princesses,  and  they  ate  up  all  the  broth, 
and  washed  up  all  the  plates  and  dishes,  and  cleared  away, 
and  pushed  the  table  into  a  corner;  and  then  they  in  their 
cooks'  caps,  and  the  Princess  Alicia  in  the  smothering 
coarse  apron  that  belonged  to  the  cook  that  had  run  away 
with  her  own  true  love  that  was  the  very  tall  but  very  tipsy 
soldier,  danced  a  dance  of  eighteen  cooks  before  the  angelic 
baby,  who  forgot  his  swelled  face  and  his  black  eye,  and 
crowed  with  joy. 

And  so  then,  once  more  the  Princess  Alicia  saw  King 
Watkins  the  First,  her  father,  standing  in  the  doorway 
looking  on,  and  he  said,  "  What  have  you  been  doing, 
Alicia?  " 

"  Cooking  and  contriving,  papa. " 

"  What  else  have  you  been  doing,  Alicia?  ** 

"Keeping  the  children  light-hearted,  papa." 

"  Where  is  the  magic  fish-bone,  Alicia?  " 

"In  my  pocket,  papa." 

"  1  thought  you  had  lost  it?  ** 

"  Oh,  ho,  papa ! " 

"  Or  forgotten  it?  " 

"No,  indeed,  papa.'* 


16  HOLIDAY  ROMANCE. 

The  king  then  sighed  so  heavily,  and  seemed  so  low- 
spirited,  and  sat  down  so  miserably,  leaning  his  head  ui)on 
his  hand,  and  his  elbow  upon  the  kitchen-table  pushed 
away  in  the  corner,  that  the  seventeen  princes  and  prin- 
cesses crept  softly  out  of  the  kitchen  and  left  him  alone 
with  the  Princess  Alicia  and  the  angelic  baby, 

"  What  is  the  matter,  papa?  " 

"I  am  dreadfully  poor,  my  child." 

"  Have  you  no  money  at  all,  papa?  " 

"None,  my  child." 

"  Is  there  no  way  of  getting  any,  papa?  " 

"  No  way,"  said  the  king.  "  I  have  tried  very  hard,  and 
I  have  tried  all  ways." 

When  she  heard  those  last  words,  the  Princess  Alicia 
began  to  put  her  hand  into  the  pocket  where  she  kept  the 
magic  fish-bone. 

"Papa,"  said  she,  "when  we  have  tried  very  hard,  and 
tried  all  ways,  we  must  have  done  our  very,  very  best?  " 

"No  doubt,  Alicia." 

"  When  we  have  done  our  very,  very  best,  papa,  and  that 
is  not  enough,  then  I  think  the  right  time  must  have  come 
for  asking  help  of  others."  This  was  the  very  secret  con- 
nected with  the  magic  fish-bone,  which  she  had  found  out 
for  herself  from  the  good  Fairy  Grandmarina's  words,  and 
which  she  had  so  often  whispered  to  her  beautiful  and  fash- 
ionable friend,  the  duchess. 

So  she  took  out  of  her  pocket  the  magic  fish-bone,  that 
had  been  dried  and  rubbed  and  polished  till  it  shone  like 
mother-of-pearl;  and  she  gave  it  one  little  kiss,  and  wished 
it  was  quarter-day.  And  immediately  it  was  quflrter-dayj 
and  the  king's  quarter's  salary  came  rattling  down  the 
chimney,  and  bounced  into  the  middle  of  the  floor. 

But  this  was  not  half  of  what  happened, — no,  not  a 
quarter;  for  immediately  afterwards  the  good  Fairy  Grand- 
marina  came  riding  in,  in  a  carriage  and  four  (peacocks) 
with  Mr.  Pickles's  boy  up  behind,  dressed  in  silver  and 
gold,  with  a  cocked  hat,  powdered  hair,  pink  silk  stock- 
ings, a  jewelled  cane,  and  a  nosegay.  Down  jumped  Mr. 
Pickles's  boy,  with  his  cocked  hat  in  his  hand,  and  won- 
derfully polite  (being  entirely  changed  by  enchantment), 
and  handed  Grandmarina  out;  and  there  she  stood,  in  her 
rich  shot-silk  smelling  of  dried  lavender,  fanning  herself 
with  a  sparkling  fan. 


HOLroAY  ROMANCE.  17 

"Alicia,  my  dear,"  said  this  charming  old  fairy,  "how 
do  you  do?  I  hope  I  see  you  pretty  well?  Give  me  a 
kiss." 

The  Princess  Alicia  embraced  her;  and  then  Grandma- 
rina  turned  to  the  king,  and  said  rather  sharply,  "  Are  you 
good?" 

The  king  said  he  hoped  so. 

"I  suppose  you  know  the  reason  wow,  why  my  god- 
daughter here,'-  kissing  the  princess  again,  "did  not  apply 
to  the  fish-bone  sooner?  "  said  the  fairy. 

The  king  made  a  shy  bow. 

"  Ah !  but  you  didn't  then  ?  "  said  the  fairy. 

The  king  made  a  shyer  bow. 

"  Any  more  reasons  to  ask  for?  "  said  the  fairy. 

The  king  said,  No,  and  he  was  very  sorry. 

"Be  good,  then,"  said  the  fairy,  "and  live  happy  ever 
afterwards." 

Then  Grandmarina  waved  her  fan,  and  the  queen  came 
ill  most  splendidly  dressed;  and  the  seventeen  young 
princes  and  princesses,  no  longer  grown  out  of  their  clothes, 
came  in,  newly  fitted  out  from  top  to  toe,  with  tucks  in 
everything  to  admit  of  its  being  let  out.  After  that,  the 
fairy  tapped  the  Princess  Alicia  with  her  fan;  and  the 
smothering  coarse  apron  flew  away,  and  she  appeared  ex- 
quisitely dressed,  like  a  little  bride,  with  a  wreath  of 
orange  flowers  and  a  silver  veil.  After  that,  the  kitchen 
diesser  changed  of  itself  into  a  wardrobe,  made  of  beauti- 
ful woods  and  gold  and  looking-glass,  which  was  full  of 
dresses  of  all  soi-ts,  all  for  her  and  all  exactly  fitting  her. 
After  that,  the  angelic  baby  came  in  running  alone,  with 
his  face  and  eye  not  a  bit  the  worse,  but  much  the  better. 
Then  Grandmarina  begged  to  be  introduced  to  the  duchess; 
and,  when  the  duchess  was  brought  down,  many  compli- 
ments passed  between  them. 

A  little  whispering  took  place  between  the  fairy  and  the 
duchess;  and  then  the  fairy  said  out  loud,  "  Yes,  I  thought 
she  would  have  told  you."  Grandmarina  then  turned  to 
the  king  and  queen,  and  said,  "  We  are  going  in  search  of 
Piince  Certainpersonio.  The  pleasure  of  your  company  is 
requested  at  church  in  half  an  hour  precisely."  So  she 
and  the  Princess  Alicia  got  into  the  carriage;  and  Mr. 
Pickles's  boy  handed  in  the  duchess,  who  sat  by  herself  on 
the  opposite  seat;  and  then  Mr.  Pickles's  boy  put  up  the 
2 


18  HOLIDAY   KOMANCB 

steps  and  got  up  behind,  and  tlie  peacocks  flew  away  with 
their  tails  behind. 

Prince  Certainpersonio  was  sitting  by  himself,  eating 
barley-sugar,  and  waiting  to  be  ninety. 

When  he  saw  the  peacocks,  followed  by  the  carriage, 
coming  in  at  the  window,  it  immediately  occurred  to  him 
that  something  uncommon  was  going  to  happen. 

"Prince,"  said  Grandmarina,  "I  bring  you  your 
bride." 

The  moment  the  fairy  said  those  words.  Prince  Certain- 
personio's  face  left  off  being  sticky,  and  his  jacket  and 
corduroys  changed  to  peach-bloom  velvet,  and  his  hair 
curled,  and  a  cap  and  feather  flew  in  like  a  bird  and  settled 
on  his  head.  He  got  into  the  carriage  by  the  fairy's  invi- 
tation; and  there  he  renewed  his  acquaintance  with  the 
duchess,  whom  he  had  seen  before. 

In  the  church  were  the  prince's  relations  and  friends, 
and  the  Princess  Alicia's  relations  and  friends,  and  the 
seventeen  princes  and  princesses,  and  the  baby,  and  a  crowd 
of  the  neighbours.  The  marriage  was  beautiful  beyond  ex- 
pression. The  duchess  was  bridesmaid,  and  beheld  the 
ceremony  from  the  pulpit,  where  she  was  supported  by  the 
cushion  of  the  desk. 

Grandmarina  gave  a  magnificent  wedding-feast  after- 
wards, in  which  there  was  everything  and  more  to  eat,  and 
everything  and  more  to  drink.  The  wedding-cake  was 
delicately  ornamented  with  white  satin  ribbons,  frosted 
silver,  and  white  lilies,  and  was  forty-two  yards  round. 

When  Grandmarina  had  drunk  her  love  to  the  young 
couple,  and  Prince  Certainpersonio  had  made  a  speech,  and 
everybody  had  cried.  Hip,  hip,  hip,  hurrah!  Grandmarina 
announced  to  the  king  and  queen  that  in  future  there  would 
be  eight  quarter-days  in  every  year,  except  in  leap-year, 
when  there  would  be  ten.  She  then  turned  to  Certainper- 
sonio and  Alicia,  and  said,  "My  dears,  you  will  have 
thirty-five  children,  and  they  will  all  be  good  and  beauti- 
ful. Seventeen  of  your  children  will  be  boys,  and  eighteen 
will  be  girls.  The  hair  of  the  whole  of  your  children  will 
curl  naturally.  They  will  never  have  the  measles,  and 
will  have  recovered  from  the  whooping-cough  before  being 
born." 

On  hearing  such  good  news,  everybody  cried  out  "  Hip, 
hip,  hip,  hurrah!"  again. 


HOLIDAY  ROMANCE.  19 

"It  only  remains,"  said  Grandmarina  in  conclusion,  "to 
make  an  end  of  the  fish-bone." 

So  she  took  it  from  the  hand  of  the  Princess  Alicia,  and 
it  instantly  flew  down  the  throat  of  the  dreadful  little 
snapping  pug-dog,  next  door,  and  choked  him,  and  he  ex- 
pired in  convulsions. 


PART  III. 

ROMANCE.    FROM  THE  PEN  OF  LIEUT. -COL.  ROBIN 
REDFORTH.' 

The  subject  of  our  present  narrative  would  appear  to 
have  devoted  himself  to  the  pirate  profession  at  a  compara- 
tively early  age.  We  find  him  in  command  of  a  splendid 
schooner  of  one  hundred  guns  loaded  to  the  muzzle,  ere 
yet  he  had  had  a  party  in  honour  of  his  tenth  birthday. 

It  seems  that  our  hero,  considering  himself  spited  by  a 
Latin-grammar  master,  demanded  the  satisfaction  due  from 
one  man  of  honour  to  another.  Not  getting  it,  he  privately 
withdrew  his  haughty  spirit  from  such  low  company, 
bought  a  second-hand  pocket-pistol,  folded  up  some  sand- 
wiches in  a  paper  bag,  made  a  bottle  of  Spanish  liquorice- 
water,  and  entered  on  a  career  of  valour. 

It  were  tedious  to  follow  Boldheart  (for  such  was  his 
name)  through  the  commencing  stages  of  his  story.  Suffice 
it,  that  we  find  him  bearing  the  rank  of  Capt.  Boldheart, 
reclining  in  full  uniform,  on  a  crimson  hearth-rug  spread 
out  upon  the  quarter-deck  of  his  schooner  The  Beauty,  in 
the  China  seas.  It  was  a  lovely  evening;  and,  as  his  crew 
lay  grouped  about  him,  he  favoured  them  with  the  following 
melody : — 

O  landsmen  are  folly! 
O  pirates  are  jolly  I 
O  diddleum  Dolly, 

^  Di! 
Chorus. — Heave  yo. 

The  soothing  effect  of  these  animated  sounds  floating 
over  the  waters,  as  the  common  sailors  united  their  rough 
voices  to  take  up  the  rich  tones  of  Boldheart,  may  be  more 
easily  conceived  than  described. 

'  Aged  nine. 


20  HOLIDAY  ROMANCE. 

It  was  under  these  circumstances  that  the  lookout  at  the 
masthead  gave  the  word,  "  Whales ! " 

All  was  now  activity, 

"Where  away?  "  cried  Capt.  Boldheart,  starting  up. 

"On  the  larboard  bow,  sir,"  replied  the  fellow  at  the 
masthead,  touching  his  hat.  For  such  was  the  height  of 
discipline  on  board  The  Beauty,  that,  even  at  that  height, 
he  was  obliged  to  mind  it,  or  be  shot  through  the  head. 

"  This  adventure  belongs  to  me,"  said  Boldheart.  "  Boy, 
my  harpoon.  Let  no  man  follow;  "  and,  leaping  alone 
into  his  boat,  the  captain  rowed  with  admirable  dexterity 
in  the  direction  of  the  monster. 

All  was  now  excitement. 

"  He  nears  him ! "  said  an  elderly  seaman,  following  the 
captain  through  his  spy-glass. 

"  He  strikes  him ! "  said  another  seaman,  a  mere  strip- 
ling, but  also  with  a  spy-glass. 

"  He  tows  him  towards  us ! "  said  another  seaman,  a  man 
in  the  full  vigour  of  life,  but  also  with  a  spy-glass. 

In  fact,  the  captain  was  seen  approaching,  with  the  huge 
bulk  following.  We  will  not  dwell  on  the  deafening  cries 
of  " Boldheart !  Boldheart!"  with  which  he  was  received, 
when,  carelessly  leaping  on  the  quarter-deck,  he  presented 
his  prize  to  his  men.  They  afterwards  made  two  thou- 
sand four  hundred  and  seventeen  pound  ten  and  sixpence 
by  it. 

Ordering  the  sails  to  be  braced  up,  the  captain  now  stood 
W.N.W.  The  Beauty  flew  rather  than  floated  over  the 
dark  blue  waters.  Nothing  particular  occurred  for  a  fort- 
night, except  taking,  with  considerable  slaughter,  four 
Spanish  galleons,  and  a  snow  from  South  America,  all 
richly  laden.  Inaction  began  to  tell  upon  the  spirits  of  the 
men.  Capt.  Boldheart  called  all  hands  aft,  and  said,  "  My 
lads,  I  hear  there  are  discontented  ones  among  ye.  Let 
any  such  stand  forth." 

After  some  murmuring,  in  which  the  expressions,  "  Ay, 
ay,  sir ! "  "  Union  Jack,"  "  Avast,"  "  Starboard,"  "  Port," 
"Bowsprit,"  and  similar  indications  of  a  mutinous  under- 
current, though  subdued,  were  audible.  Bill  Boozey,  cap- 
tain of  the  foretop,  came  out  from  the  rest.  His  form  was 
that  of  a  giant,  but  he  quailed  under  the  captain's  eye. 

"  What  are  your  wrongs?  "  said  the  captain. 

"  Why,  d'ye  see,  Captain  Boldheart,"  replied  the  tower- 


HOLIDAY  ROMANCE.  21 

ing  mariner,  "  I've  sailed,  mau  and  boy,  for  many  a  year, 
but  I  never  yet  know'd  the  milk  served  out  for  the  ship's 
company's  teas  to  be  so  sour  as  'tis  aboard  this  craft." 

At  this  moment  the  thrilling  cry,  "Man  overboard  I** 
announced  to  the  astonished  crew  that  Boozey,  in  step'ping 
back,  as  the  captain  (in  mere  thoughtfulness)  laid  his  hand 
upon  the  faithful  pocket-pistol  which  he  wore  in  his  belt, 
had  lost  his  balance,  and  was  struggling  with  the  foaming 
tide. 

All  was  now  stupefaction. 

But  with  Capt.  Boldheart,  to  throw  off  his  uniform  coat, 
regardless  of  the  various  rich  orders  with  which  it  was 
decorated,  and  to  plunge  into  the  sea  after  the  drowning 
giant,  was  the  work  of  a  moment.  Maddening  was  the 
excitement  when  boats  were  lowered;  intense  the  joy  when 
the  captain  was  seen  holding  up  the  drowning  man  with 
his  teeth;  deafening  the  cheering  when  both  were  restored 
to  the  main  deck  of  The  Beauty.  And,  from  the  instant 
of  his  changing  his  wet  clothes  for  dry  ones,  Capt,  Bold- 
heart  had  no  such  devoted  though  humble  friend  as  Wil- 
liam Boozey. 

Boldheart  now  pointed  to  the  horizon,  and  called  the 
attention  of  his  crew  to  the  taper  spars  of  a  ship  lying 
snug  in  harbour  under  the  guns  of  a  fort. 

"She  shall  be  ours  at  sunrise,"  said  he.  "Serve  out  a 
double  allowance  of  grog,  and  prepare  for  action." 

All  was  now  preparation. 

When  morning  dawned,  after  a  sleepless  night,  it  was 
seen  that  the  stranger  was  crowding  on  all  sail  to  come  out 
of  the  harbour  and  offer  battle.  As  the  two  ships  came 
nearer  to  each  other,  the  stranger  fired  a  gun  and  hoisted 
Roman  colours.  Boldheart  then  perceived  her  to  be  the 
Latin-grammar  master's  bark.  Such  indeed  she  was,  and 
had  been  tacking  about  the  world  in  unavailing  pursuit, 
from  the  time  of  his  first  taking  to  a  roving  life. 

Boldheart  now  addressed  his  men,  promising  to  blow 
them  up  if  he  should  feel  convinced  that  their  reputation 
required  it,  and  giving  orders  that  the  Latin-grammar 
master  should  be  taken  alive.  He  then  dismissed  them  to 
their  quarters,  and  the  fight  began  with  a  broadside  from 
The  Beauty.  She  then  veered  around,  and  poured  in 
another.  The  Scorpion  (so  was  the  bark  of  the  Latin- 
grammar  master  appropriately  called)  was  not  slow  to  re- 


22  HOLIDAY  ROMANCE. 

turn  her  fire;  and  a  terrific  cannonading  ensued  in  which 
the  guns  of  The  Beauty  did  tremendous  execution. 

The  Latin-grammar  master  was  seen  upon  the  poop,  in 
the  midst  of  the  smoke  and  fire,  encouraging  his  men.  To 
do  him  justice,  he  was  no  craven,  though  his  white  hat, 
his  short  gray  trousers,  and  his  long  snuff-coloured  surtout 
reaching  to  his  heels  (the  self-same  coat  in  which  he  had 
spited  Boldheart),  contrasted  most  unfavourably  with  the 
brilliant  uniform  of  the  latter.  At  this  moment,  Bold- 
heart,  seizing  a  pike  and  putting  himself  at  the  head  of  his 
men,  gave  the  word  to  board. 

A  desperate  conflict  ensued  in  the  hammock-nettings, — 
or  somewhere  in  about  that  direction, — until  the  Latin- 
grammar  master,  having  all  his  masts  gone,  his  hull  and 
rigging  shot  through,  and  seeing  Boldheart  slashing  a  path 
towards  him,  hauled  down  his  flag  himself,  gave  up  his 
sword  to  Boldheart,  and  asked  for  quarter.  Scarce  had  he 
been  put  into  the  captain's  boat,  ere  The  Scorpion  went 
down  with  all  on  board. 

On  Capt.  Boldheart' s  now  assembling  his  men,  a  circum- 
stance occurred.  He  found  it  necessary  with  one  blow  of 
his  cutlass  to  kill  the  cook,  who,  having  lost  his  brother  in 
the  late  action,  was  making  at  the  Latin-grammar  master 
in  an  infuriated  state,  intent  on  his  destruction  with  a 
carving  knife. 

Capt.  Boldheart  then  turned  to  the  Latin-grammer  mas- 
ter, severely  reproaching  him  with  his  perfidy,  and  put  it 
to  his  crew  what  they  considered  that  a  master  who  spited 
a  boy  deserved. 

They  answered  with  one  voice,  "Death." 

"It  maybe  so,"  said  the  captain;  "but  it  shall  never 
be  said  that  Boldheart  stained  his  hour  of  triumph  with 
the  blood  of  his  enemy.     Prepare  the  cutter." 

The  cutter  was  immediately  prepared. 

"Without  taking  your  life,"  said  the  captain,  "I  must 
yet  forever  deprive  you  of  the  power  of  spiting  other  boys. 
I  shall  turn  you  adrift  in  this  boat.  You  will  find  in  her 
two  oars,  a  compass,  a  bottle  of  rum,  a  small  cask  of  water, 
a  piece  of  pork,  a  bag  of  biscuit,  and  my  Latin  grammar. 
Go!  and  spite  the  natives,  if  you  can  find  any." 

Deeply  conscious  of  this  bitter  sarcasm,  the  unhappy 
wretch  was  put  into  the  cutter,  and  was  soon  left  far  be- 
hind.    He  made  no  effort  to  row,  but  was  seen  lying  op 


HOLIDAY  ROMANCE.  28 

his  back  with  his  legs  up,  when  last  made  out  by  the  ship's 
telescopes. 

A  stiff  breeze  now  beginning  to  blow,  Capt.  Boldheart 
gave  orders  to  keep  her  S.S.W.,  easing  her  a  little  during 
the  night  by  falling  off  a  point  or  two  W.  by  W.  or  even 
by  W.S.,  if  she  complained  much.  He  then  retired  for 
the  night,  having  in  truth  much  need  of  repose.  In  addi- 
tion to  the  fatigues  he  had  undergone,  this  brave  officer 
had  received  sixteen  wounds  in  the  engagement,  but  had 
not  mentioned  it. 

In  the  morning  a  white  squall  came  on,  and  was  suc- 
ceeded by  other  squalls  of  various  colours.  It  thundered 
and  lightened  heavily  for  six  weeks.  Hurricanes  then  set 
in  for  two  months.  Waterspouts  and  tornadoes  followed. 
The  oldest  sailor  on  board — and  he  was  a  very  old  one — 
had  never  seen  such  weather.  The  Beauty  lost  all  idea 
where  she  was,  and  the  carpenter  reported  six  feet  two  of 
water  in  the  hold.  Everybody  fell  senseless  at  the  pumps 
every  day. 

Provisions  now  ran  very  low.  Our  hero  put  the  crew 
on  short  allowance,  and  put  himself  on  shorter  allowance 
than  any  man  in  the  ship.  But  his  spirit  kept  him  fat. 
In  this  extremity,  the  gratitude  of  Boozey,  the  captain  of 
the  foretop,  whom  our  readers  may  remember,  was  truly 
affecting.  The  loving  though  lowly  William  repeatedly  re- 
quested to  be  killed,  and  preserved  for  the  captain's  table. 

We  now  approach  a  change  of  affairs. 
.  One   day  during   a  gleam  of  sunshine,   and  when  the 
weather  had  moderated,  the  man  at  the  masthead — too 
weak  now  to  touch  his  hat,  besides  its  having  been  blown 
away — called  out, — 

"  Savages ! " 

All  was  now  expectation. 

Presently  fifteen  hundred  canoes,  each  paddled  by 
twenty  savages,  were  seen  advancing  in  excellent  order. 
They  were  of  a  light-green  colour  (the  savages  were),  and 
sang  with  great  energy,  the  following  strain : — 

Choo  a  choo  a  choo  tooth. 

Muntch,  muntch.     Nycey! 
Choo  a  choo  a  choo  tooth. 

Muntch,  muntch.     Nyce! 

As  the  shades  of  night  were  by  this  time  closing  in,  these 
expressions  were  supposed  to  embody  this  simple  people's 


24  HOLIDAY  ROMANCE. 

views  of  the  evening  hymn.  But  it  too  soon  appeared  that 
the  song  was  a  translation  of  "  For  what  we  are  going  to 
receive,"  etc. 

The  chief,  imposingly  decorated  with  feathers  of  lively 
colours,  and  having  the  majestic  appearance  of  a  fighting 
parrot,  no  sooner  understood  (he  understood  English  per- 
fectly) that  the  ship  was  The  Beauty,  Capt.  Boldheart, 
than  he  fell  upon  his  face  on  the  deck,  and  could  not  be  per- 
suaded to  rise  until  the  captain  had  lifted  him  up,  and  told 
him  he  wouldn't  hurt  him.  All  the  rest  of  the  savages  also 
fell  on  their  faces  with  marks  of  terror,  and  had  also  to  be 
lifted  up  one  by  one.  Thus  the  fame  of  the  great  Bold- 
heart  had  gone  before  him,  even  among  these  children  of 
Nature. 

Turtles  and  oysters  were  now  produced  in  astonishing 
numbers;  and  on  these  and  yams  the  people  made  a  hearty 
meal.  After  dinner  the  chief  told  Capt.  Boldheart  that 
there  was  better  feeding  up  at  the  village,  and  that  he 
would  be  glad  to  take  him  and  his  officers  there.  Appre- 
hensive of  treachery,  Boldheart  ordered  his  boat's  crew  to 
attend  him  completely  armed.  And  well  were  it  for  other 
commanders  if  their  precaution — but  let  us  not  anticipate. 

When  the  canoes  arrived  at  the  beach,  the  darkness  of 
the  night  was  illumined  by  the  light  of  an  immense  fire. 
Ordering  his  boat's  crew  (with  the  intrepid  though  illiterate 
William  at  their  head)  to  keep  close  and  be  upon  their 
guard,  Boldheart  bravely  went  on,  arm  in  arm  with  the 
chief. 

But  how  to  depict  the  captain's  surprise  when  he  found 
a  ring  of  savages  singing  in  chorus  that  translation  of  "  For 
what  we  are  going  to  receive,"  etc.,  which,  has  been  given 
above,  and  dancing  hand  in  hand  round  the  Latin  gram- 
mar master,  in  a  hamper  with  his  head  shaved,  while  two 
savages  floured  him,  before  putting  him  to  the  fire  to  be 
cooked ! 

Boldheart  now  took  counsel  with  his  officers  on  the  course 
to  be  adopted.  In  the  mean  time,  the  miserable  captive 
never  ceased  begging  pardon  and  imploring  to  be  delivered. 
On  the  generous  Boldheart's  proposal,  it  was  at  length  re- 
solved that  he  should  not  be  cooked,  but  should  be  allowed 
to  remain  raw,  on  two  conditions,  namely : — 

1.  That  he  should  never,  under  any  circumstances,  pre- 
sume to  teach  any  boy  anything  any  more. 


HOLIDAY  ROMANCE.  26 

2.  That,  if  taken  back  to  England,  he  should  pass  his 
life  in  travelling  to  find  out  boys  who  wanted  their  exer- 
cises done,  and  should  do  their  exercises  for  those  boys  for 
nothing,  and  never  say  a  word  about  it. 

Drawing  the  sword  from  its  sheath,  Boldheart  swore  him 
to  these  conditions  on  its  shining  blade.  The  prisoner 
wept  bitterly,  and  appeared  acutely  to  feel  the  errors  of  his 
past  career. 

The  captain  then  ordered  his  boat's  crew  to  make  ready 
for  a  volley,  and  after  firing  to  reload  quickly.  "  And  ex- 
pect a  score  or  two  on  ye  to  go  head  over  heels,"  murmured 
William  Boozey;  "for  I'm  a-looking  at  ye."  With  those 
words,  the  derisive  though  deadly  William  took  a  good  aim. 

"Fire!" 

The  ringing  voice  of  Boldheart  was  lost  in  the  report  of 
the  guns  and  the  screeching  of  the  savages.  Volley  after 
volley  awakened  the  numerous  echoes.  Hundreds  of  sav- 
ages were  killed,  hundreds  wounded,  and  thousands  ran 
howling  into  the  woods.  The  Latin-grammar  master  had 
a  spare  night-cap  lent  him,  and  a  long-tailed  coat,  which 
he  wore  hind  side  before.  He  presented  a  ludicrous  though 
pitiable  appearance,  and  serve  him  right. 

We  now  find  Capt.  Boldheart,  with  this  rescued  wretch 
on  board,  standing  off  for  other  islands.  At  one  of  these, 
not  a  cannibal  island,  but  a  pork  and  vegetable  one,  he 
married  (only  in  fun  on  his  part)  the  king's  daughter. 
Here  he  rested  some  time,  receiving  from  the  natives  great 
quantities  of  precious  stones,  gold  dust,  elephants'  teeth, 
and  sandal- wood,  and  getting  very  rich.  This,  too,  though 
he  almost  every  day  made  presents  of  enormous  value  to 
his  men. 

The  ship  being  at  length  as  full  as  she  could  hold  of  all 
sorts  of  valuable  things,  Boldheart  gave  orders  to  weigh 
the  anchor,  and  turn  The  Beauty's  head  towards  England. 
These  orders  were  obeyed  with  three  cheers;  and  ere  the 
sun  went  down  full  many  a  hornpipe  had  been  danced  on 
deck  by  the  uncouth  though  agile  William. 

We  next  find  Capt.  Boldheart  about  three  leagues  off 
Maderia,  surveying  through  his  spy-glass  a  stranger  of 
auspicious  appearance  making  sail  towards  him.  On  his 
firing  a  gun  ahead  of  her  to  bring  her  to,  she  ran  up  a  flag, 
which  he  instantly  recognized  as  the  flag  from  the  mast  in 
the  back-garden  at  home. 


28  HOLIDAY  ROMANCE. 

Inferring  from  this,  that  his  father  had  put  to  sea  lo 
seek  his  long-lost  son,  the  captain  sent  his  own  boat  on 
board  the  stranger  to  inquire  if  this  was  so,  and,  if  so, 
whether  his  father's  intentions  were  strictly  honourable. 
The  boat  came  back  with  a  present  of  greens  and  fresh 
meat,  and  reported  that  the  stranger  was  The  Family,  of 
twelve  hundred  tons,  and  had  not  only  the  captain's  father 
on  board,  but  also  his  mother,  with  the  majority  of  his 
aunts  and  uncles,  and  all  his  cousins.  It  was  further  re- 
ported to  Boldheart  that  the  whole  of  these  relations  had 
expressed  themselves  in  a  becoming  manner,  and  were 
anxious  to  embrace  him  and  thank  him  for  the  glorious 
credit  he  had  done  them.  Boldheart  at  once  invited  them 
to  breakfast  next  morning  on  board  The  Beauty,  and  gave 
orders  for  a  brilliant  ball  that  should  last  all  day. 

It  was  in  the  course  of  the  night  that  the  captain  dis- 
covered the  hopelessness  of  reclaiming  the  Latin-grammar 
master.  That  thankless  traitor  was  found  out,  as  the  two 
ships  lay  near  each  other,  communicating  with  The  Family 
by  signals,  and  offering  to  give  up  Boldheart.  He  was 
hanged  at  the  yard-arm  the  first  thing  in  the  morning,  after 
having  it  impressively  pointed  out  to  him  by  Boldheart 
that  this  was  what  spiters  came  to. 

The  meeting  between  the  captain  and  his  parents  was 
attended  with  tears.  His  uncles  and  aunts  would  have  at- 
tended their  meeting  with  tears  too,  but  he  wasn't  going 
to  stand  that.  His  cousins  were  very  much  astonished  by 
the  size  of  his  ship  and  the  discipline  of  his  men,  and  were 
greatly  overcome  by  the  splendour  of  his  uniform.  He 
kindly  conducted  them  round  the  vessel,  and  pointed  out 
everything  worthy  of  notice.  He  also  fired  his  hundred 
guns,  and  found  it  amusing  to  witness  their  alarm. 

The  entertainment  surpassed  everything  ever  seen  on 
board  ship,  and  lasted  from  ten  in  the  morning  until  seven 
the  next  morning.  Only  one  disagreeable  incident  occurred. 
Capt.  Boldheart  foiuid  himself  obliged  to  put  his  cousin 
Tom  in  irons,  for  being  disrespectful.  On  the  boy's  prom- 
ising amendment,  however,  he  was  humanely  released 
after  a  few  hours'  close  confinement. 

Boldheart  now  took  his  mother  down  into  the  great  cabin, 
and  asked  after  the  young  lady  with  whom,  it  was  well 
known  to  the  world,  he  was  in  love.  His  mother  replied 
that  the  object  of  his  affections  was  then  at  school  at  Mar- 


HOLIDAY  ROMANCE.  27 

gate,  for  the  benefit  of  sea-bathing  (it  was  the  month  of 
September),  but  that  she  feared  the  young  lady's  friends 
were  still  opposed  to  the  union.  Boldheart  at  once  resolved, 
if  necessary,  to  bombard  the  town. 

Taking  the  command  of  his  ship  with  this  intention,  and 
putting  all  but  fighting  men  on  board  The  Family,  with 
orders  to  that  vessel  to  keep  in  company,  Boldheart  soon 
anchored  in  Margate  Roads.  Here  he  went  ashore  well 
armed,  and  attended  by  his  boat's  crew  (at  their  head  the 
faithful  though  ferocious  William),  and  demanded  to  see 
the  mayor,  who  came  out  of  his  office. 

"  Dost  know  the  name  of  yon  ship,  mayor?  "  asked  Bold- 
heart  fiercely. 

"No,"  said  the  mayor,  rubbing  his  eyes,  which  he  could 
scarce  believe,  when  he  saw  the  goodly  vessel  riding  at 
anchor. 

"  She  is  named  The  Beauty,"  said  the  captain. 

"  Hah !  "  exclaimed  the  mayor,  with  a  start.  "  And  you, 
then,  are  Capt.  Boldheart?  " 

"The  same." 

A  pause  ensued.     The  mayor  trembled. 

"Now,  mayor,"  said  the  captain,  "choose!  Help  me 
to  my  bride,  or  be  bombarded." 

The  mayor  begged  for  two  hours'  grace,  in  which  to 
make  inquiries  respecting  the  young  lady.  Boldheart 
accorded  him  but  one;  and  during  that  one  placed  William 
Boozey  sentry  over  him,  with  a  drawn  sword,  and  in- 
structions to  accompany  him  wherever  he  went,  and  to 
run  him  through  the  body  if  he  showed  a  sign  of  playing 
false. 

At  the  end  of  the  hour  the  mayor  reappeared  more  dead 
than  alive,  closely  waited  on  by  Boozey  more  alive  than 
dead. 

"Captain,"  said  the  mayor,  "I  have  ascertained  that  the 
young  lady  is  going  to  bathe.  Even  now  she  waits  her 
turn  for  a  machine.  The  tide  is  low,  though  rising.  I,  in 
one  of  our  town-boats,  shall  not  be  suspected.  When  she 
comes  forth  in  her  bathing-dress  into  the  shallow  water 
from  behind  the  hood  of  the  machine,  my  boat  shall  inter- 
cept her,  and  prevent  her  return.     Do  jon  the  rest." 

"Mayor,"  returned  Capt.  Boldheart,  "thou  hast  saved 
thy  town." 

The  captain  then  signalled  his  boat  to  take  him  off,  and, 


28  HOLIDAY  ROMANCE. 

steering  her  himself,  ordered  her  crew  to  row  towards  the 
bathing-ground,  and  there  to  rest  upon  their  oars.  All 
happened  as  had  been  arranged.  His  lovely  bride  came 
forth,  the  mayor  glided  in  behind  her,  she  became  confused, 
and  had  floated  out  of  her  depth,  when,  with  one  skilful 
touch  of  the  rudder,  and  one  quivering  stroke  from  the 
boat's  crew,  her  adoring  Boldheart  held  her  in  his  strong 
arms.  There  her  shrieks  of  terror  were  changed  to  cries 
of  joy. 

Before  The  Beauty  could  get  under  way,  the  hoisting  of 
all  the  flags  in  the  town  and  harbour,  and  the  ringing  of  all 
the  bells,  announced  to  the  brave  Boldheart  that  he  had 
nothing  to  fear.  He  therefore  determined  to  be  married 
on  the  spot,  and  signalled  for  a  clergyman  and  clerk,  who 
came  off  promptly  in  a  sailing-boat  named  The  Skylark. 
Another  great  entertainment  was  then  given  on  board  The 
Beauty,  in  the  midst  of  which  the  mayor  was  called  out  by 
a  messenger.  He  returned  with  the  news  that  government 
had  sent  down  to  know  whether  Capt.  Boldheart,  in 
acknowledgment  of  the  great  services  he  had  done  his 
country  by  being  a  pirate,  would  consent  to  be  made  a 
lieutenant-colonel.  For  himself  he  would  have  spurned 
the  worthless  boon;  but  his  bride  wished  it,  and  he  con- 
sented. 

Only  one  thing  further  happened  before  the  good  ship 
Family  was  dismissed,  with  rich  presents  to  all  on  board. 
It  is  painful  to  record  (but  such  is  human  nature  in  some 
cousins)  that  Capt.  Boldheart's  unmannerly  Cousin  Tom 
was  actually  tied  up  to  receive  three  dozen  with  a  rope's 
end  "for  cheekiness  and  making  game,"  when  Capt.  Bold- 
heart's  lady  begged  for  him,  and  he  was  spared.  The 
Beauty  then  refitted,  and  the  captain  and  his  bride  departed 
for  the  Indian  Ocean  to  enjoy  themselves  for  evermore. 

PART  IV. 

ROMANCE.    PROM  THE  PEN  OP  MISS  NEriTB 
ASHFORD.' 

There  is  a  country,  which  I  will  show  you  when  I  get 
into  maps,  where  the  children  have  everything  their  own 
way.     It  is  a  most  delightful  country  to  live  in.     The 

'Aged  half -past  ais:. 


HOLIDAY  ROMANCE.  i29 

grown-up  people  are  obliged  to  obey  the  children,  and  are 
never  allowed  to  ^it  up  to  supper,  except  on  their  birth- 
days. The  children  order  them  to  make  jam  and  jelly  and 
marmalade,  and  tarts  and  pies  and  puddings,  and  all  man- 
ner of  pastry.  If  they  say  they  won't,  they  are  put  in  the 
corner  till  they  do.  They  are  sometimes  allowed  to  have 
some;  but  when  they  have  some,  they  generally  have  pow- 
ders given  them  afterwards. 

One  of  the  inhabitants  of  this  country,  a  truly  sweet 
young  creature  of  the  name  of  Mrs.  Orange,  had  the  mis- 
fortune to  be  sadly  plagued  by  her  numerous  family.  Her 
parents  required  a  great  deal  of  looking  after,  and  they 
had  connections  and  companions  who  were  scarcely  ever 
out  of  mischief.  So  Mrs.  Orange  said  to  herself,  "  I  really 
cannot  be  troubled  with  these  torments  any  longer;  I  must 
put  them  all  to  school." 

Mrs.  Orange  took  off  her  pinafore,  and  dressed  herself 
very  nicely,  and  took  up  her  baby,  and  went  out  to  call 
upon  another  lady  of  the  name  of  Mrs.  Lemon,  who  kept  a 
preparatory  establishment.  Mrs.  Orange  stood  upon  the 
scraper  to  pull  at  the  bell,  and  gave  a  ring-ting-ting. 

Mrs.  Lemon's  neat  little  housemaid,  pulling  up  her 
socks  as  she  came  along  the  passage,  answered  the  ring- 
ting-ting. 

" Good-morning,"  said  Mrs.  Orange.  "Fine day.  How 
do  you  do?     Mrs.  Lemon  at  home?  " 

"  Yes,  ma'am." 

"  Will  you  say  Mrs.  Orange  and  baby?  " 

"Yes,  ma'am.     Walk  in." 

Mrs.  Orange's  baby  was  a  very  fine  one,  and  real  wax 
all  over.  Mrs.  Lemon's  baby  was  leather  and  bran.  How- 
ever, when  Mrs.  Lemon  came  into  the  drawing-room  with 
her  baby  in  her  arms,  Mrs.  Orange  said  politely,  "  Good- 
morning.  Fine  day.  How  do  you  do?  And  how  is  little 
Tootleum-boots?  " 

"  Well,  she  is  but  poorly.  Cutting  her  teeth,  ma'am," 
said  Mrs.  Lemon. 

"O,  indeed,  ma'am  I"  said  Mrs.  Orange.  "No  fits,  I 
hope?  " 

"No,  ma'am." 

"  How  many  teeth  has  she,  ma'am?  " 

"Five,  ma'am." 

^'  My   Emilia,  ma'am,  has  eight,"  said  Mrs.   Orange 


30  HOLIDAY  ROMANCE. 

*'  Shall  we  lay  them  on  the  mantel-piece  side  by  side,  while 
we  converse?  " 

"By  all  means,  ma'am,"  said  Mrs.  Leinon.     "Hem!" 

"The  first  question  is,  ma'am,"  said  Mrs.  Orange,  "1 
don't  bore  you?  " 

"Not  in  the  least,  ma'am,"  said  Mrs.  Lemon.  "Far 
from  it,  I  assure  you." 

"  Then  pray  have  you,"  said  Mrs  Orange, — "  have  you 
any  vacancies?  " 

"  Yes,  ma'am.     How  many  might  you  require?  " 

"Why,  the  truth  is,  ma'am,"  said  Mrs.  Orange,  "I  have 
come  to  the  conclusion  that  my  children," — oh,  I  forgot  to 
say  that  they  call  the  grown-up  people  children  in  that 
country! — "that  my  children  are  getting  positively  too 
much  for  me.  Let  me  see.  Two  parents,  two  intimate 
friends  of  theirs,  one  godfather,  two  godmothers,  and  an 
aunt.     Have  you  as  many  as  eight  vacancies?  " 

"I  have  just  eight,  ma'am,"  said  Mrs.  Lemon. 

"  Most  fortunate !     Terms  moderate,  I  think?  " 

"Very  moderate,  ma'am." 

"Diet  good,  I  believe?" 

"Excellent,  ma'am." 

"  Unlimited?  " 

"Unlimited." 

"Most  satisfactory  I  Corporal  punishment  dispensed 
with?  " 

"  Why,  we  do  occasionally  shake,"  said  Mrs.  Lemon, 
"and  we  have  slapped.     But  only  in  extreme  cases." 

"  Could  I,  ma'am,"  said  Mrs.  Orange, — ^^ could  I  see  the 
establishment?  " 

"  With  the  greatest  of  pleasure,  ma'am,"  said  Mrs. 
Lemon. 

Mrs.  Lemon  took  Mrs.  Orange  into  the  schoolroom, 
where  there  were  a  number  of  pupils.  "  Stand  up,  chil- 
dren," said  Mrs.  Lemon;  and  they  all  stood  up. 

Mrs.  Orange  whispered  to  Mrs.  Lemon,  "  There  is  a  pale, 
bald  child,  with  red  whiskers,  in  disgrace.  Might  I  ask 
what  he  has  done?  " 

"Come  here,  White,"  said  Mrs.  Lemon,  "and  tell  this 
lady  what  you  have  been  doing. " 

"  Betting  on  horses,"  said  White,  sulkily. 

"  Are  you  sorry  for  it,  you  naughty  child?  "  said  Mrs 
Lemon. 


HOLIDAY  ROMANCE.  9L 

"No,"  said  White.  "Sorry  to  lose,  but  shouldn't  be 
sorry  to  win." 

"There's  a  vicious  boy  for  you,  ma'am,"  said  Mrs. 
Lemon.  "  Go  along  with  you,  sir.  This  is  Brown,  Mrs. 
Orange.  Oh,  a  sad  case.  Brown's!  Never  knows  when 
he  has  had  enough.     Greedy,     How  is  your  gout,  sir?  " 

"Bad,"  said  Brown. 

"  What  else  can  you  expect?  "  said  Mrs.  Lemon.  "  Your 
stomach  is  the  size  of  two.  Go  and  take  exercise  directly. 
Mrs.  Black,  come  here  to  me.  Now,  here  is  a  child,  Mrs. 
Orange,  ma'am,  who  is  always  at  play.  She  can't  be  kept 
at  home  a  single  day  together;  always  gadding  about  and 
spoiling  her  clothes.  Play,  play,  play,  play,  from  morn- 
ing to  night,  and  to  morning  again.  How  can  she  expect 
to  improve?  " 

"  Don't  expect  to  improve,"  sulked  Mrs.  Black.  "  Don't 
want  to." 

"There  is  a  specimen  of  her  temper,  ma'am,"  said  Mrs. 
Lemon.  "  To  see  her  when  she  is  tearing  about,  neglect- 
ing everything  else,  you  would  suppose  her  to  be  at  least 
good-humoured.  But  bless  you,  ma'am,  she  is  as  pert  and 
flouncing  a  minx  as  ever  you  met  with  in  all  your  days !  " 

"  You  must  have  a  great  deal  of  trouble  with  them, 
ma'am,"  said  Mrs.  Orange. 

"Ah,  I  have,  indeed,  ma'am!"  said  Mrs.  Lemon. 
"  What  with  their  tempers,  what  with  their  quarrels,  what 
with  their  never  knowing  what's  good  for  them,  and  what 
with  their  always  wanting  to  domineer,  deliver  me  from 
these  unreasonable  children !  " 

"Well,  I  wish  you  good-morning,  ma'am,"  said  Mrs. 
Orange. 

"  Well,  I  wish  you  good-morning,  ma'am,"  said  Mrs. 
Lemon. 

So  Mrs.  Orange  took  up  her  baby  and  went  home,  and 
told  the  family  that  plagued  her  so  that  they  were  all  going 
to  be  sent  to  schooL  They  said  they  didn't  want  to  go  to 
school;  but  she  packed  up  their  boxes,  and  packed  them  off. 

"Oh,  dear  me,  dear  me!  Rest  and  be  thankful!"  said 
Mrs.  Orange,  throwing  herself  back  in  her  little  arm-chair. 
"Those  troublesome  troubles  are  got  rid  of,  please  the 
pigs ! " 

Just  then  another  lady,  named  Mrs.  Alicumpaine,  came 
calling  at  the  street  door  with  a  ring-ting- ting. 


'«  HOLTOAY  ROMANCE. 

"My  dear  Mrs.  Alicumpaine,"  said  Mrs.  Orange,  "how 
do  you  do?  Pray  stay  to  dinner.  We  have  but  a  simple 
joint  of  sweet-stuff,  followed  by  a  plain  dish  of  bread  and 
treacle;  but,  if  you  will  take  us  as  you  find  us,  it  will  be 
so  kind ! " 

"Don't  mention  it,"  said  Mrs.  Alicumpaine.  "I  shall 
be  too  glad.  But  what  do  you  think  I  have  come  for, 
ma'am?     Guess,  ma'am." 

"I  really  cannot  guess,  ma'am,"  said  Mrs.  Orange. 

"  Why,  I  am  going  to  have  a  small  juvenile  party  to- 
night," said  Mrs.  Alicumpaine;  "and  if  you  and  Mr. 
Orange  and  baby  would  but 'join  us,  we  should  be  com- 
plete." 

"  More  than  charmed,  I  am  sure !  "  said  Mrs.  Orange. 

"  So  kind  of  you ! "  said  Mrs.  Alicumpaine.  "  But  I 
hope  the  children  won't  bore  you?  " 

"Dear  things!  Kot  at  all,"  said  Mrs.  Orange.  "I  dote 
upon  them." 

Mr.  Orange  here  came  home  from  the  city;  and  he  came, 
too,  with  a  ring-ting-ting. 

"James,  love,"  said  Mrs.  Orange,  "you  look  tired. 
What  has  been  doing  in  the  city  to-day?" 

"Trap,  bat,  and  ball,  my  dear,"  said  Mr.  Orange;  "and 
it  knocks  a  man  up. " 

"  That  dreadfully  anxious  city,  ma'am,"  said  Mrs.  Orange 
*o  Mrs.  Alicumpaine;  "so  wearing,  is  it  not?" 
.  "0,  so  trying!"  said  Mrs.  Alicumpaine.  "John  has 
lately  been  speculating  in  the  peg-top  ring;  and  I  often 
say  to  him  at  night,  'John,  is  the  result  worth  the  wear  and 
tear?  ' " 

Dinner  was  ready  by  this  time :  so  they  sat  down  to  din- 
ner; and  while  Mr.  Orange  carved  the  joint  of  sweet-stuff, 
he  said,  "  It's  a  poor  heart  that  never  rejoices.  Jane,  go 
down  to  the  cellar,  and  fetch  a  bottle  of  the  Upest  ginger- 
beer." 

At  tea-time,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Orange,  and  baby,  and  Mrs. 
Alicumpaine  went  off  to  Mrs.  Alicurapaine's  house.  The 
children  had  not  come  yet;  but  the  ballroom  was  ready  for 
them,  decorated  with  paper  flowers. 

"How  very  sweet!"  said  Mrs,  Orange.  "The  dear 
things !     How  pleased  they  will  be !  " 

"I  don't  care  for  children  myself,"  said  Mr  Orange, 
gaping. 


HOLIDAY  ROMANCE.  33 

"Not  for  girls? "  said  Mrs.  Alicumpaine.  "Gomel  you 
care  for  girls?  " 

Mr.  Orange  shook  his  head,  and  gaped  again.  "  Frivo- 
lous and  vain,  ma'am." 

"My  dear  James,"  cried  Mrs.  Orange,  who  had  been 
peeping  about,  "do  look  here.  Here's  the  supper  for  the 
darlings,  ready  laid  in  the  room  behind  the  folding-doors. 
Here's  their  little  pickled  salmon,  I  do  declare.  And  here's 
their  little  salad,  and  their  little  roast  beef  and  fowls,  and 
their  little  pastry,  and  their  wee,  wee,  wee  champagne ! " 

"  Yes,  I  thought  it  best,  ma'am,"  said  Mrs.  Alicumpaine, 
"that  they  should  have  their  supper  by  themselves.  Our 
table  is  in  the  corner  here,  where  the  gentlemen  can  have 
their  wine-glass  of  negus,  and  their  egg  sandwich,  and 
their  quiet  game  at  beggar-my-neighbour,  and  look  on.  As 
for  us,  ma'am,  we  shall  have  quite  enough  to  do  to  manage 
the  company." 

"0,  indeed,  you  may  say  so!  Quite  enough,  ma'am," 
said  Mrs.  Orange. 

The  company  began  to  come.  The  first  of  them  was  a 
stout  boy,  with  a  vvliiLe  tojj-kiiuL  and  speuLaules.  xne 
housemaid  brought  him  in  and  said,  "Compliments,  and 
at  what  time  was  he  to  be  fetched?  "  Mrs.  Alicumpaine 
said,  "Not  a  moment  later  than  ten.  How  do  you  do, 
sir?  Go  and  sit  down."  Then  a  number  of  other  children 
came;  boys  by  themselves,  and  girls  by  themselves,  and 
boys  and  girls  together.  They  didn't  behave  at  all  well. 
Some  of  them  looked  through  quizzing-glasses  at  others, 
and  said,  "  Who  are  those?  Don't  know  them."  Some  of 
them  looked  through  quizzing-glasses  at  others,  and  said, 
"  How  do? "  Some  of  them  had  cups  of  tea  or  cofFee 
handed  to  them  by  others,  and  said,  "Thanks;  much!" 
A  good  many  boys  stood  about,  and  felt  their  shirt-collars. 
Four  tiresome  fat  boys  would  stand  in  the  doorway,  and 
talk  about  the  newspapers,  till  Mrs.  Alicumpaine  went  to 
them  and  said,  "  My  dears,  I  really  cannot  allow  you  to 
prevent  people  from  coming  in.  I  shall  be  truly  sorry  to 
do  it;  but,  if  you  put  yourselves  in  everybody's  way,  I  , 
must  positively  send  you  home."  One  boy,  with  a  beard 
and  a  large  white  waistcoat,  who  stood  straddling  on  the 
hearthrug  warming  his  coat-tails,  was  sent  home.  "  Highly 
incorrect,  my  dear,"  said  Mrs.  Alicumpaine,  handing  him 
out  of  the  room,  "and  I  cannot  permit  it." 
8 


34  HOLIDAY  ROMANCE. 

There  was  a  children's  band, — harp,  cornet,  and  piano, 
— and  Mrs.  Alicumpaine  and  Mrs.  Orange  bustled  among 
the  children  to  persuade  them  to  take  partners  and  dance. 
But  they  were  so  obstinate !  For  quite  a  long  time  they 
would  not  be  persuaded  to  take  partners  and  dance.  Most 
of  the  boys  said,  "Thanks;  much!  But  not  at  present." 
And  most  of  the  rest  of  the  boys  said,  "Thanks;  much! 
But  never  do." 

"Oh,  these  children  are  very  wearing!"  said  Mrs.  Ali- 
cumpaine to  Mrs.  Orange. 

"Dear  things!  I  dote  upon  them;  but  they  are  wear- 
ing," said  Mrs.  Orange  to  Mrs.  Alicumpaine. 

At  last  they  did  begin  in  a  slow  and  melancholy  way  to 
slide  about  to  the  inusic;  though  even  then  they  wouldn't 
mind  what  they  were  told,  but  would  have  this  partner, 
and  wouldn't  have  that  partner,  and  showed  temper  about 
it.  And  they  wouldn't  smile, — no,  not  on  any  account 
they  wouldn't;  but,  when  the  music  stopped,  went  round 
and  round  the  room  in  dismal  twos,  as  if  everybody  else 
was  dead. 

"H,  if  a  vpry  hnr(]  indeed  to  get  these  vexing  chil- 
dren to  be  entertained!"  said  Mrs.  Alicumpaine  to  Mrs. 
Orange. 

"I  dote  upon  the  darlings;  but  it  is  hard,"  said  Mrs. 
Orange  to  Mrs.  Alicumpaine. 

They  were  trying  children,  that's  the  truth.  First, 
they  wouldn't  sing  when  they  were  asked;  and  then,  when 
everybody  fully  believed  they  wouldn't,  they  would.  "  If 
you  serve  us  so  any  more,  my  love,"  said  Mrs.  Alicumpaine 
to  a  tall  child,  with  a  good  deal  or  white  back,  in  mauve 
silk  trimmed  with  lace,  "it  will  be  my  painful  privilege  to 
offer  you  a  bed,  and  to  send  you  to  it  immediately." 

The  girls  were  so  ridiculously  dressed,  too,  that  they 
were  in  rags  before  supper.  How  could  the  boys  help 
treading  on  their  trains?  And  yet  when  their  trains  were 
trodden  on,  they  often  showed  temper  again,  and  looked 
as  black,  they  did !  However,  they  all  seemed  to  be  pleased 
when  Mrs.  Alicumpaine  said,  "  Supper  is  ready,  children !  ''• 
And  they  went  crowding  and  pushing  in,  as  if  they  had 
had  dry  bread  for  dinner, 

"  How  are  the  children  getting  on?  "  said  Mr.  Orange  to 
Mrs.  Orange,  when  Mrs.  Orange  came  to  look  after  baby. 
Mrs.  Orange  had  left  baby  on  a  shelf  near  Mr.  Orange 


HOLIDAY  ROMAi^CE.  35 

while  he  played  at  beggar-my-neighbour,  and  had  asked  him 
to  keep  his  eyes  upon  her  now  and  then. 

"Most  charming,  my  dear!"  said  Mrs.  Orange.  "So 
droll  to  see  their  little  flirtations  and  jealousies !  Do  come 
and  look ! " 

"  Much  obliged  to  you,  my  dear,"  said  Mr.  Orange;  "  but 
I  don't  care  about  children  myself," 

So  Mrs.  Orange,  having  seen  that  baby  was  safe,  went 
back  without  Mr.  Orange  to  the  room  where  the  children 
were  having  supper. 

"  What  are  they  doing  now?  "  said  Mrs.  Orange  to  Mrs. 
Alicumpaine. 

"  They  are  making  speeches,  and  playing  at  parliament," 
said  Mrs.  Alicumpaine  to  Mrs.  Orange. 

On  hearing  this,  Mrs.  Orange  set  off  once  more  back 
again  to  Mr.  Orange,  and  said,  "James,  dear,  do  come. 
The  children  are  playing  at  parliament." 

"ThanV  you,  my  dear,"  said  Mr.  Orange,  "but  I  don't 
care  about  parliament  myself." 

So  Mrs.  Orange  went  once  again  without  Mr%  Orange  to 
the  room  where  the  children  were  having  supper,  to  see  them 
playing  at  parliament.  And  she  found  some  of  the  boys 
crying,  "  Hear,  hear,  hear ! "  while  other  boys  cried  "  No, 
no !  "  and  others,  "  Question !  "  "  Spoke !  "  and  all  sorts  of 
nonsense  that  ever  you  heard.  Then  one  of  those  tiresome 
fat  boys  who  had  stopped  the  doorway  told  them  he  was 
on  his  legs  (as  if  they  couldn't  see  that  he  wasn't  on  his 
head,  or  on  his  anything  else)  to  explain,  and  that,  with 
the  permission  of  his  honourable  friend,  if  he  would  allow 
him  to  call  him  so  (another  tiresome  boy  bowed),  he  would 
proceed  to  explain.  Then  he  went  on  for  a  long  time  in  a 
sing-song  (whatever  he  meant),  did  this  troublesome  fat 
boy,  about  that  he  held  in  his  hand  a  glass;  and  about  that 
he  had  come  down  to  that  house  that  night  to  discharge 
what  he  would  call  a  public  duty,  and  about  that,  on  the 
present  occasion,  he  would  lay  his  hand  (his  other  hand) 
upon  his  heart,  and  would  tell  honourable  gentlemen  that 
he  was  about  to  open  the  door  to  general  approval.  Then 
he  opened  the  door  by  saying,  "  To  our  hostess !  "  and  every- 
body else  said,  "  To  our  hostess ! "  and  then  there  were 
cheers.  Then  another  tiresome  boy  started  up  in  sing- 
song, and  then  half  a  dozen  noisy  and  nonsensical  boys  at 
once.     But  at  last  Mrs.  Alicumpaine  said,  "  I  cannot  have 


36  HOLIDAY  ROMANCE. 

this  din.  Isow,  children,  you  have  played  at  parliament 
very  nicely;  but  parliament  gets  tiresome  after  a  while, 
and  it's  time  you  left  off,  for  you  will  soon  be  fetched." 

After  another  dance  (with  more  tearing  to  rags  than  be- 
fore supper),  they  began  to  be  fetched;  and  you  will  be 
very  glad  to  be  told  that  the  tiresome  fat  boy  who  had  been 
on  his  legs  was  walked  off  first  without  any  ceremony. 
When  they  were  all  gone,  poor  Mrs.  Alicumpaine  dropped 
upon  a  sofa,  and  said  to  Mrs.  Orange, — 

"  These  children  will  be  the  death  of  me  at  last,  ma'am, 
— they  will  indeed !  " 

"I  quite  adore  them,  ma'am,"  said  Mrs.  Orange;  "but 
they  DO  want  varietj^" 

Mr.  Orange  got  his  hat,  and  Mrs.  Orange  got  her  bonnet 
and  her  baby,  and  they  set  out  to  walk  home.  They  had 
to  pass  Mrs.  Lemon's  preparatory  establishment  on  their 
way. 

"I  wonder,  James  dear,"  said  Mrs.  Orange,  looking  up 
at  the  window,  "  whether  the  precious  children  are  asleep !  " 

"I  don't  care  much  whether  they  are  or  not,  myself," 
said  Mr.  Orange. 

"  James  dear ! " 

"  You  dote  upon  them,  you  know,"  said  Mr.  Orange. 
"That's  another  thing." 

"I  do,"  said  Mrs.  Orange  rapturously.     "0,  I  do!  " 

"I  don't,"  said  Mr.  Orange. 

"But  I  was  thinking,  James  love,"  said  Mrs.  Orange, 
pressing  his  arm,  "  whether  our  dear,  good,  kind  Mrs. 
Lemon  would  like  them  to  stay  the  holidays  with  her." 

"If  she  was  paid  for  it,  I  dare  say  she  would,"  said  Mr. 
Orange. 

"  I  adore  them,  James,"  said  Mrs.  Orange,  "  but  suppose 
we  pay  her  then !  " 

This  was  what  brought  that  country  to  such  perfection, 
and  made  it  such  a  delightful  place  to  live  in.  The  grown- 
up people  (that  would  be  in  other  countries)  soon  left  off 
being  allowed  any  holidays  after  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Orange 
tried  the  experiment;  and  the  children  (that  would  be  in 
other  countries)  kept  them  at  school  as  long  as  ever  they 
lived,  and  made  them  do  whatever  they  were  told. 


GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION 


GEOEGE  SILVEEMAN'S  EXPLANATION 


FIRST  CHAPTER. 


It  happened  in  this  wise — 

But,  sitting  with  my  pen  in  my  hand  looking  at  those 
words  again,  without  descrying  any  hint  in  them  of  the 
words  that  should  follow,  it  comes  into  my  mind  that  they 
have  an  abrupt  appearance.  They  may  serve,  however,  if 
I  let  them  remain,  to  suggest  how  very  difficult  I  find  it  to 
begin  to  explain  my  explanation.  An  uncouth  phrase: 
and  yet  I  do  not  see  my  way  to  a  better. 

SECOND  CHAPTER. 

It  happened  in  this  wise — 

But,  looking  at  those  words,  and  comparing  them  with 
my  former  opening,  I  find  they  are  the  self-same  words 
repeated  This  is  the  more  surprising  to  me,  because  I 
employ  them  in  quite  a  new  connection.  For  indeed  I  de- 
clare that  my  intention  was  to  discard  the  commencement 
I  first  had  in  my  thoughts,  and  to  give  the  preference  to 
another  of  an  entirely  different  nature,  dating  my  explana- 
tion from  an  anterior  period  of  my  life.  I  will  make  a 
third  trial,  without  erasing  this  second  failure,  protesting 
that  it  is  not  my  design  to  conceal  any  of  my  infirmities, 
whether  they  be  of  head  or  heart. 

THIRD  CHAPTER. 

Not  as  yet  directly  aiming  at  how  it  came  to  pass,  I  will 
come  upon  it  by  degrees.  The  natural  manner,  after  all, 
for  God  knows  that  is  how  it  came  upon  me. 


2  GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION. 

My  parents  were  in  a  miserable  condition  of  life,  and 
my  infant  home  was  a  cellar  in  Preston.  I  recollect  the 
sound  of  father's  Lancashire  clogs  on  the  street  pavement 
above,  as  being  different  in  my  young  hearing  from  the 
sound  of  all  other  clogs;  and  I  recollect  that,  when  mother 
came  down  the  cellar-steps,  I  used  tremblingly  to  speculate 
on  her  feet  having  a  good  or  an  ill  tempered  look, — on  her 
knees, — on  her  waist, — until  finally  her  face  came  into 
view,  and  settled  the  question.  From  this  it  will  be  seen 
that  I  was  timid,  and  that  the  cellar -steps  were  steep,  and 
that  the  doorway  was  very  low. 

Mother  had  the  gripe  and  clutch  of  poverty  upon  her 
face,  upon  her  figure,  and  not  least  of  all  upon  her  voice. 
Her  sharp  and  high-pitched  words  were  squeezed  out  of 
her,  as  by  the  compression  of  bony  fingers  on  a  leathern  bag; 
and  she  had  a  way  of  rolling  her  eyes  about  and  about  the 
cellar,  as  she  scolded,  that  was  gaunt  and  hungry.  Father, 
with  his  shoulders  rounded,  would  sit  quiet  on  a  three- 
legged  stool,  looking  at  the  empty  grate,  until  she  would 
pluck  the  stool  from  under  him,  and  bid  him  go  bring  some 
money  home.  Then  he  would  dismally  ascend  the  steps; 
and  I,  holding  my  ragged  shirt  and  trousers  together  with 
a  hand  (my  only  braces),  would  feint  and  dodge  from 
mother's  pursuing  grasp  at  my  hair. 

A  worldly  little  devil  was  mother's  usual  name  for  me. 
Whether  I  cried  for  that  I  was  in  the  dark,  or  for  that  it 
was  cold,  or  for  that  I  was  hungry,  or  whether  I  squeezed 
myself  into  a  warm  corner  when  there  was  a  fire,  or  ate 
voraciously  when  there  was  food,  she  would  still  say,  "  0 
you  worldly  little  devil !  "  And  the  sting  of  it  was,  that  I 
quite  well  knew  myself  to  be  a  worldly  little  devil. 
Worldly  as  to  wanting  to  be  housed  and  warmed,  worldly 
as  to  wanting  to  be  fed,  worldly  as  to  the  greed  with  which 
I  inwardly  compared  how  much  I  got  of  those  good  things 
with  how  much  father  and  mother  got,  when,  rarely,  those 
good  things  were  going. 

Sometimes  they  both  went  away  seeking  work;  and  then 
I  would  be  locked  up  in  the  cellar  for  a  day  or  two  at  a 
time,  I  was  at  my  worldliest  then.  Left  alone,  I  yielded 
myself  up  to  a  worldly  yearning  for  enough  of  anything 
(except  misery),  and  for  the  death  of  mother's  father,  who 
was  a  machine  maker  at  Birmingham,  and  on  whose  decease, 
I  had  heard  mother  say,  she  would  come  into  a  whole  court- 


GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION.  3 

ful  of  houses  "if  she  had  her  rights."  Worldly  little 
devil,  I  would  stand  about,  musingly  fitting  my  cold  bare 
feet  into  cracked  bricks  and  crevices  of  the  damp  cellar- 
floor, — vt^alking  over  my  grandfather's  body,  so  to  speak, 
into  the  courtful  of  houses,  and  selling  them  for  meat  and 
drink,  and  clothes  to  wear. 

At  last  a  change  came  down  into  our  cellar.  The  uni- 
versal change  came  down  even  as  low  as  that, — so  will  it 
mount  to  any  height  on  which  a  human  creature  can  perch, 
— and  brought  other  changes  with  it. 

We  had  a  heap  of  1  don't  know  what  foul  litter  in  the 
darkest  corner,  which  we  called  "the  bed."  For  three 
days  mother  lay  upon  it  without  getting  up,  and  then  be- 
gan at  times  to  laugh.  If  I  had  ever  heard  her  laugh  be- 
fore, it  had  been  so  seldom  that  the  strange  sound  fright- 
ened me.  It  frightened  father  too;  and  we  took  it  by 
turns  to  give  her  water.  Then  she  began  to  move  her  head 
from  side  to  side,  and  sing.  After  that,  she  getting  no 
better,  father  fell  a-laughing  and  a-singingj  and  then  there 
was  only  I  to  give  them  both  water,  and  they  both  died. 


FOUETH   CHAPTER. 

When  I  was  lifted  out  of  the  cellar  by  two  men,  of 

whom  one  came  peeping  down  alone  first,  and  ran  away 
and  brought  the  other,  I  could  hardly  bear  the  light  of  the 
street.  I  was  sitting  in  the  roadway,  blinking  at  it,  and 
at  a  ring  of  people  collected  around  me,  but  not  close  to 
me,  when,  true  to  my  character  of  worldly  little  devil,  I 
broke  silence  by  saying,  "  I  am  hungry  and  thirsty !  " 

"Does  he  know  they  are  dead?  "  asked  one  of  another. 

"  Do  you  know  your  father  and  mother  are  both  dead  of 
fever?  "  asked  a  third  of  me  severely.  "  I  don't  know 
what  it  is  to  be  dead.  I  supposed  it  meant  that,  when  the 
cup  rattled  against  their  teeth,  and  the  water  spilt  over 
them.  I  am  hungry  and  thirsty."  That  was  all  I  had  to 
say  about  it. 

The  ring  of  people  widened  outward  from  the  inner  side 
as  I  looked  around  me;  and  I  smelt  vinegar,  and  what  I 
know  to  be  camphor,  thrown  in  towards  where  I  sat.  Pres- 
ently some  one  put  a  great  vessel  of  smoking  vinegar  on 
the  ground  near  me;  and  then  they  all  looked  at  me  in 


4  GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION. 

silent  horror  as  I  ate  and  drank  of  what  was  brought  for 
me.  I  knew  at  the  time  they  had  a  horror  of  me,  but  I 
couldn't  help  it. 

I  Avas  still  eating  and  drinking,  and  a  murmur  of  discus- 
sion had  begun  to  arise  respecting  what  was  to  be  done 
with  me  next,  when  I  heard  a  cracked  voice  somewhere  in 
the  ring  say,  "  My  name  is  Hawkyard,  Mr.  Verity  Hawk- 
yard,  of  West  Bromwich."  Then  the  ring  split  in  one 
place;  and  a  yellow-faced,  peak-nosed  gentleman,  clad  all 
in  iron-grey  to  his  gaiters,  pressed  forward  with  a  police- 
man and  another  official  of  some  sort.  He  came  forward 
close  to  the  vessel  of  smoking  vinegar;  from  which  he  sprin- 
kled himself  carefully,  and  me  copiously. 

"  He  had  a  grandfather  at  Birmingham,  this  young  boy, 
who  is  just  dead  too,"  said  Mr.  Hawkyard. 

I  turned  my  eyes  upon  the  speaker,  and  said  in  a  raven- 
ing manner,  "Where's  his  houses?  " 

"Hah!  Horrible  worldliness  on  the  edge  of  the  grave," 
said  Mr.  Hawkyard,  casting  more  of  the  vinegar  over  me, 
as  if  to  get  my  devil  out  of  me.  "  I  have  undertaken  a 
slight — a  ve-ry  slight — trust  in  behalf  of  this  boy;  quite  a 
voluntary  trust;  a  matter  of  mere  honour,  if  not  of  mere 
sentiment :  still  I  have  taken  it  upon  myself,  and  it  shall 
be  (0  yes,  it  shall  be!)  discharged." 

The  bystanders  seemed  to  form  an  opinion  of  this  gen- 
tleman much  more  favourable  than  their  opinion  of  me. 

"He  shall  be  taught,"  said  Mr,  Hawkyard  "(0  yes,  he 
shall  be  taught!),  but  what  is  to  be  done  with  him  for  the 
present?  He  may  be  infected.  He  may  disseminate  in- 
fection." The  ring  widened  considerably.  "What  is  to 
be  done  with  him?  " 

He  held  some  talk  with  the  two  officials.  I  could  dis- 
tinguish no  word  save  "  Farmhouse. "  There  was  another 
sound  several  times  repeated,  which  was  wholly  meaning- 
less in  my  ears  then,  but  which  I  knew  afterwards  to  be 
"  Hoghton  Towers." 

"Yes,"  said  Mr.  Hawkyard,  "I  think  that  sounds 
promising;  I  think  that  sounds  hopeful.  And  he  can  be 
put  by  himself  in  a  ward,  for  a  night  or  two,  you  say?  " 

It  seemed  to  be  the  police  officer  who  had  said  so;  for  it 
was  he  who  replied,  Yes!  It  was  he,  too,  who  finally  took 
me  by  the  arm,  and  walked  me  before  him  through  the 
streets,  intd  a  whitewashed  room  in  a  bare  building,  where 


GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION.  6 

I  haid  a  chair  to  sit  in,  a  table  to  sit  at,  an  iron  bedstead 
and  a  good  mattress  to  lie  upon,  and  a  rug  and  blanket  to 
cover  .me.  Where  I  had  enough  to  eat,  too,  and  was  shown 
how  to  clean  the  tin  porringer  in  which  it  was  conveyed  to 
me,  until  it  was  as  good  ,as  a  looking-glass.  Here,  like- 
wise, I  was  put  in  a  bath,  and  had  new  clothes  brought  to 
me;  and  my  old  rags  were  burnt,  and  I  was  camphored 
and  vinegared  and  disinfected  in  a  variety  of  ways. 

When  all  this  was  done, — I  don't  know  in  how  many 
days  or  how  few,  but  it  matters  not, — Mr.  Hawkyard 
stepped  in  at  the  door,  remaining  close  to  it,  and  said,  "  Go 
and  stand  against  the  opposite  wall,  George  Silverman. 
As  far  off  as  you  can.     That'll  do.     How  do  you  feel?  " 

I  told  him  that  I  didn't  feel  cold,  and  didn't  feel  hungry, 
and  didn't  feel  thirsty.  That  was  the  whole  round  of  human 
feelings,  as  far  as  I  knew,  except  the  pain  of  being  beaten. 

"Well,"  said  he,  "you  are  going,  George,  to  a  healthy 
farmhouse  to  be  purified.  Keep  in  the  air  there  as  much 
as  you  can.  Live  an  out-of-door  life  there,  until  you  are 
fetched  away.  You  had  better  not  say  much — in  fact,  you 
had  better  be  very  careful  not  to  say  anything — about  what 
your  parents  died  of,  or  they  might  not  like  to  take  you  in. 
Behave  well,  and  I'll  put  you  to  school;  O  yes!  I'll  put 
you  to  school,  though  I  am  not  obligated  to  do  it.  I  am  a 
servant  of  the  Lord,  George;  and  I  have  been  a  good  ser- 
vant to  him,  I  have,  these  five  and  thirty  years.  The  Lord 
has  had  a  good  servant  in  me,  and  he  knows  it." 

What  I  then  supposed  him  to  mean  by  this,  I  cannot 
imagine.  As  little  do  I  know  when  I  began  to  comprehend 
that  he  was  a  prominent  member  of  some  obscure  denomi- 
nation or  congregation,  every  member  of  which  held  forth 
to  the  rest  when  so  inclined;  and  among  whom  he  was 
called  Brother  Hawkyard.  It  was  enough  for  me  to  know, 
on  that  day  in  the  ward,  that  the  farmer's  cart  was  waiting 
for  me  at  the  street  corner.  I  was  not  slow  to  get  into  it; 
for  it  was  the  first  ride  I  ever  had  in  my  life. 

It  made  me  sleepy,  and  I  slept.  First,  I  stared  at  Pres- 
ton streets  as  long  as  they  lasted;  and,  meanwhile,  I  may 
have  had  some  small  dumb  wondering  within  me  wherea- 
bouts our  cellar  was;  but  I  doubt  it.  Such  a  worldly  little 
devil  was  I,  that  I  took  no  thought  who  would  bury  father 
and  mother,  or  where  they  would  be  buried,  or  when. 
The  question  whether  the  eating  and  drinking  by  day,  and 


«  GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION. 

the  covering  by  night  would  be  as  good  at  the  farmhouse 
as  at  the  ward,  superseded  those  questions. 

The  jolting  of  the  cart  on  a  loose  stony  road  awoke  me; 
and  I  found  that  we  were  mounting  a  steep  hill,  where  the 
road  was  a  rutty  by-road  through  ^  field.  And  so,  by  frag- 
ments of  an  ancient  terrace,  and  by  some  rugged  out-build- 
ings that  had  once  been  fortified,  and  passing  under  a  ruined 
gateway  we  came  to  the  old  farmhouse  in  the  thick  stone 
wall  outside  the  old  quadrangle  of  Hoghton  Towers;  which 
I  looked  at  like  a  stupid  savage,  seeing  no  specialty  in, 
seeing  no  antiquity  in;  assuming  all  farmhouses  to  resem- 
ble it;  assigning  the  decay  I  noticed  to  the  one  potent  cause 
of  all  ruin  that  I  knew, — poverty;  eying  the  pigeons  in 
their  flights,  the  cattle  in  their  stalls,  the  ducks  in  the 
pond,  and  the  fowls  pecking  about  the  yard,  with  a  hungry 
hope  that  plenty  of  them  might  be  killed  for  dinner  while 
I  stayed  there;  wondering  whether  the  scrubbed  dairy  ves- 
sels, drying  in  the  sunlight,  could  be  goodly  porringers  out 
of  which  the  master  ate  his  belly-filling  food,  and  which 
he  polished  when  he  had  done,  according  to  my  ward  expe- 
rience; shrinkingly  doubtful  whether  the  shadows,  passing 
over  that  airy  height-  on  the  bright  spring  day,  were  not 
something  in  the  nature  of  frowns, — sordid,  afraid,  unad- 
miring, — a  small  brute  to  shudder  at. 

To  that  time  I  had  never  had  the  faintest  impression  of 
duty.  I  had  had  no  knowledge  whatever  that  there  was 
anything  lovely  in  this  life.  When  I  had  occasionally 
slunk  up  the  cellar-steps  into  the  street,  and  glared  in  at 
shop-windows,  I  had  done  so  with  no  higher  feelings  than 
we  may  suppose  to  animate  a  mangy  young  dog  or  wolf- 
cub.  It  is  equally  the  fact  that  I  had  never  been  alone,  in 
the  sense  of  holding  unselfish  converse  with  myself.  I  had 
been  solitary  often  enough,  but  nothing  better. 

Such  was  my  condition  when  I  sat  down  to  my  dinner 
that  day,  in  the  kitchen  of  the  old  farmhouse.  Such  was 
my  condition  when  I  lay  on  my  bed  in  the  old  farmhouse 
that  night,  stretched  out  opposite  the  narrow  mullioned 
window,  in  the  cold  light  of  the  moon,  like  a  young  vam- 
pire. 


GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION. 


FIFTH  CHAPTER. 

What  do  I  know  now  of  Hoghton  Towers?  Very  little; 
for  I  have  been  gratefully  unwilling  to  disturb  my  first 
impressions.  A  house,  centuries  old,  on  high  ground  a 
mile  or  so  removed  from  the  road  between  Preston  and 
Blackburn,  where  the  first  James  of  England,  in  his  hurry 
to  make  money  by  making  baronets,  perhaps  made  some  of 
those  remunerative  dignitaries.  A  house,  centuries  old, 
deserted  and  falling  to  pieces,  its  woods  and  gardens  long 
since  grass-land  or  ploughed  up,  ^the  rivers  Ribble  and 
Darwen  glancing  below  it,  and  a  vague  haze  of  smoke, 
against  which  not  even  the  supernatural  prescience  of  the 
first  Stuart  could  foresee  a  counterblast,  hinting  at  steam- 
power,  powerful  in  two  distances. 

What  did  I  know  then  of  Hoghton  Towers?  When  I 
first  peeped  in  at  the  gate  of  the  lifeless  quadrangle,  and 
started  from  the  mouldering  statue  becoming  visible  to  me 
like  its  guardian  ghost;  when  I  stole  round  by  the  back  of 
the  farmhouse,  and  got  in  among  the  ancient  rooms,  many 
of  them  with  their  floors  and  ceilings  falling,  the  beams 
and  rafters  hanging  dangerously  down,  the  plaster  dropping 
as  I  trod,  the  oaken  panels  stripped  away,  the  windows 
half  walled  up,  half  broken;  when  I  discovered  a  gallery 
commanding  the  old  kitchen,  and  looked  down  between 
balustrades  upon  a  massive  old  table  and  benches,  fearing 
to  see  I  know  not  what  dead-alive  creatures  come  in  and 
seat  themselves,  and  look  up  with  I  know  not  what  dread- 
ful eyes,  or  lack  of  eyes,  at  me;  when  all  over  the  house  I 
was  awed  by  gaps  and  chinks  where  the  sky  stared  sorrow- 
fully at  me,  where  the  birds  passed,  and  the  ivy  rustled, 
and  the  stains  of  winter  weather  blotched  the  rotten  floors ; 
when  down  at  the  bottom  of  dark  pits  of  staircase,  into 
which  the  stairs  had  sunk,  green  leaves  trembled,  butter- 
flies fluttered,  and  bees  hummed  in  and  out  through  the 
broken  doorways;  when  encircling  the  whole  ruin  were 
sweet  scents,  and  sights  of  fresh  green  growth,  and  ever- 
renewing  life,  that  I  had  never  dreamed  of, — I  say,  when  I 
passed  into  such  clouded  perception  of  these  things  as  my 
dark  soul  could  compass,  what  did  I  know  then  of  Hoghton 
Towers? 


8  GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPL /SANATION. 

I  have  written  that  the  sky  stared  sorrowfully  at  me. 
Therein  have  I  anticipated  the  answer.  I  knew  that  all 
these  things  looked  sorrowfully  at  me;  that  they  seemed 
to  sigh  or  whisper,  not  without  pity  for  me,  "  Alas !  poor 
worldly  little  devil ! " 

There  were  two  or  three  rats  at  the  bottom  of  one  of  the 
smaller  pits  of  bioken  staircase  when  I  craned  over  and 
looked  in.  They  were  scuffling  for  some  prey  that  was 
there;  and,  when  they  started  and  hid  themselves  close 
together  in  the  dark,  I  thought  of  the  old  life  (it  had  grown 
old  already)  in  the  cellar. 

How  not  to  be  this  worldly  little  devil?  how  not  to  have 
a  repugnance  towards  «iyself  as  I  had  towards  the  rats?  I 
hid  in  a  comer  of  one  of  the  smaller  chambers,  frightened 
at  myself,  and  crying  (it  was  the  first  time  I  had  ever  cried 
for  any  cause  not  purely  physical),  and  I  tried  to  think 
about  it.  One  of  the  farm-ploughs  came  into  my  range  of 
view  just  then;  and  it  seemed  to  help  me  as  it  went  on 
with  its  two  horses  up  and  down  the  field  so  peacefully  and 
quietly. 

There  was  a  girl  of  about  my  own  age  in  the  farmhouse 
family,  and  she  sat  opposite  to  me  at  the  narrow  table  at 
meal-times.  It  had  come  into  my  mind,  at  our  first  dinner, 
that  she  might  take  the  fever  from  me.  The  thought  had 
not  disquieted  me  then.  I  had  only  speculated  how  she 
would  look  under  the  altered  circumstances,  and  whether 
she  would  die.  But  it  came  into  my  mind  now,  that  I 
might  try  to  prevent  her  taking  the  fever  by  keeping  away 
from  her.  I  knew  I  should  have  bvit  scrambling  board  if 
I  did;  so  much  the  less  worldly  and  less  devilish  the  deed 
would  be,  I  thought. 

From  that  hour,  I  withdrew  myself  at  early  morning  into 
secret  corners  of  the  ruined  house,  and  remained  hidden 
there  until  she  went  to  bed.  At  first,  when  meals  were 
ready,  I  used  to  hear  them  calling  me;  and  then  my  reso- 
lution weakened.  But  I  strengthened  it  again,  by  going 
farther  off  into  the  ruin,  and  getting  out  of  hearing.  I 
often  watched  for  her  at  the  dim  windows;  and,  when  I 
saw  that  she  was  fresh  and  rosy,  felt  much  happier. 

Out  of  this  holding  her  in  my  thoughts,  to  the  humanis- 
ing of  myself,  I  suppose  some  childish  love  arose  within 
me.  I  felt,  in  some  sort,  dignified  by  the  pride  of  protect- 
ing her, — by  the  pride  of  making  the  sacrifice  for  her.     As 


GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION.  » 

my  heart  swelled  with  that  new  feeling,  it  insensibly  soft- 
ened about  mother  and  father.  It  seemed  to  have  been 
frozen  before,  and  now  to  be  thawed.  The  old  ruin  and 
all  the  lovely  things  that  haunted  it  were  not  sorrowful 
for  me  only,  but  sorrowful  for  mother  and  father  as  well. 
Therefore  did  I  cry  again,  and  often  too. 

The  farmhouse  family  conceived  me  to  be  of  a  morose 
temper,  and  were  very  short  with  me;  though  they  never 
stinted  me  in  such  broken  fare  as  was  to  be  got  out  of  regu- 
lar hours.  One  night  when  I  lifted  the  kitchen  latch  at 
my  usual  time,  Sylvia  (that  was  her  pretty  name)  had  but 
just  gone  out  of  the  room.  Seeing  her  ascending  the  oppo- 
site stairs,  I  stood  still  at  the  door.  She  had  heard  the 
clink  of  the  latch,  and  looked  round. 

"George,"  she  called  to  me  in  a  pleased  voice,  "to- 
morrow is  my  birthday;  and  we  are  to  have  a  tiddler, 
and  there's  a  party  of  boys  and  girls  coming  in  a  cart, 
and  we  shall  dance.  I  invite  you.  Be  sociable  for  once, 
George." 

"I  am  very  sorry,  miss,"  I  answered;  "but  I — but,  no; 
I  can't  come." 

"  You  are  a  disagreeable,  ill-humoured  lad,"  she  returned 
disdainfully;  "  and  I  ought  not  to  have  asked  you.  I  shall 
never  speak  to  you  again." 

As  I  stood  with  my  eyes  fixed  on  the  fire,  after  she  was 
gone,  I  felt  that  the  farmer  bent  his  brows  upon  me. 

"Eh,  lad,"  said  he;  "Sylvy's  right.  You're  as  moody 
and  broody  a  lad  as  never  I  set  eyes  on  yet." 

I  tried  to  assure  him  that  I  meant  no  harm;  but  he  only 
said  coldly,  "  Maybe  not,  maybe  not !  There !  get  thy  sup- 
per, get  thy  supper ;  and  then  thou  canst  sulk  to  thy  heart's 
content  again." 

Ah !  if  they  could  have  seen  me  next  day,  in  the  ruin, 
watching  for  the  arrival  of  the  cart  full  of  merry  young 
guests;  if  they  could  have  seen  me  at  night,  gliding  out 
from  behind  the  ghostly  statue,  listening  to  the  music  and 
the  fall  of  dancing  feet,  and  watching  the  lighted  farm- 
house windows  from  the  quadrangle  when  all  the  ruin  was 
dark;  if  they  could  have  read  my  heart,  as  I  crept  up  to 
bed  by  the  back  way,  comforting  myself  with  the  reflection, 
"They  will  take  no  hurt  from  me," — they  would  not  have 
thought  mine  a  morose  or  an  unsocial  nature. 

It  was  in  these  ways  that  I  began  to  form  a  shy  disposi- 


10  GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION. 

tion;  to  be  of  a  timidly  silent  character  under  misconstruc- 
tion; to  have  an  inexpressible,  perhaps  a  morbid,  dread  of 
ever  being  sordid  or  worldly.  It  was  in  these  ways  that 
my  nature  came  to  shape  itself  to  such  a  mould,  even  be- 
fore it  was  affected  by  the  influences  of  the  studious  and 
retired  life  of  a  poor  scholar. 


SIXTH  CHAPTEE. 

Brother  Hawkyard  (as  he  insisted  on  my  calling  him) 
put  me  to  school,  and  told  me  to  work  my  way.  "  You  are 
all  right,  George,"  he  said.  "  I  have  been  the  best  servant 
the  Lord  has  had  in  his  service  for  this  five  and  thirtj'  year 
(0,  I  have!);  and  he  knows  the  value  of  such  a  servant  as 
1  have  been  to  him  (0,  yes,  he  does);  and  he'll  prosper 
your  schooling  as  a  part  of  my  reward.  That's  what  he'll 
do,  George.     He'll  do  it  for  me." 

From  the  first  I  could  not  like  this  familiar  knowledge 
of  the  ways  of  the  sublime,  inscrutable  Almighty,  on 
Brother  Hawkyard's  part.  As  I  grew  a  little  wiser,  and 
still  a  little  wiser,  I  liked  it  less  and  less.  His  manner, 
too,  of  confirming  himself  in  a  parenthesis, — as  if,  know- 
ing himself,  he  doubted  his  own  word, — I  found  distaste- 
ful. I  cannot  tell  how  much  these  dislikes  cost  me;  for  I 
had  a  dread  that  they  were  worldly. 

As  time  went  on,  I  became  a  Foundation-boy  on  a  good 
foundation,  and  I  cost  Brother  Hawkyard  nothing.  When 
I  had  worked  my  way  so  far,  I  worked  yet  harder,  in  the 
hope  of  ultimately  getting  a  presentation  to  college  and  a 
fellowship.  My  health  has  never  been  strong  (some  vapour 
from  the  Preston  cellar  cleaves  to  me,  I  think);  and  what 
with  much  work  and  some  weakness,  I  came  again  to  be 
regarded — that  is,  by  my  fellow-students — as  unsocial. 

All  through  my  time  as  a  foundation-boy,  I  was  within 
a  few  miles  of  Brother  Hawkyard's  congregation;  and 
whenever  I  was  what  we  called  a  leave-boy  on  a  Sunday, 
I  went  over  there  at  his  desire.  Before  the  knowledge  be- 
came forced  upon  me  that  outside  their  place  of  meeting 
these  brothers  and  sisters  were  no  better  than  the  rest  of 
the  human  family,  but  on  the  whole  were,  to  put  the  case 
mildly,  as  bad  as  most,  in  respect  of  giving  short  weight 
in  their  shops,  and  not  speaking  the  truth, — I  say,  before 


GEOKGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION.  11 

this  knowledge  became  forced  upon  me,  their  prolix  ad- 
dresses, their  inordinate  conceit,  their  daring  ignorance, 
their  investment  of  the  Supreme  Ruler  of  heaven  and  earth 
with  their  own  miserable  meannesses  and  littlenesses, 
greatly  shocked  me.  Still,  as  their  term  for  the  frame  of 
mind  that  could  not  perceive  them  to  be  in  an  exalted  state 
of  grace  was  the  "  worldly  "  state,  I  did  for  a  time  suffer 
tortures  under  my  inquiries  of  myself  whether  that  young 
worldly  devilish  spirit  of  mine  could  secretly  be  lingering 
at  the  bottom  of  my  non-appreciation. 

Brother  Hawkyard  was  the  popular  expounder  in  this 
assembly,  and  generally  occupied  the  platform  (there  was 
a  little  platform  with  a  table  ou  it.  In  lieu  of  a  pulpit)  first, 
on  a  Sunday  afternoon.  He  was  by  trade  a  drysalter. 
Brother  Gimblet,  an  elderly  man  with  a  crabbed  face,  a 
large  dog's-eared  shirt-collar,  and  a  spotted  blue  necker- 
chief reaching  up  behind  to  the  crown  of  his  head,  was  also 
a  drysalter  and  an  expounder.  Brother  Gimblet  professed 
the  greatest  admiration  for  Brother  Hawkyard,  but  (I  had 
thought  more  than  once)  bore  him  a  jealous  grudge. 

Let  whosoever  may  peruse  these  lines  kindly  take  the 
pains  here  to  read  twice  my  solemn  pledge,  that  what  I 
write  of  the  language  and  customs  of  the  congregation  in 
question  I  write  scrupulously,  literally,  exactly,  from  the 
life  and  the  truth. 

On  the  first  Sunday  after  I  had  won  what  I  had  so  long 
tried  for,  and  when  it  was  certain  that  I  was  going  up  to 
college.  Brother  Hawkyard  concluded  a  long  exhortation 
thus : — 

"  Well,  my  friends  and  fellow-sinners,  now  I  told  you 
when  I  began,  that  I  didn't  know  a  word  of  what  I  was 
going  to  say  to  you  (and  no,  I  did  not!),  but  that  it  was  all 
one  to  me,  because  I  knew  the  Lord  would  put  into  my 
mouth  the  words  I  wanted. 

("That's  it!  "  from  Brother  Gimblet.) 

"And  he  did  put  into  my  mouth  the  words  I  wanted-** 

("  So  he  did  ! "  from  Brother  Gimblet.) 

"And  why?" 

("  Ah,  let's  have  that!  "  from  Brother  Gimblet.) 

"  Because  I  have  been  his  faithful  servant  for  five  and 
thirty  years,  and  because  he  knows  it.  For  five  and  thirty 
years !  And  he  knows  it,  mind  you !  I  got  those  words 
that  I  wanted  ou  account  of  my  wages.     I  got  'em  from 


12  GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION. 

the  Lord,  my  fellow-sinners.  Down!  I  said,  'Here's  a 
heap  of  wages  due;  let  us  have  something  down,  on  ac- 
count.' And  I  got  it  down,  and  I  paid  it  over  to  you;  and 
you  won't  wrap  it  up  in  a  napkin,  nor  yet  in  a  towel,  nor 
yet  pocketankercher,  but  you'll  put  it  out  at  good  interest. 
Very  well.  Now,  my  brothers  and  sisters  and  fellow-sin- 
ners, I  am  going  to  conclude  witl.  a  question,  and  I'll  make 
it  so  plain  (with  the  help  of  the  Lord,  after  five  and  thirty 
years,  I  should  rather  hope!)  as  that  the  Devil  shall  not 
be  able  to  confuse  it  in  your  heads, — which  he  would  be 
overjoyed  to  do." 

("  Just  his  way.  Crafty  old  blackguard  I "  from  Brother 
Gimblet.) 

"And  the  question  is  this.  Are  the  angels  learned? " 

("Not  they.  Not  a  bit  on  it!"  from  Brother  Gimblet, 
with  the  greatest  confidence.) 

"Not  they.  And  where's  the  proof?  sent  ready-made 
by  the  hand  of  the  Lord.  Why,  there's  one  among  us  here 
now,  that  has  got  all  the  learning  that  can  be  crammed  into 
him.  /  got  him  all  the  learning  that  could  be  crammed 
into  him.  His  grandfather"  (this  I  had  never  heard  be- 
fore) "  was  a  brother  of  ours.  He  was  Brother  Parksop. 
That's  what  he  was.  Parksop;  Brother  Parksop.  His 
worldly  name  was  Parksop,  and  he  was  a  brother  of  this 
brotherhood.     Then  wasn't  he  Brother  Parksop?  " 

("  Must  be.  Couldn't  help  hisself  I "  from  Brother  Gim- 
blet.) 

"  Well,  he  left  that  one  now  here  present  among  us  to 
the  care  of  a  brother-sinner  of  his  (and  that  brother-sinner, 
mind  you,  was  a  sinner  of  a  bigger  size  in  his  time  than 
any  of  you;  praise  the  Lord!),  Brother  Hawkyard.  Me, 
/  got  him  without  fee  or  reward, — without  a  morsel  of 
myrrh,  or  frankincense,  nor  yet  amber,  letting  alone  the 
honeycomb, — all  the  learning  that  could  be  crammed  into 
him.  Has  it  brought  him  into  our  temple,  in  the  spirit? 
No.  Have  we  had  any  ignorant  brothers  and  sisters  that 
didn't  know  round  O  from  crooked  S,  come  in  among  us 
meanwhile?  Many.  Then  the  angels  are  not  learned; 
then  they  don't  so  much  as  know  their  alphabet.  And 
now,  my  friends  and  fellow-sinners,  having  brought  it  to 
that,  perhaps  some  brother  present— perhaps  you.  Brother 
Gimblet — will  pray  a  bit  for  us?  " 

Brother  Gimblet  xindertook  the  sacred  function,  after 


GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION.  13 

having  drawn  his  sleeve  across  his  rnouth,  and  muttered, 
"  Well,  I  dou't  know  as  I  see  ray  way  to  hitting  any  of 
you  quite  in  the  right  place  neither. "  He  said  this  with  a 
dark  smile  and  then  began  to  bellow.  What  we  were  spe- 
cially to  be  preserved  from,  according  to  his  solicitations, 
was,  despoilment  of  the  orphan,  suppression  of  testamen- 
tary intentions  on  the  part  of  a  father  or  (say)  grand- 
father, appropriation  of  the  orphan's  house-property,  feign- 
ing to  give  in  charity  to  the  wronged  one  from  whom  we 
withheld  his  due;  and  that  class  of  sins.  He  ended  with 
the  petition,  "  Give  us  peace !  "  which,  speaking  for  myself, 
was  very  much  needed  after  twenty  minutes  of  his  bellow- 
ing. 

Even  though  I  had  not  seen  him  when  he  rose  from  his 
knees,  steaming  with  perspiration,  glance  at  Brother  Hawk- 
yard,  and  even  though  I  had  not  heard  Brother  Hawkyard's 
tone  of  congratulating  him  on  the  vigour  with  which  he  had 
roared,  I  should  have  detected  a  malicious  application  in 
this  prayer.  Unformed  suspicions  to  a  similar  effect  had 
sometimes  passed  through  my  mind  in  my  earlier  school- 
days, and  had  always  caused  me  great  distress;  for  they 
were  worldly  in  their  nature,  and  wide,  very  wide,  of  the 
spirit  that  had  drawn  me  from  Sylvia.  They  were  sordid 
suspicions,  without  a  shadow  of  proof.  They  were  worthy 
to  have  originated  in  the  unwholesome  cellar.  They  were 
not  only  without  proof,  but  against  proof;  for  was  I  not 
myself  a  living  proof  of  what  Brother  Hawkyard  had  done? 
and  without  him,  how  should  I  ever  have  seen  the  sky  looli 
sorrowfully  down  upon  that  wretched  boy  at  Hoghton 
Towers? 

Although  the  dread  of  a  relapse  into  a  stage  of  savage 
selfishness  was  less  strong  upon  me  as  I  approached  man 
hood,  and  could  act  in  an  increased  degree  for  myself,  yet 
I  was  always  on  my  guard  against  any  tendency  to  such 
relapse.  After  getting  these  suspicions  under  my  feet,  I 
had  been  troubled  by  not  being  able  to  like  Brother  Hawk- 
yard's  manner,  or  his  professed  religion.  So  it  came  about, 
that,  as  I  walked  back  that  Sunday  evening,  I  thought  it 
would  be  an  act  of  reparation  for  any  such  injury  my  strug- 
gling thoughts  had  unwillingly  done  him,  if  I  wrote,  and 
placed  in  his  hands,  before  going  to  college,  a  full  acknowl- 
edgment of  his  goodness  to  me,  and  an  ample  ti'ibute  of 
thanks.     It  might  serve  as  an  implied  vindication  of  him 


14  GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION. 

against  any  dark  scandal  from  a  rival  brother  and  expounder, 
or  from  any  other  quarter. 

Accordingly,  I  wrote  the  document  with  much  care.  I 
may  add  with  much  feeling  too;  for  it  affected  me  as  I 
went  on.  Having  no  set  studies  to  pursue,  in  the  brief  in- 
terval between  leaving  the  foundation  and  going  to  Cam- 
bridge, I  determined  to  walk  out  to  his  place  of  business, 
and  give  it  into  his  own  hands. 

It  was  a  winter  afternoon,  when  I  tapped  at  the  door  of 
his  little  counting-house,  which  was  at  the  farther  end  of 
his  long,  low  shop.  As  I  did  so  (having  entered  by  the 
back  yard,  where  casks  and  boxes  were  taken  in,  and  where 
there  was  the  inscription,  "  Private  way  to  the  counting- 
house  " ) ,  a  shopman  called  to  me  from  the  counter  that  he 
was  engaged. 

"Brother  Gimblet"  (said  the  shopman,  who  is  one  of 
the  brotherhood)  "is  with  him." 

I  thought  this  all  the  better  for  my  purpose,  and  made 
bold  to  tap  again.  They  were  talking  in  a  low  tone,  and 
money  was  passing;  for  I  heard  it  being  counted  out. 

"  Who  is  it?  "  asked  Brother  Hawkyard  sharply. 

"  George  Silverman,"  I  answered,  holding  the  door  open. 
"  May  I  come  in?  " 

Both  brothers  seemed  so  astounded  to  see  me  that  I  felt 
shyer  than  usual.  But  they  looked  quite  cadaverous  in  the 
early  gaslight,  and  perhaps  that  accidental  circumstance 
exaggerated  the  expression  of  their  faces. 

"What  is  the  matter? "  asked  Brother  Hawkyard. 

"  Ay !     What  is  the  matter?  "  asked  Brother  Gimblet. 

"Nothing  at  all,"  I  said,  diffidently  producing  my  docu- 
ment :     "  I  am  only  the  bearer  of  a  letter  from  myself. " 

"From  yourself,  George?"  cried  Brother  Hawkyard. 

"And  to  you,"  said  I. 

"And  to  me,  George?  " 

He  turned  paler,  and  opened  it  hurriedly;  but  looking 
over  it,  and  seeing  generally  what  it  was,  became  less  hur- 
ried, recovered  his  colour,  and  said,  "  Praise  the  Lord !  " 

"That's  it!"  cried  Brother  Gimblet.  "Well  put! 
Amen ! " 

Brother  Hawkyard  then  said,  in  a  livelier  strain,  "  You 
must  know,  George,  that  Brother  Gimblet  and  I  are  going 
to  make  our  two  businesses  one.  We  are  going  into  part- 
nership.    We  are  settling  it  now.     Brother  Gimblet  is  to 


GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION.  16 

take  one  clear  half  of  the  profits  (0,  yes!  he  shall  have  it; 
he  shall  have  it  to  the  last  farthing)." 

"D.  v.!"  said  Brother  Gimblet,  with  his  right  fist 
firmly  clinched  on  his  right  leg. 

"There  is  no  objection,"  pursued  Brother  Hawkyard, 
"to  my  reading  this  aloud,  George?" 

As  it  was  what  I  expressly  desired  should  be  done,  after 
yesterday's  prayer,  I  more  than  readily  begged  him  to  read 
it  aloud.  He  did  so;  and  Brother  Gimblet  listened  with 
a  crabbed  smile. 

"It  was  in  a  good  hour  that  I  came  here,"  he  said, 
wrinkling  up  his  eyes.  "  It  was  in  a  good  hour,  likewise, 
that  I  was  moved  yesterday  to  depict  for  the  terror  of  evil- 
doers a  character  the  direct  opposite  of  Brother  Hawk- 
yard's.  But  it  was  the  Lord  that  done  it:  I  felt  him  at 
it  while  I  was  perspiring." 

After  that  it  was  proposed  by  both  of  them  that  I  should 
attend  the  congregation  once  more  before  my  final  depart- 
ure. What  my  shy  reserve  would  undergo,  from  being 
expressly  preached  at  and  prayed  at,  I  knew  beforehand. 
But  I  reflected  that  it  would  be  for  the  last  time,  and  that 
it  might  add  to  the  weight  of  my  letter.  It  was  well 
known  to  the  brothers  and  sisters  that  there  was  no  place 
taken  for  me  in  their  paradise;  and  if  I  showed  this  last 
token  of  deference  to  Brother  Hawkyard,  notoriously  in 
despite  of  my  own  sinful  inclinations,  it  might  go  some  little 
way  in  aid  of  my  statement  that  he  had  been  good  to  me,  and 
that  I  was  grateful  to  him.  Merely  stipulating,  therefore, 
that  no  express  endeavour  should  be  made  for  my  conver- 
sion,— which  would  involve  the  rolling  of  several  brothers 
and  sisters  on  the  floor,  declaring  that  they  felt  all  their 
sins  in  a  heap  on  their  left  side,  weighing  so  many  pounds 
avoirdupois,  as  I  knew  from  what  I  had  seen  of  those  re- 
pulsive mysteries, — I  promised. 

Since  the  reading  of  my  letter,  Brother  Gimblet  had  been 
at  intervals  wiping  one  eye  with  an  end  of  his  spotted  blue 
neckerchief,  and  grinning  to  himself.  It  was,  however,  a 
habit  that  brother  had,  to  grin  in  an  ugly  manner  even 
when  expounding.  I  call  to  mind  a  delighted  snarl  with 
which  he  used  to  detail  from  the  platform  the  torments 
reserved  for  the  wicked  (meaning  all  human  creation  except 
the  brotherhood),  as  being  remarkably  hideous. 

I  left  the  two  to  settle  their  articles  of  partnership,  and 


16  GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION. 

count  money;  and  I  never  saw  them  again  but  on  the  fol- 
lowing Sunday.  Brother  Hawkyard  died  within  two  or 
three  years,  leaving  all  he  possessed  to  Brother  Gimblet, 
in  virtue  of  a  will  dated  (as  I  have  been  told)  that  very 
day. 

Now  1  was  so  far  at  rest  with  myself,  when  Sunday 
came,  knowing  that  I  had  conquered  my  own  mistrust,  and 
righted  Brother  Hawkyard  in  the  jaundiced  vision  of  a 
rival,  that  I  went,  even  to  that  coarse  chapel,  in  a  less  sen- 
sitive state  than  usual.  How  could  I  foresee  that  the  deli- 
cate, perhaps  the  diseased,  corner  of  my  mind,  where  I 
winced  and  shrunk  when  it  was  touched,  or  was  even  ap- 
proached, would  be  handled  as  the  theme  of  the  whole  pro- 
ceedings? 

On  this  occasion  it  was  assigned  to  Brother  Hawkyard  to 
pray,  and  to  Brother  Gimblet  to  preach.  The  prayer  was 
to  open  the  ceremonies;  the  discourse  was  to  come  next. 
Brothers  Hawkyard  and  Gimblet  were  both  on  the  plat- 
form; Brother  Hawkyard  on  his  knees  at  the  table,  un- 
musically ready  to  pray;  Brother  Gimblet  sitting  against 
the  wall,  grinningly  ready  to  preach. 

"  Let  us  oifer  up  the  sacrifice  of  prayer,  my  brothers  and 
sisters  and  fellow-sinners."  Yes;  but  it  was  I  who  was 
the  sacrifice.  It  was  our  poor,  sinful,  worldly  minded 
brother  here  present  who  was  wrestled  for.  The  now- 
opening  career  of  this  our  una  wakened  brother  might  lead 
to  his  becoming  a  minister  of  what  was  called  "  the  church." 
That  was  what  7/6  looked  to.  The  church.  Not  the  chapel, 
Lord.  The  church.  No  rectors,  no  vicars,  no  archdea- 
cons, no  bishops,  no  archbishops  in  the  chapel,  but,  O 
Lord !  many  such  in  the  church.  Protect  our  sinful  brother 
from  his  love  of  lucre.  Cleanse  from  our  unawakened 
brother's  breast  his  sin  of  worldly  mindedness.  The 
prayer  said  infinitely  more  in  words,  but  nothing  more  to 
any  intelligible  effect. 

Then  Brother  Gimblet  came  forward,  and  took  (as  I 
knew  he  would)  the  text,  "My  kingdom  is  not  of  this 
world."  Ah!  but  whose  was,  my  fellow-sinners?  Whose? 
Why,  our  brother's  here  present  was.  The  only  kingdom 
he  had  an  idea  of  was  of  this  world  ("  That's  it !  "  from  sev- 
eral of  the  congregation).  What  did  the  woman  do  when 
she  lost  the  piece  of  money?  Went  and  looked  for  it. 
What  should  our  brother  do  when  he  lost  hia  way?     ("  Go 


GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION.  17 

and  look  for  it,"  from  a  sister.)  Go  and  look  for  it,  tme. 
But  must  he  look  for  it  in  the  right  direction,  or  in  the 
wrong?  ("In  the  right,"  from  a  brother.)  There  spake 
the  prophets !  He  must  look  for  it  in  the  right  direction, 
or  he  couldn't  find  it.  But  he  had  turned  his  back  upon 
the  right  direction,  and  he  wouldn't  find  it.  Now,  my 
fellow-sinners,  to  show  you  the  difference  betwixt  worldly 
mindedness  and  unworldly  mindedness,  betwixt  kingdoms 
not  of  this  world  and  kingdoms  of  this  world,  here  was  a 
letter  wrote  by  even  our  worldly  minded  brother  unto 
Brother  Hawkyard.  Judge,  from  hearing  of  it  read, 
whether  Brother  Hawkyard  was  the  faithful  steward  that 
the  Lord  had  in  his  mind  only  t'other  day,  when,  in  this 
very  place,  he  drew  you  the  picter  of  the  unfaithful  one; 
for  it  was  hira  that  done  it,  not  me.     Don't  doubt  that! 

Brother  Gimblet  then  groaned  and  bellowed  his  way 
through  my  composition,  and  subsequently  through  an 
hour.  The  service  closed  with  a  hymn,  in  which  the 
brothers  unanimously  roared,  and  the  sisters  unanimously 
shrieked  at  me,  That  I  by  wiles  of  worldly  gain  was 
mocked,  and  they  on  waters  of  sweet  love  were  rocked; 
that  I  with  mammon  struggled  in  the  dark,  while  they 
were  floating  in  a  second  ark. 

I  went  out  from  all  this  with  an  aching  heart  and  a 
weary  spirit :  not  because  I  was  quite  so  weak  as  to  con- 
sider these  narrow  creatures  interpreters  of  the  Divine  Ma- 
jesty and  Wisdom,  but  because  I  was  weak  enough  to  feel 
as  though  it  were  my  hard  fortune  to  be  misrepresented 
and  misunderstood,  when  I  most  tried  to  subdue  any  ris- 
ings of  mere  worldliness  within  me,  and  when  I  most  hoped 
that,  by  dint  of  trying  earnestly,  I  had  succeeded. 


SEVENTH  CHAPTEE. 

My  timidity  and  my  obscurity  occasioned  me  to  live  a 
secluded  life  at  college,  and  to  be  little  known.  No  rela- 
tive ever  came  to  visit  me,  for  I  had  no  relative.  No  inti- 
mate friends  broke  in  upon  my  studies,  for  I  made  no  inti- 
mate friends.  I  supported  myself  on  my  scholarship,  and 
read  much.  My  college  time  was  otherwise  not  so  very 
different  from  my  time  at  Hoghtou  Towers. 

Knowing  myself  to  be  unfit  for  the  noisier  stir  of  social 
2 


18  (JEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION. 

existence,  but  believing  myself  qualified  to  do  my  duty  in 
a  moderate,  though  earnest  way,  if  I  could  obtain  some 
small  preferment  in  the  Church,  I  applied  my  mind  to  the 
clerical  profession.  In  due  sequence  I  took  orders,  was 
ordained,  and  began  to  look  about  me  for  employment  I 
must  observe  that  I  had  taken  a  good  degree,  that  I  had 
succeeded  in  winning  a  good  fellowship,  and  that  my  means 
were  an:iple  for  my  retired  way  of  life.  By  this  time  I  had 
read  with  several  young  men^  and  the  occupation  increased 
my  income,  while  it  was  highly  interesting  to  me.  I  once 
accidentally  overheard  our  greatest  don  say  to  my  bound- 
less joy,  "  That  he  heard  it  reported  of  Silverman  that  his 
gift  of  quiet  explanation,  his  patience,  his  amiable  temper, 
and  his  conscientiousness  made  him  the  best  of  coaches." 
May  my  "  gift  of  quiet  explanation  "  come  more  seasonably 
and  powerfully  to  my  aid  in  this  present  explanation  than 
I  think  it  will ! 

It  may  be  in  a  certain  degree  owing  to  the  situation  of 
my  college-rooms  (in  a  corner  where  the  daylight  was  so- 
bered), but  it  is  in  a  much  larger  degree  referable  to  the 
state  of  my  own  mind,  that  I  seem  to  myself,  on  looking 
back  to  this  time  of  my  life,  to  have  been  always  in  the 
peaceful  shade.  I  can  see  others  in  the  sunlight;  I  can 
see  our  boats'  crews  and  our  athletic  young  men  on  the 
glistening  water,  or  speckled  with  the  moving  lights  of 
sunlit  leaves;  but  I  myself  am  always  in  the  shadow  look- 
ing on.  Not  unsympathetically, — God  forbid ! — but  look- 
ing on  alone,  much  as  I  looked  at  Sylvia  from  the  shadows 
of  the  ruined  house,  or  looked  at  the  red  gleam  shining 
through  the  farmer's  windows,  and  listened  to  the  fall  of 
dancing  feet,  when  all  the  ruin  was  dark  that  night  in  the 
quadrangle. 

I  now  come  to  the  reason  of  my  quoting  that  laudation 
of  myself  above  given.  Without  such  reason,  to  repeat  it 
would  have  been  mere  boastfulness. 

Among  those  who  had  read  with  me  was  Mr.  Fareway, 
second  son  of  Lady  Fareway,  widow  of  Sir  Gaston  Fare- 
way,  baronet.  This  young  gentleman's  abilities  were 
much  above  the  average;  but  he  came  of  a  rich  family,  and 
was  idle  and  luxurious.  He  presented  himself  to  me  too 
late,  and  afterwards  came  to  me  too  irregularly,  to  admit 
of  my  being  of  much  service  to  him.  In  the  end,  I  con- 
sidered it  my  duty  to  dissuade  him  from  going  up  for  an 


GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION.  19 

examination  which  he  could  never  pass;  and  he  left  college 
without  a  degree.  After  his  departure,  Lady  Fareway 
wrote  to  me,  representing  the  justice  of  my  returning  half 
of  my  fee,  as  I  had  been  of  so  little  use  to  her  son.  With- 
in my  knowledge  a  similar  demand  had  not  been  made  in 
any  other  case;  and  I  most  freely  admit  that  the  justice  of 
it  had  not  occurred  to  me  until  it  was  pointed  out.  But  I 
at  once  perceived  it,  yielded  to  it,  and  returned  the  money. 

Mr.  Fareway  had  been  gone  two  years  or  more,  and  I 
had  forgotten  him,  when  he  one  day  walked  into  my  rooms 
as  I  was  sitting  at  my  books. 

Said  he,  after  the  usual  salutations  had  passed,  "Mr. 
Silverman,  my  mother  is  in  town  here,  at  the  hotel,  and 
wishes  me  to  present  you  to  her." 

I  was  not  comfortable  with  strangers,  and  I  dare  say  I 
betrayed  that  I  was  a  little  nervous  or  unwilling.  "For," 
said  he,  without  my  having  spoken,  "  I  think  the  interview 
may  tend  to  the  advancement  of  your  prospects." 

It  put  me  to  the  blush  to  think  that  I  should  be  tempted 
by  a  worldly  reason,  and  I  rose  immediately. 

Said  Mr.  Fareway,  as  we  went  along,  "  Are  you  a  good 
nand  at  business?  " 

"I  think  not,"  said  I. 

Said  Mr.  Fareway  then,  '*My  mother  is." 

"Traly?"saidl. 

"  Yes :  my  mother  is  what  is  usually  called  a  managing 
woman.  Doesn't  make  a  bad  thing,  for  instance,  even  out 
of  the  spendthrift  habits  of  my  eldest  brother  abroad.  In 
short,  a  managing  woman.     This  is  in  confidence." 

He  had  never  spoken  to  me  in  confidence,  and  I  was  sur- 
prised by  his  doing  so.  I  said  I  should  respect  his  con- 
fidence, of  course,  and  said  no  more  on  the  delicate  sub- 
ject. We  had  but  a  little  way  to  walk,  and  I  was  soon  in 
his  mother's  company.  He  presented  me,^  shook  hands 
with  me,  and  left  us  two  (as  he  said)  to  business. 

I  saw  in  my  Lady  Fareway  a  handsome,  well-preserved 
lady  of  somewhat  large  stature,  with  a  steady  glare  in  her 
great  round  dark  eyes  that  embarrassed  me. 

Said  my  lady,  "I  have  heard  from  my  son,  Mr.  Silver- 
man, that  you  would  be  glad  of  some  preferment  in  the 
Church." 

I  gave  my  lady  to  understand  that  was  so 

**  I  don't  know  whether  you  are  aware,"  my  lady  pro- 


20  GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION. 

ceeded,  "  that  we  have  a  presentation  to  a  living?  I  say 
we  have;  but,  in  point  of  face,  1  have." 

I  gave  my  lady  to  understand  that  I  had  not  been  aware 
of  this. 

Said  my  lady,  "  So  it  is :  indeed  I  have  two  presenta- 
tions,— one  to  two  hundred  a  year,  one  to  six.  Both  liv- 
ings are  in  our  county, — North  Devonshire, — as  you  proba- 
bly know.     The  first  is  vacant.     Would  you  like  it?  " 

What  with  my  lady's  eyes,  and  what  with  the  sudden- 
ness of  this  proposed  gift,  I  was  much  confused. 

"  I  am  sorry  it  is  not  the  larger  presentation,"  said  my 
lady,  rather  coldly;  "though  I  will  not,  Mr.  Silverman, 
pay  you  the  bad  compliment  of  supposing  that  you  are,  be- 
cause that  would  be  mercenary, — and  mercenary  I  am  per- 
suaded you  are  not." 

Said  I,  with  my  utmost  earnestness,  "  Thank  you,  Lady 
Fareway,  thank  you,  thank  you !  I  should  be  deeply  hurt 
if  I  thought  I  bore  the  character." 

"Naturally,"  said  my  lady.  "Always  detestable,  but 
particularly  in  a  clergyman.  You  have  not  said  whether 
you  will  like  the  living?  " 

With  apologies  for  my  remissness  or  indistinctness,  I 
assured  my  lady  that  I  accepted  it  most  readily  and  grate- 
fully. I  added  that  I  hoped  she  would  not  estimate  my 
appreciation  of  the  generosity  of  her  choice  by  my  flow  of 
words;  for  I  was  not  a  ready  man  in  that  respect  when 
taken  by  surprise  or  touched  at  heart. 

"The  affair  is  concluded,"  said  my  lady;  "concluded. 
You  will  find  the  duties  very  light,  Mr.  Silverman.  Charm- 
ing house,  charming  little  garden,  orchard,  and  all  that. 
You  will  be  able  to  take  pupils.  By-the-by !  No:  I  will 
return  to  the  word  afterwards.  What  was  I  going  to  men- 
tion when  it  put  me  out?  " 

My  lady  stared  at  me,  as  if  I  knew.  And  I  didn't 
know.     And  that  perplexed  me  afresh. 

Said  my  lady,  after  some  consideration,  "0,  of  course, 
how  very  dull  of  me !  The  last  encumbent, — least  mercen- 
ary man  I  ever  saw, — in  consideration  of  the  duties  being 
so  light  and  the  house  so  delicious,  couldn't  rest,  he  said, 
unless  I  permitted  him  to  help  me  with  my  correspondence, 
accounts,  and  various  little  things  of  that  kind;  nothing  in 
themselves,  but  which  it  worries  a  lady  to  cope  with. 
Would  Mr.  Silverman  also  like  to?— Or  shall  I?  "— 


GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION.  21 

I  hastened  to  say  that  my  poor  help  would  be  always  at 
her  ladyship's  service. 

"  I  am  absolutely  blessed,"  said  my  lady,  casting  up  her 
eyes  (and  so  taking  them  off  of  me  for  one  moment),  "  in 
having  to  do  with  gentlemen  who  cannot  endure  an  approach 
to  the  idea  of  being  mercenary ! "  She  shivered  at  the 
word.     "And  now  as  to  the  pupil." 

"  The?  " — I  was  quite  at  a  loss. 

"  Mr.  Silverman,  you  have  no  idea  what  she  is.  She  is,*' 
said  my  lady,  laying  her  touch  upon  my  coat-sleeve,  "  I  do 
verily  believe,  the  most  extraordinary  girl  in  this  world. 
Already  knows  more  Greek  and  Latin  than  Lady  Jane 
Grey.  And  taught  herself !  Has  not  yet,  remember,  de- 
rived a  moment's  advantage  from  Mr.  Silverman's  classical 
acquirements.  To  say  nothing  of  mathematics,  which  she 
is  bent  upon  becoming  versed  in,  and  in  which  (as  I  hear 
from  my  son  and  others)  Mr=  Silverman's  reputation  is  so 
deservedly  high ! " 

Under  my  lady's  eyes  I  must  have  lost  the  clew,  I  felt 
persuaded;  and  yet  I  did  not  know  where  I  could  have 
dropped  it. 

"  Adelina,"  said  my  lady,  "is  my  only  daughter.  If  I 
did  not  feel  quite  convinced  that  I  am  not  blinded  by  a 
mother's  partiality;  unless  I  was  absolutely  sure  that  when 
you  know  her,  Mr.  Silverman,  you  will  esteem  it  a  high 
and  unusual  privilege  to  direct  her  studies, — I  should  intro- 
duce a  mercenary  element  into  this  conversation,  and  ask 
you  on  what  terms  " — 

I  entreated  my  lady  to  go  no  further.  My  lady  saw  that 
I  was  troubled,  and  did  me  the  honour  to  comply  with  my 
request. 

EIGHTH  CHAPTER. 

Everything  in  mental  acquisition  that  her  brother  might 
have  been,  if  he  would,  and  everything  in  all  gracious 
charms  and  admirable  qualities  that  no  one  but  herself 
could  be, — this  was  Adelina. 

I  will  not  expatiate  upon  her  beauty:  I  will  not  expati- 
ate upon  her  intelligence,  her  quickness  of  perception,  her 
powers  of  memory,  her  sweet  consideration,  from  the  first 
moment,  for  the  slow-paced  tutor  who  ministered  to  her 
wonderful  gifts.     I  was  thirty  then;  I  am  over  sixty  now : 


22  GEORGE  SILVERMAN  S  EXPI.ANATION. 

she  is  ever  present  to  me  in  these  hours  as  ^he  was  in 
those,  bright  and  beautiful  and  young,  wise  and  fanciful 
and  good. 

When  I  discovered  that  I  loved  her,  how  can  I  say?  In 
the  first  day?  in  the  first  week?  in  the  first  month?  Im  ■ 
possible  to  trace.  If  I  be  (as  I  am)  unable  to  represent  to 
myself  any  previous  period  of  my  life  as  quite  separable 
from  her  attracting  power,  how  can  1  answer  for  this  one 
detail? 

Whensoever  I  made  the  discovery,  it  laid  a  heavy  burden 
on  me.  And  yet,  comparing  it  with  the  far  heavier  burden 
that  I  afterwards  took  up,  it  does  not  seem  to  me  now  to 
have  been  very  hard  to  bear.  In  the  knowledge  that  I  did 
love  her,  and  that  I  should  love  her  while  my  life  lasted, 
and  that  I  was  ever  to  hide  my  secret  deep  in  my  own 
breast,  and  she  was  never  to  find  it,  there  was  a  kind  of 
sustaining  joy  or  pride,  or  comfort,  mingled  with  my 
pain. 

But  later  on, — say,  a  year  later  on, — when  I  made 
another  discovery,  then  indeed  my  suffering  and  my  strug- 
gle were  strong.     That  other  discovery  was — 

These  words  will  never  see  the  light,  if  ever,  until  my 
heart  is  dust;  until  her  bright  spirit  has  returned  to  the 
regions  of  wliicli,  when  imprisoned  here,  it  surely  retained 
some  unusual  glimpse  of  remembrance;  until  all  the  pulses 
that  ever  beat  around  us  shall  have  long  been  quiet;  until 
all  the  fruits  of  all  the  tiny  victories  and  defeats  achieved 
in  our  little  breasts  shall  have  withered  away.  That  dis- 
covery was  that  she  loved  me. 

She  may  have  enhanced  my  knowledge,  and  loved  me 
for  that;  she  may  have  overvalued  my  discharge  of  duty 
to  her,  and  loved  me  for  that;  she  may  have  refined  upon 
a  playful  compassion  which  she  would  sometimes  show  for 
what  she  called  my  want  of  wisdom,  according  to  tlie  light 
of  the  world's  dark  lanterns,  and  loved  me  for  that;  she 
may — she  must — have  confused  the  borrowed  light  of  what 
I  had  only  learned,  with  its  brightness  in  its  pure,  original 
rays;  but  she  loved  ma  at  that  time,  and  she  made  me 
know  it. 

Pride  of  family  and  pride  of  wealth  put  me  as  far  off 
from  her  in  my  lady's  eyes  as  if  I  had  been  some  domesti- 
cated creature  of  another  kind.  But  they  could  not  put 
me  farther  from  her  than  I  put  myself  when  I  set  my 


GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION.  23 

merits  against  hers.  More  than  that.  They  could  not  put 
me,  by  millions  of  fathoms,  half  so  low  beneath  her  as  I 
put  myself  when  in  imagination  I  took  advantage  of  her 
noble  trustfulness,  took  the  fortune  that  I  knew  she  must 
possess  in  her  own  right,  and  left  her  to  find  herself,  in 
the  zenith  of  her  beauty  and  genius,  bound  to  poor  rusty, 
plodding  me. 

No!  Worldliness  should  not  enter  here,  at  any  cost. 
If  I  had  tried  to  keep  it  out  of  other  ground,  how  much 
harder  was  I  bound  to  try  to  keep  it  from  this  sacred 
place ! 

But  there  was  something  daring  in  her  broad,  generous 
character,  that  demanded  at  so  delicate  a  crisis  to  be  deli- 
cately and  patiently  addressed.  After  many  and  many  a 
bitter  night  (0,  I  found  I  could  ciy  for  reasons  not  purely 
physical,  at  this  pass  of  my  life!)  I  took  my  course. 

My  lady  had,  in  our  first  interview,  unconsciously  over- 
stated the  accommodation  of  my  pretty  hou?e.  There  was 
room  in  it  for  only  one  pupil.  He  was  a  young  gentleman 
near  coming  of  age,  very  well  connected,  but  what  is  called 
a  poor  relation.  His  parents  were  dead.  The  charges  of 
his  living  and  reading  with  me  were  defrayed  by  an  uncle; 
and  he  and  I  were  to  do  our  utmost  together  for  three 
years  towards  qualifying  him  to  make  his  way.  At  this 
time  he  had  entered  into  his  second  year  with  me.  He  was 
well-looking,  clever,  energetic,  enthusiastic,  bold;  in  the 
best  sense  of  the  term,  a  thorough  young  Anglo-Saxon. 

I  resolved  to  bring  these  two  together. 


NINTH  CHAPTER 

Said  I,  one  night,  when  I  had  conquered  myself,  "  Mr. 
Granville," — Mr.  Granville  Wharton  his  name  was, — "I 
doubt  if  you  have  ever  yet  so  much  as  seen  Miss  Fare- 
way." 

*'  Well,  sir,"  returned  he,  laughing,  "you  see  her  so 
much  yourself,  that  you  hardly  leave  another  fellow  a 
chance  of  seeing  her." 

"I  am  her  tutor,  you  know,''  said  I. 

And  there  the  subject  dropped  for  that  time.  But  I  sc 
contrived  as  that  they  should  come  together  shortly  after- 
wards.    I  had  previously  so  contrived  as  to  keep  them 


24  GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION. 

asunder;  for  while  I  loved  her, — I  mean  before  I  had  de- 
termined on  my  sacrifice, — a  lurking  jealousy  of  Mr.  Gran- 
ville lay  within  my  unworthy  breast. 

It  was  quite  an  ordinary  interview  in  the  Fare  way  Park; 
but  they  talked  easily  together  for  some  time :  like  takes 
to  like,  and  they  had  many  points  of  resemblance.  Said 
Mr.  Granville  to  me,  when  he  and  I  sat  at  our  supper  that 
night,  "Miss  Fareway  is  remarkably  beautiful,  sir,  re- 
markably engaging.  Don't  you  think  so?  " — "  I  think  so," 
said  I.  And  I  stole  a  glance  at  him,  and  saw  that  he  had 
reddened  and  was  thoughtful.  I  remember  it  most  vividly, 
because  the  mixed  feeling  of  grave  pleasure  and  acute  pain 
that  the  slight  circumstance  caused  me  was  the  first  of  a 
long,  long  series  of  such  mixed  impressions  under  which 
my  hair  turned  slowly  grey. 

I  had  not  much  need  to  feign  to  be  subdued;  but  I  coun- 
terfeited to  be  older  than  I  was  in  all  respects  (Heaven 
knows !  my  heart  being  all  too  young  the  while),  and  feign 
to  be  more  of  a  recluse  and  bookworm  than  I  had  really 
become,  and  gradually  set  up  more  and  more  of  a  fatherly 
manner  towards  Adeliua.  Likewise  I  made  my  tuition 
less  imaginative  than  before;  separated  myself  from  my 
poets  and  philosophers;  was  careful  to  present  them  in 
their  own  light,  and  me,  their  lowly  servant,  in  my  own 
shade.  Moreover,  in  the  matter  of  apparel  I  was  equally 
mindful:  not  that  I  had  ever  been  dapper  that  way;  but 
that  I  was  slovenly  now. 

As  I  depressed  myself  with  one  hand,  so  did  I  labour  to 
raise  Mr.  Granville  with  the  other;  directing  his  attention 
to  such  subjects  as  I  too  well  knew  most  interested  her, 
and  fashioning  him  (do  not  deride  or  misconstrue  the  ex- 
pression, unknown  reader  of  this  writing;  for  I  have  suf- 
fered!) into  a  greater  resemblance  to  myself  in  my  solitary 
one  strong  aspect.  And  gradually,  gradually,  as  I  saw 
him  take  more  and  more  to  these  thrown-out  lures  of  mine, 
then  did  I  come  to  know  better  and  better  that  love  was 
drawing  him  on,  and  was  drawing  her  from  me. 

So  passed  more  than  another  year;  every  day  a  year  in 
its  number  of  my  mixed  impressions  of  grave  pleasure  and 
acute  pain;  and  then  these  two,  being  of  age  and  free  to 
act  legally  for  themselves,  came  before  me  hand  in  hand 
(my  hair  being  now  quite  white),  and  entreated  me  that  I 
would  unite  them  together.     "And  indeed,  dear  tutor,'* 


GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION.  26 

said  Adelina,  "  it  is  but  consistent  in  you  that  you  should 
do  this  thing  for  us,  seeing  that  we  should  never  have 
spoken  together  that  first  time  but  for  you,  and  that  but 
for  you  we  could  never  have  met  so  often  afterwards." 
The  whole  of  which  was  literally  true;  for  I  had  availed 
myself  of  my  inany  business  attendances  on,  and  confer- 
ences with,  my  lady,  to  take  Mr.  Granville  to  the  house, 
and  leave  him  in  the  outer  room  with  Adelina. 

I  knew  that  my  lady  would  object  to  such  a  marriage  for 
her  daughter,  or  to  any  marriage  that  was  other  than  an 
exchange  of  her  for  stipulated  lands,  goods,  and  moneys. 
But  looking  on  the  two,  and  seeing  with  full  eyes  that  they 
were  both  young  and  beautiful;  and  knowing  that  they 
were  alike  in  the  tastes  and  acquirements  that  will  outlive 
youth  and  beauty;  and  considering  that  Adelina  had  a 
fortune  now,  in  her  own  keeping;  and  considering  further 
that  Mr,  Granville,  though  for  the  present  poor,  was  of  a 
good  family  that  had  never  lived  in  a  cellar  in  Preston; 
and  believing  that  their  love  would  endure,  neither  having 
any  great  discrepancy  to  find  out  in  the  other, — I  told  them 
of  my  readiness  to  do  this  thing  which  Adelina  asked 
of  her  dear  tutor,  and  to  send  them  forth,  husband  and 
wife,  into  the  shining  world  with  golden  gates  that  awaited 
them. 

It  was  on  a  summer  morning  that  I  rose  before  the  sun 
to  compose  myself  for  the  crowning  of  my  work  with  this 
end;  and  my  dwelling  being  near  to  the  sea,  I  walked 
down  to  the  rocks  on  the  shore,  in  order  that  I  might  be- 
hold the  sun  rise  in  his  majesty. 

The  tranquillity  upon  the  deep,  and  on  the  firmament, 
the  orderly  withdrawal  of  the  stars,  the  calm  promise  of 
coming  day,  the  rosy  suffusion  of  the  sky  and  waters,  the 
ineffable  splendour  that  then  burst  forth,  attuned  my  mind 
afresh  aft«r  the  discords  of  the  night.  Methought  that  all 
I  looked  on  said  to  me,  and  that  all  I  heard  in  the  sea  and 
in  the  air  said  to  me,  "Be  comforted,  mortal,  that  thy 
life  is  so  short.  Our  preparation  for  what  is  to  follow  has 
endured,  and  shall  endure,  for  unimaginable  ages." 

I  married  them.  I  knew  that  my  hand  was  cold  when  I 
placed  it  on  their  hands  clasped  together;  but  the  words 
with  which  I  had  to  accompany  the  action  I  could  say 
without  faltering,  and  I  was  at  peace. 

They  being  well  away  from  my  house  and  from  the  place 


26  GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION. 

after  our  simple  breakfast,  the  time  was  come  when  I  must 
do  what  I  had  pledged  myself  to  them  that  I  would  do, — 
break  the  intelligence  to  my  lady. 

I  went  up  to  the  house,  and  found  my  lady  in  her  ordi- 
nary business-room.  She  happened  to  have  an  unusual 
amount  of  commissions  to  intrust  to  me  thkt  day;  and  she 
had  tilled  my  hands  with  papers  before  I  could  originate  a 
word. 

"My  lady,"  I  then  began,  as  I  stood  beside  her  table. 

"  Wh}"-,  what's  the  matter?  "  she  said  quickly,  looking  up. 

"Not  much,  I  would  fain  hope,  after  you  shall  have 
prepared  yourself,  and  considered  a  little." 

"Prepared  myself;  and  considered  a  little!  You  ap- 
pear to  have  prepared  i/ourneM  but  indifferently,  anyhow, 
Mr.  Silverman."  This  mighty  scornfully,  as  I  experienced 
my  usual  embarrassment  under  her  stare. 

Said  I,  in  self-extenuation  once  for  all,  "Lady  Fareway, 
I  have  but  to  say  for  myself  that  I  have  tried  to  do  my 
duty." 

"For  yourself ?"  repeated  my  lady.  "Then  there  are 
others  concerned,  I  see.      Who  are  they?" 

I  was  about  to  answer,  when  she  made  towards  the  bell 
with  a  dart  that  stopped  me,  and  said,  "  VVhy,  where  is 
Adelina?  " 

"  Forbear!  be  calm,  my  lady.  I  married  her  this  morn- 
ing to  Mr.  Granville  Wharton." 

She  set  her  lips,  looked  more  intently  at  me  than  ever, 
x-aised  her  right  hand,  and  smote  me  hard  upon  the 
cheek. 

"  Give  me  back  those  papers !  give  me  back  those  papers," 
She  tore  them  out  of  my  hands,  and  tossed  them  on  her 
table.  Then  seating  herself  defiantly  in  her  great  chair, 
and  folding  her  arms,  she  stabbed  me  to  the  heart  with  the 
unlooked-for  reproach,  "  You  worldly  wretch  1 " 

"W\n-ldly?"  I  cried.     "Worldly?" 

"This,  if  you  please," — she  went  on  with  supreme  scorn, 
pointing  me  out  as  if  there  were  some  one  there  to  see, — 
"tliis,  if  you  please,  is  the  disinterested  scholar,  with  not 
a  design  beyond  his  books!  This,  if  you  please,  is  the 
simple  creature  whom  any  one  could  overreach  in  a  bargain ! 
This,  if  you  please,  is  Mr.  Silverman!  Not  of  this  world; 
not  be !  He  has  too  much  simplicity  for  this  world's  cun- 
ning.    He  has  too  much  singleness  of  purpose  to  be  a  match 


GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION.  27 

for  this  world's  double-dealing.  What  did  he  give  you 
for  it?  » 

«  For  what?     And  who?  " 

"How  much,"  she  asked,  bending  forward  in  her  great 
chair,  and  insultingly  tapping  the  fingers  of  her  right  hand 
on  the  palm  of  her  left, — how  much  does  Mr.  Granville 
Wharton  pay  you  for  getting  him  Adelina's  money?  What 
is  the  amount  of  your  percentage  upon  Adelina's  fortune? 
What  were  the  terms  of  the  agreement  that  you  proposed 
to  this  boy  when  you,  the  Kev.  George  Silverman,  licensed 
to  marry,  engaged  to  put  him  in  possession  of  the  girl? 
You  made  good  terms  for  yourself,  whatever  they  were. 
He  would  stand  a  poor  chance  against  your  keenness." 

Bewildered,  horrified,  stunned  by  this  cruel  perversion, 
I  could  not  speak.  But  I  trust  that  I  looked  innocent, 
being  so. 

"Listen  to  me,  shrewd  hypocrite,"  said  my  lady,  whose 
anger  increased  as  she  gave  it  utterance;  "attend  to  my 
words,  you  cunning  schemer,  who  have  carried  this  plot 
through  with  such  a  practised  double  face  that  I  have  never 
suspected  you.  I  had  my  projects  for  my  daughter;  pro- 
jects for  family  connection;  projects  for  fortune.  You 
have  thwarted  them,  and  overreached  me;  but  I  am  not 
one  to.be  thwarted  and  overreached  without  retaliation. 
Do  you  mean  to  hold  this  living  another  month?  " 

"Do  you  deem  it  possible.  Lady  Fareway,  that  I  can 
hold  it  another  hour,  under  your  injurious  words?  " 

"  Is  it  resigned,  then?  " 

"  It  was  mentally  resigned,  my  lady,  some  minutes  ago." 

"Don't  equivocate,  sir.     /s  it  resigned?" 

"Unconditionally  and  entirely;  and  I  would  that  I  had 
never,  never  come  near  it ! " 

"A  cordial  response  from  me  to  that  wish,  Mr,  Silver- 
man! But  take  this  with  you,  sir.  It  you  had  not  re- 
signed it,  I  would  have  had  you  deprived  of  it.  And 
though  you  have  resigned  it,  yoxt  will  not  get  quit  of  me 
as  easily  as  you  think  for.  1  will  puisne  j'ou  with  this 
story.  I  will  make  this  nefarious  conspiracy  of  yours,  for 
money,  known.  You  have  made  money  by  it,  but  you 
have  at  the  same  time  made  an  enemy  by  it.  You  will 
take  good  care  that  the  money  sticks  to  you;  I  will  take 
good  care  that  the  enemy  sticks  to  you." 

Then  said  1  finally,  "  Lady  Fareway,  1  think  my  heart 


28  GEORGE  SILVERMAN'S  EXPLANATION. 

is  broken.  Until  I  came  into  this  room  just  now,  the  pos- 
sibility of  such  mean  wickedness  as  you  have  imputed  to 
me  never  dawned  upon  my  thoughts.     Your  suspicions  " — 

"  Suspicions !  Pah !  "  said  she  indignantly.  "  Certain- 
ties." 

"  Your  certainties,  my  lady,  as  you  call  them,  your  suspi 
cions  as  I  call  them,  are  cruel,  unjust,  wholly  devoid  of 
foundation  in  fact.  I  can  declare  no  more;  except  that  I 
have  not  acted  for  my  own  profit  or  my  own  pleasure.  I 
have  not  in  this  proceeding  considered  myself.  Once  again, 
I  think  my  heart  is  broken.  If  I  have  unwittingly  done 
any  wrong  with  a  righteous  motive,  that  is  some  penalty 
to  pay." 

She  received  this  with  another  and  a  more  indignant 
"Pah! "  and  I  made  my  way  out  of  her  room  (I  think  I 
felt  iny  way  out  with  my  hands,  although  my  eyes  were 
open),  almost  suspecting  that  my  voice  had  a  repulsive 
sound,  and  that  I  was  a  repulsive  object. 

There  was  a  great  stir  made,  the  bishop  was  appealed  to, 
I  received  a  severe  reprimand,  and  narrowly  escaped 
suspension.  Por  years  a  cloud  hung  over  me,  and  my 
name  was  tarnished.  But  my  heart  did  not  break,  if  a 
broken  heart  involves  death;  for  I  lived  through  it. 

They  stood  by  me,  Adelina  and  her  husband,  through  it 
all.  Those  who  had  known  me  at  college,  and  even  most 
of  those  who  had  only  known  me  there  by  reputation,  stood 
by  me  too.  Little  by  little,  the  belief  widened  that  I  was 
not  capable  of  what  was  laid  to  my  charge.  At  length  I 
was  presented  to  a  college-living  in  a  sequestered  place, 
and  there  I  now  pen  my  explanation.  I  pen  it  at  my  open 
window  in  the  summer-time,  before  me,  lying  in  the  church- 
yard, equal  resting-place  for  sound  hearts,  wounded  hearts, 
and  broken  hearts.  I  pen  it  for  the  relief  of  my  own  mind, 
not  foreseeing  whether  or  no  it  will  ever  have  a  reader. 


! 


^xoc^^ 


University  of  California 

SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 

305  De  Neve  Drive  -  Parking  Lot  17  •  Box  951388 

LOS  ANGELES,  CALIFORNIA  90095-1388 

Return  this  material  to  the  library  from  which  it  was  borrowed. 


UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


A     000  779  003     3 


